P1

Learners explore the games industry through a focused case study of one computer/ console game company, including:

A: Structure

Naughty Dog was founded on September 27th 1984 by Andy Gavin and Jason Rubin.
The president of Naughty Dog is Evan Wells.
Since 2001, Naughty Dog has been a subsidiary company of Sony Interactive Entertainment.
Naughty Dog is home to ICE Team which focus on core graphics for Sony games.The way that Naughty Dog produces games is unique. This is because no team has a producer.
Everybody is open to sharing ideas and when they are working on multiple releases. The team will split and will work on their assigned title.

B: Platform Technology

Naughty Dog primarily develop games for the PlayStation consoles, as they are owned by Sony.
They have released games for the 3DO, Sega Mega Drive, Amiga, Apple IIGS, DOS, Atari ST and the Apple II.
Since 1996, their games have been released for PlayStation, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, PlayStation Portable and PlayStation Vita.

C: Game Types

Naughty Dog’s earlier games, Dream Zone, Keep the Thief and Rings of Power are all either adventure, or role-playing games and are all single player.
Two of their most popular game series’, Crash Bandicoot and Jak and Daxter are both single player platformer games.
The Uncharted series is an action-adventure single player.
Their only single and multiplayer game is the action-adventure, survival horror The Last of Us.

D: Games On Multi Platforms

most of Naughty Dog’s games have been published on the PlayStation 3 & 4 consoles because Sony Interactive Entertainment own Naughty Dog.
Since being a subsidiary of Sony, all of Naughty Dog’s games have been published by them, whereas before, Naughty Dog had games published by Universal Interactive Studios, EA, Baudville and JAM Software.
Naughty Dog have made games for ps3 like Jak II, Crash Bandicoot, The Last of us left behind, These games are really fun to play and are good graphics but not the best because the console can’t run high frame rate games such The Last Of Us (PS4).
Naughty dog have also created games for the uptodate console which can run higher frame rate games which look visually better than the old console, this console can also be bought in a 1Tb edition which means Naughty Dog could make bigger games.

E: Regulatory Bodies

All video games are regulated differently in different areas of the world. For example, in the USA, (where Naughty Dog are situated), video games are self-regulated by the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB). They assign age and content ratings to video games. these age ratings are still advertised on video games and it is entirely the consumer’s choice as to whether they abide by this or not. Despite this, the ESRB rating system is still considered extremely effective. they also use PEGI which is for the age range 3+ to 18 in EU and that decides the rating of a game so if the game is graphic it would be rated a 16-18.

F: Developmental Software

the programmes Naughty Dog use are Maya, 3DS Max and Zbrush. They use different 3D software depending on what the employee’s experience in.

Unit 60 Gaming