Research
Harry Adkins-Pennington

Existing Product-Mario
• Pixel art platformer
• Shot from the right hand side of main character
• Contact with non-important enemy=death
• Timer counts down
• Game score increasing with different tasks
• Bright and colourful backgrounds and characters
• Smooth animation
Super Mario Bros. is a platform video game developed and published by Nintendo. The
successor to the 1983 arcade game, Mario Bros., it was released in Japan in 1985 for
the Famicom, and in North America and Europe for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in
1985 and 1987 respectively. Players control Mario, or his brother Luigi in the multiplayer mode,
as they travel the Mushroom Kingdom to rescue Princess Toadstool from the antagonist, Bowser.
They must traverse side-scrolling stages while avoiding hazards such as enemies and pits with
the aid of power-ups such as the Super Mushroom, Fire Flower and Starman.
Super Mario Bros. is frequently cited as one of the greatest video games of all time, with praise
going towards its precise controls. It has sold over 40 million physical copies, also making it one
of the bestselling games of all time. It is credited alongside the NES as one of the key factors in
reviving the video game industry after the 1983 crash, and helped popularize side-scrolling
platform games. It began an expansive franchise including a long-running game series,
an animated television series, and a feature film (which was god awful). Ports and remakes of
the game have been released for most of Nintendo's future systems. Alongside Mario
himself, Super Mario Bros. has become a prominent aspect of popular culture.

Gameplay
In Super Mario Bros., the player takes on the role of Mario, the protagonist of the series. Mario's younger brother, Luigi, is controlled by the
second player in the game's multiplayer mode and assumes the same plot role and functionality as Mario. The objective is to race through the
Mushroom Kingdom, survive the main antagonist Bowser's forces, and save Princess Toadstool. The game is a side-scrolling platformer; the player
moves from the left side of the screen to the right side in order to reach the flag pole at the end of each level.
The game world features coins scattered around for Mario to collect and special bricks marked with a question mark (?), which when hit from
below by Mario may reveal more coins or a special item. Other "secret", often invisible, bricks may contain more coins or rare items. If the player
gains a Super Mushroom, Mario grows to double his size and gains the ability to break bricks above him. If Mario gets hit in this mode, then
instead of dying he turns back to regular Mario. Players start with a certain number of lives and may gain additional lives by picking up green
spotted orange 1-Up mushrooms hidden in bricks, or by collecting 100 coins, defeating several enemies in a row with a Koopa shell, or bouncing
on enemies successively without touching the ground also rewards an extra life. Mario loses a life if he takes damage while small, falls in a
bottomless pit, or runs out of time. The game ends when the player runs out of lives.
Audience Appeal
Super Mario Bros. was immensely successful and helped popularize side-scrolling platform games. Altogether, excluding ports and rereleases, the
original NES version of the game has sold 40.24 million copies, making it the bestselling video game in the Mario series and one of the bestselling
video games of all time, with 29 million copies sold in North America. The game was the all-time bestselling game for over 20 years until its
lifetime sales were ultimately surpassed by Wii Sports. The game's Wii Virtual Console release was also successful, becoming the #1 selling game
out of the service's line-up of games by mid-2007.
Development
Super Mario Bros., the successor to the 1983 arcade title Mario Bros., was designed by Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka, both of whom
belonged to Nintendo's Creative Department, and largely programmed by Toshihiko Nakago of SRD Company, Ltd. Though not originally using any
particular character, the very deliberate creative process of what would become their next game was motivated by their technical knowledge
from previous games such as Excitebike, Devil World and Kung Fu, by a desire to give the ROM cartridge format "a final exclamation point" in light
of the forthcoming Famicom Disk System which was expected to become the dominant new game delivery medium, and by continuing their
legacy of "athletic games" with a character running and jumping with many obstacles.

Existing Product-Sonic.exe
• Pixel art platformer
• Timer counting down
• Invincible demon chases the player when the timer runs out, resulting in death
• Dark but colourful backgrounds
X, better known as Sonic.exe, is the titular main antagonistof the Creepy pasta of
the same name and its sequel "Sonic.exe/Round 2". Sonic.exe is an inter-
dimensional energy-based entity that possesses a CD-ROM of the original Sonic the
Hedgehog, taking on the form of the titular main character. Then, he proceeds to
"kill" the in-game characters before attacking and removing the soul/killing the
person playing his game.
Sonic.exe was created by J.C. the Hyena, who was inspired by the works of H.P.
Lovecraft and Stephen King.
I chose this because I plan on implementing the idea of Sonic.exe chasing the player
to my own video gameproject by having Sonic.exe catch and kill the player when the
timer reaches 0, using the sonic the hedgehog drowning music for the last few
seconds in order to give a sense of rush and urgency to the player

Gameplay
Sonic.exe plays a major role in the PC/computer/indie game adaption as the titular main antagonist. First the player plays
as Tails, and then he will go to "HILL", progressing through the level. The player will soon find dead animals on the ground
and in the palm trees. Eventually, Sonic.exe can be seen hiding in one of the trees along with Tails running, then, out of
nowhere, Sonic.exe can be seen just standing there as Tails wonders. When Tails gets close to him, static/buzzing sounds
can be heard/seen.
The scene later cuts to a level named "HIDE AND SEEK", where Tails is crying while running in a burning Angel Island Zone.
Suddenly, Sonic.exe appears and the fox tries to run, but cries when he gets caught, and then Sonic.exe appears and kills
him with just one claw. Right after Tails became Sonic.exe's victim, Knuckles takes the place as a player and runs into Scrap
Brain Zone entitled "YOU CANT RUN". Again a static effect will appear and blood will appear under the ground. The sky is a
hellish shade of red.
Sonic.exe teleports in front of Knuckles with the text "FOUND YOU" and Knuckles is forced to fight Sonic.exe as Sonic.exe
teleports left and right with black smoke surrounding him. Unable to land a punch, Knuckles cries just before Sonic.exe kills
him, just like he did with Tails. The last character is Dr. Robotnik; the player spawns in Marble Zone, now labelled as "...".
The background resembles a castle, with bloody walls and ghostly blue flames. Robotnik will run down the stairs as the
background changes erratically before Sonic.exe kills him. Suddenly a screen will appear with Sonic.exe's face,
accompanied with the text "I AM GOD".
The game over screen depicts Green Hill Zone in hellish flames, with Sonic.exe running past the mutilated corpses of his
victims. Knuckles’s innards resemble bungee cords, with Tails and Robotnik decapitated. Attempting to escape will result in
the screen flashing an image of Sonic.exe grinning evilly with his head tilted; “I AM GOD” appearing several times in the
background. After the game over screen shows, the screen will switch to a picture of Japanese text with Sonic.exe in the
background. Demonic-sounding music is heard throughout.

Story
The original Sonic.exe story centers on Tom, a young man who was a big fan of Sonic the Hedgehog,especially the older games. He
claimed that he had not played any glitched or hacked games before, though he admitted that he did not want to after an experience
he had.
He then proceeded to recount his experience, saying how he received a CD and an accompanyingletter from his friend Kyle, begging
him to destroy the disc before it's "too late" and not to never play the game.
Ignoring his friend's warnings, Tom played the game and began to encounter odd, somewhat disturbing phenomena, from a title card
featuring an evil-looking Sonic with bloody eyes and glowing pupils with a wide smile to the presence of a file select screen similar to
that of the one in Sonic the Hedgehog 3, with a red backgroundand chilling music playing.
As he picked the only available character,Tails and began the first stage, titled "HILL ACT 1", Tom continued to find more evidence that
there was something wrong with the game, namely the copious amounts of dead animals, all murdered in gruesome ways and
eventually encountering Sonic at the end of the level, standing completely still and with his eyes closed.
When Tails attemptedto get his attentionduring a cutscene by tapping him on the shoulder, Sonic's eyes opened, identical to the evil
Sonic on the title screen before cuttingto black, with the message "Hello. Do you want to play with me?" In the next level, "HIDE AND
SEEK", Tom witnessed Sonic chasing Tails, the latter flying despite an inability to do so without a Super form, before disappearing,
teleporting in front of the distraughtfoxand killing him and cutting to black. Tails screams as his throatis slit; a splash of blood is seen
coming from his neck.
Shocked, Tom reads the next message, "YOU'RE TOO SLOW.WANT TO TRY AGAIN?".After playing as Knuckles and losing a supposed
"boss battle" with Sonic, with Knuckles dying the same way as Tails, Tom decided to take a break from the game.
However, his rest was plagued by nightmares featuring the corruptedTails and Knuckles, and the demonic Sonic, with him waking in a
cold sweat. Returning to the game, Tom picked Doctor Robotnik from the file select screen and continued with the game.
At the end of the level, Sonic teleported in front of Robotnik, before the screen cut to red static.Then, a "hyper-realistic" image of Sonic
appeared on the screen, with the words "I AM GOD!". This Sonic had bleeding black and red eyes, a very wide grin, and sharp
bloodstained teeth. After the game ended, Tom turned around to find, to his utter horror,a bloodied Sonic plush doll on his bed. Tom's
fate is ambiguous (thoughthe official sequel reveals that Tom committed suicide to escape from the entity using Sonic's likeness). Kyle
was likely Exe's previous victim.

Existing Product-Final Fantasy 7
• Turn based RPG battles
• Interesting story
• Inspirationon how RPG battles work
• Ideas for the UI during RPG fights
Final Fantasy VII is a 1997 role-playing video game developed by Square for the PlayStation console. It is the seventh main instalment in the Final
Fantasy series. Published in Japan by Square, it was released in other regions by Sony Computer Entertainment and became the first in the main
series to see a PAL release. The game's story follows Cloud Strife, a mercenary who joins an eco-terrorist organization to stop a world-
controlling megacorporation from using the planet's life essence as an energy source. Events send Cloud and his allies in pursuit of Sephiroth, a
superhuman intent on destroying their planet. During the journey, Cloud builds close friendships with his party members, including Aerith
Gainsborough, who holds the secret to saving their world.
I chose this game for my research because I plan on using this style of fighting for the important moments of my game
Gameplay
The gameplay of Final Fantasy VII is mostly comparable to earlier Final Fantasy titles
and Japanese role-playing games. The game features three modes of play: the world map, the
field, and the battle screen. At its grandest scale, players explore the entire world of Final Fantasy
VII on a 3D world map. The world map is littered with representations of areas for the player to
enter, including towns, environments, and ruins. Natural barriers—such as mountains, deserts,
and bodies of water—block access by foot to some areas; as the game progresses, the player
receives vehicles that help traverse these obstacles. Chocobos can be found in certain spots on
the map, and if caught, can be ridden to areas inaccessible by foot or vehicle. In field mode, the
player navigates fully scaled versions of the areas represented on the world map.
At random intervals on the world map and in field mode, and at specific moments in the story,
the game will enter the battle screen. This screen places the player characters on one side, the
enemies on the other, and employs an "Active Time Battle" (ATB) system in which the characters
exchange moves until one side is defeated. The damage (or healing) dealt by either side
is quantified on screen. Characters have many statistics that determine their effectiveness in
battle; for example, hit points determine how much damage they can take, and magic
determines how much damage they can inflict with spells.

Existing Product-Mega Man
Mega Man, also known as Rockman in Japan, is a 1987 action-platform video game developed and publishedby Capcom for
the NintendoEntertainmentSystem (NES). It was directed by Akira Kitamura, with NobuyukiMatsushimaas lead programmer,
and is the first game of the Mega Man franchise and the original video game series. Mega Man was produced by a small team
specificallyfor the home console market, a first for Capcom, who previously focused on arcade titles.
I chose this game because I plan on using Mega Man as a canvasfor my main charactersbecause it is a unique style that will
allow me to create my charactersand their movement animations
• Action platformer
• Pixel art
• Easy to use and create art and animationstyle
• Bright and colourful backgroundsand platforms with different textures to look more realistic for the game's time
Gameplay
Mega Man consists of six side-scrolling platformer levelsfreely chosen by the player.In each
level, the player-character,Mega Man, fights through variousenemies and obstacles before
facing a "RobotMaster" boss at the level's end. Upon defeating the boss, the playerassimilates
the Robot Master's signature attack,or "Special Weapon", intoMega Man's arsenal for the rest
of the game. Unlike the standard Mega Buster (Rock Buster in Japan), the Robot Master powers
have limitedammunitionreplenished by collecting ammunitioncells droppedby defeated
enemies at random. Enemies also drop energy cells that replenish Mega Man's healthgauge.
While the playeris free to proceed through the game in any order, each RobotMaster is
especiallyvulnerableto a specific weapon, which encourages the player to complete certain
stages before others. The playercan also revisit cleared levels. Besides the weaponstaken from
the Robot Masters, the playeris able to pick up a platform generator item known as the
"Magnet Beam" in Elec Man's stage.

Research Analysis
What common features do the researched products have?
• All products will be part of my video game project in some way, either by using game
mechanics like Sonic.exe chasing the player and killing them or art styles like mega man.
• All products are video games so I know how my video game project is supposed to work
• Most of the game I had done research on are made with pixel art
• All the platforming video games are from the side point of view in 2D
What aspects of the research will you include within your own production work?
• Using Sonic.exe killing the player when the timer runs out as a way for the player to feel
rushed and afraid of failure and death
• The art animation style of mega man himself for my main characters designs and movement
• A similar style of RPG battles from Final Fantasy
• One hit=death from Mario and other 90s platforming video games

Audience Research

Secondary Audience ResearchObservation:
• More players play on more recent consoles from the early 2000s
• Most of the gamers on the table are male and between the ages of 18 and 34
What this says about my audience:
• Most of my audience would either be part of a family or serious gamers
How will your product appeal to this audience:
• The family can enjoy the bright and colourful images unless whoever is playing
the game is not very good in which case should probably be avoided by families
with little kids
Use this space to record any secondary audience research you might do. This is
finding out about the audience for existing products.
https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/dpoi8oo4yd/
YouGov%20video%20games%20consoles.pdf

Console
Gender Age
Male Female 18-24 25-34 35-44 45-54 55+
NES 14% 4% 5% 17% 22% 6% 2%
Sega Master System 12% 4% 3% 13% 22% 8% 2%
Sega Mega Drive 22% 12% 8% 32% 35% 18% 4%
SNES 17% 6% 7% 24% 27% 9% 2%
PS1 30% 15% 35% 46% 34% 21% 5%
Nintendo 64 18% 9% 13% 31% 24% 9% 3%
Sega Saturn 5% 1% 2% 8% 6% 3% 0%
Sega Dreamcast 9% 2% 6% 14% 10% 4% 1%

Console
Gender Age
Male Female 18-24 25-34 35-44 45-54 55+
PS2 32% 17% 50% 47% 33% 20% 6%
GameCube 13% 5% 18% 20% 12% 6% 1%
Xbox 22% 11% 27% 30% 24% 16% 5%
Xbox 360 27% 14% 46% 38% 28% 16% 4%
PS3 24% 11% 40% 34% 20% 16% 4%
Nintendo Wii 33% 31% 58% 47% 47% 33% 13%
PS4 23% 11% 38% 34% 21% 12% 4%
Xbox One 18% 10% 32% 25% 17% 11% 4%
Wii U 8% 6% 14% 12% 11% 6% 3%
Switch 6% 5% 9% 12% 7% 3% 1%

The table shows me that more males play games however with different, specific consoles like
the Nintendo Switch, Wii U, Sega Dreamcastand the Sega Saturn, the gap between male and
females is not as large compared to other consoles. My guess is that the Nintendo Switch and
Wii U are mostly for gamers whereas the original Wii was for families based on the price and
accessibility. Another theory is that they were Nintendo's more recent consoles so less people
might own the consoles but that doesn't explain why less people own the Sega Saturn and
Dreamcast. My guess is that because Sega was not doing so well when producing consoles, less
people decided to purchase Sega's later consoles.
What didn't surprise me was the number and range of people who own a Wii because of the
price and how accessible it is to most ages. What also didn't surprise me was how many people
owned a PlayStation 2 mainly because of how the console was the first and cheapest option for
a DVD player during its time so more people purchased the PS2 for watching DVDs instead of
just gaming.
The tables also tell me that most gamers that play on more recent consoles are between the
ages of 18 and 34 because these age ranges have the time to play games whereas other ages
either are "too mature" to play games or doesn't have the time to play them.

Observation:
• Some of the best selling games are older, retro games like Mario and
Pac-Man
• Some players enjoy unique games like Final Fantasy and Pokémon
What this says about my audience:
• They might enjoy games that uses a mix of game genres
How will your product appeal to this audience:
• The game uses a mix of genres from other popular games so there is
something for most people, even mysteries behind the game to keep
players interested in the game
Use this space to record any secondaryaudience research you might do.
This is finding out about the audience for existing products.
Secondary Audience Research

Franchise Year of
Inception
Lifetime
revenue
RevenueBreakdown Franchise
Owner
Platform
of origin
Pokémon 1996 $90 billion (as of
2019) (including
all media)
• Japan retail – $4.513 billion
• Overseas retail – $9.265 billion
• Mobile games – $3.36 billion
Nintendo
The Pokémon
Company
Game Boy
Mario 1981 est. $29.623
billion (as of
2018)
• Super Mario– $15.728 billion
• Donkey Kong– $6.366 billion
• Mario Kart– $5.202 billion
Nintendo Arcade
Pac-Man 1980 est. $14.107
billion (as of
2016)
• Pac-Man– $12.81 billion
• Ms. Pac-Man– $1.2 billion
• Other games (US) – $97 million
Bandai Namco Arcade
Space
Invaders
1978 $13.93 billion (as
of 2016)
• Space Invaders–$13.93 billion Taito
Square Enix
Arcade
Final
Fantasy
1987 est. $10.656
billion (as of
2018)
•Main series– $9.31 billion
•Spin-offs–$1.346 billion
Square Enix NES

• The table shows me that some of the highest grossing franchises
started out as pixel art although that was probably because of the
power of technology during the time of the games production and
release
• The wide range of genres of games show me that most people play
different, unique and innovative games that changed how players play
games like Final Fantasy which brought RPGs into the mix of video
game genres
• Some of the highest grossing franchises like Mario and Pac-Man are
surprisingly simple which tells me that most players enjoy simple
repetitive games which explains why games like Call of Duty are doing
very well

Secondary Audience Research
Observation:
• More retro gamers play games that are similar to the games of the past, whether that is that
the game is in pixel art or that they use characters or mechanics similar to retro games
• Most of the games some players play have been either remastered or slightly edited to make
the franchise slightly more different t with every game instead of doing the exact same game
every time unlike Call of Duty
What this says about my audience:
• They enjoy games that reference to the older games of the past by either have a similar art
style like pixel art or have characters from the past
How will your product appeal to this audience:
• They might enjoy my video game project because the game is going to be in pixel art and use
the platforming gameplay style from when they started like Mario and Sonic and turn based
RPG style fights from games like Final Fantasy 7
Use this space to record any secondary audience research you might do. This is finding out about
the audience for existing products.

Popular Video Games Release Year Average Rating
Donkey Kong 1981 7.6 out of 10
Pong 1972 6 out of 10
Paperboy 1985 6.8 out of 10
Manic Miner 1983 8.6 out of 10
Pac-Man 1980 7.9 out of 10
Sonic the Hedgehog 2 1992 8.6 out of 10
Gauntlet 1985 7.4 out of 10
Chuckie Egg 1983 8 out of 10
Day of the Tentacle 1993 9.1 out of 10

Primary Audience ResearchObservation:
• More players prefer platforming video games compared to the other options
given from the survey
• Everyone who took the survey enjoy any mysteries behind games
What this says about my audience:
• They enjoy a few parts of my video game project at least like the platforming
• They also enjoy games that have a mystery behind them for the players to solve
How will your product appeal to this audience:
• My product will have platforming sections for most of it
• I plan on adding hidden QR codes in any promotional images or clues in the
images source codes
Use this for any primary audience research that you do. Questionnaires,
interviews, Vox pops, focus groups… whatever you did, record the responses here
and note what you have learned and how it will influence your project.

Subject Research-Video Game Trailers
If you do any additional subject research, record that here. This might be most
relevant if you are producing a magazineor a documentary but even a fiction
trailer mightrequire some additional research in to a particular subject.
Getting some background information on your subject would be a really good
idea.
Find some resources, log them, read them and write something about them.
• Video gametrailers, similar to movie trailers, are used to give gamers a taste
of what will happen in the newest game by either showing some gameplay,
having the trailer be live action or show something different from the actual
game to keep players interested in what the gameis actually like
• Video gametrailers started in the late 1990s to early 2000s
• Unfortunately I was unable to find any information on what the first video
game trailer was
• One of my favourite video gametrailers is the first Five Nights at Freddy's
trailer which showed a small bit of the gameplaybut most of the trailer was
Scott Cawthon's, the creator, own animation made for the trailer itself. The
reason I enjoy this trailer is part of the mystery behind the gamebecause
Scott likes to leave clues in different areas like in the trailer itself or in the
source code of the trailer

Practical Research

Practical Research
• Undertaking practical research is another great way to improve your project.
Experimenting with techniques, equipment and processes you might want to use
in you project will help you plan for the future.
• Think about what you will research. It could be studio photography, or sound
recording, or post-production techniques for video or animation techniques for a
video game. Tutorials are useful here.
• Make something similar but unrelated to your chosen idea.
• Do not make it a version of your final product; it is an experiment
• Provide a reflection of the processes you used and how it has been useful.
• Don’t do something that you already know how to do.

This is one of my experiments for my video game
project.
I used Photoshop, using pixel art, I created 12 cards
with the Dragon Ball Z logo for the back of the card
and two of each dragon ball, except for the 7 star
dragon ball because it would be harder to sort the
cards out so there are the same number of cards in
each columns and rows.

• This is my second experiment
• This is an example of the platforming that will
be implemented into my final video game
project
• Using Photoshop, I copied and pasted two
images, one of the city during night time for
the background and the ninja for the main
character
• I removed the white background from the ninja
using the erasure tool and creating a blue
background to find all of the white background
without accidently removing part of the
character

• This is my third experiment for my FMP
• This is another example of the platforming
in the game
• Using Photoshop, I copied and pasted 8
images, one of the forest background and
7 of the animated character
• I removed most of the white background
from each of the characters but due to
time restrictions, I was not able to remove
all of the background from every
character

Bibliography

Bibliography
List all products researched in previous sections. Include anything additional
you have watched/read in preparation for production. Alphabetize your list.
1. Akira Toriyama (1989) Dragon Ball Z
2. Scott Cawthon (2014) Five Nights at Freddy’s
3. Toby Fox (2015) Undertale
4. Jacksepticeye (2013) Fan games
5. Sega (1991) Sonic the Hedgehog
6. Nintendo (1985) Super Mario Bros
7. Markiplier (2012) Fan Games
8. PewDiePie (2016) PewDiePie Tuber Simulator
9. J.C. the Hyena (2011) Sonic.exe
10.Nintendo (1996) Pokémon