1.1 Problem Identification
Playing through Covid-19
During the first few months of Covid-19 back in 2019, gaming sales grew a huge amount hitting up to 75% growth in the US at some points and around 30% later on in the year (Epstein, A. ,2020) and many people found that video games help to relax during the stressful times, and also allowed people to interact and 'meet up' with their friends virtually. This gave the illusion of being with people and made lockdown that bit more enjoyable, and in a study by Barr, M. and Copeland-Stewart, A, 2021, there was an overwhelming positive impact on the people who played video games with links to mental health improvements and reduced anxiety.
2D Platformers success
2D platformers are the longest standing form of games, with the first games such as Pokemon and Mario still being recognised today and being the two largest franchises acording to Hallman, C. (2020). Mario keeps on giving with each new game it gives, especially with Super Mario Bros, with enough new features to captivate more people and keep the existing players engaged in the franchise. 2D games limit what the developers can do in terms of imersion, but lets them branch out in ways connecting to story and features due to thme being simpler to develop, and produces games that are easier to follow and get to grips with from the player's viewpoint.. This leads to them being popular and growing more than a lot of 3D games like World of Warcraft and Call of Duty, which are still massive titles. (Faber, T. 2020)
Problem Solving, Cognative Boost and more Creative Thinking
Playing video games helps to boost problem solving skills and visual processing meaning people are able to pick out things in their surroundings faster than those who can't, based on a social experiment conducted by Green, C.S. and Bavelier, D. (2007). Furthermore, games are more and more frequently being used as a method to learn, such Minecraft Education Edition and Kerbal Space Program, as well as some Assassin Creed Titles being used to give realistic examples of life in certain time periods. This is supported by the fact that games help to enhance learning and can make it more effective, due to decision making and to be able to set goals and achieve them successfully. (Slota, S. 2013)(Barrus, J 2022)
Creating a Game that attends to Different Players
Many people are turning to video games as a way to talk and socialise and this has become more apparent with covid-19 where many people have been in lockdown, and unable to speak to people face to face, but video games allow people to do this. The sterotype of teenage males being the only ones to game is being re-written as we speak and is more widely done by lots of people and comes with lots of beneficial mental health benefits (Baxter, M. 2011).
Overall I believe that video games provide a wide-spread improvement to peoples mental health and improves the quality of life for people who can't leave their homes, due to the added interaction with others. Not only this but video games break their stereotypes when it comes to learning, as they were thought to be bad for learning and have negative effects on it, when in reality there is a benefit to problem solving and creative thinking.
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