First Post

So my first blog. Its hard to do this while im streaming South Park. About a week ago a speaker, Corvus Elrod, come into my game theory class to talk about story telling in video games and a little about what he does. He also told us that the best way to get myself noticed is to start a blog and put down my thoughts. Unfortunately this means i have to pretend that i about something relevent once in a while. But he didnt let us get off so easy as to just start a blog; but he aso gave us a something to write about, if we think that lack of a HUD in a game acually helps integrate the player into the game or if it just makes it harder for the player. Elrod stated that he thinks a lack of a HUD acually makes it harder for the player to get into the game because it keeps them from keeping track of themeselves as well as a little of the environment. I know a few games do have a special game difficulty were the hud is completely removed to make it harder for the player. Ive acuall enjoyed having no HUD and preferd it over having a big complicated one. Though i do agree with Elrod that it tends to pull the player out of the game depending on how many factors the player has to pay attencion to. One game, Amnesia, had no Hud yet they did a great job pulling the player into the game environment. Of course all that the player had to keep track of on the game was the players health and sanity, and they did a great job letting the player keep track of it with sound and some visual effects (particularly when the character went insane). But when theres too much HUD it just looks like a game of statiscits. One game though, that i know of, took a creative turn into the use of a HUD. They incorperated the HUD into objects in the game so its like not having a hud but you can still keep track of your stats. In Dead Space, the players health was displaid along the spine of the players suit, ammo was on the weapon, and whenever the player needed to go to a menu or look at the map it was displayed off of a little hologram display that came from the players arm. Its creativity like that that should be the future of HUDs in games, though technological limitations depending on the games setting and timeline might make it a little tricky at times.  Another thing I found pretty creative would be from Splinter Cell: Conviction. Whenever the player had a new objective it would display from the environment instead of popping in as a little window on the screen. For example, when you get a new objective as your walking along it might be clearly spelled out on a billboard or spelled out on a large building with lights from windows. Though it looked cool at times it didnt feel like it helped draw me into the game. So i suppose my conclisive answer would be a for some HUD but mixed into the environment. So until next time, I suppose I can try to think about something else interesting that I'll put down as my next topic. And mabey a line to say when i end my blogs.