An important part of this project is understanding who plays Siege and how long they spend playing it overall as this is important. I looked online for answers but I struggled to find any information on the age of Siege players and what they feel about the game so I thought it best to carry out my own research into how old people were and how often they played the game. To do this I used a very simple closed question survey to gather an idea of the average age and playtime of a Siege player in a week and put this onto Reddit to ask the Siege community. This is the post I created:

This was very successful overall and I gained close to 30 responses over the week which is efficient information for now. The survey I created was very basic as for right now nothing major was necessary. This survey is below:

I think these questions for how simple they are are very useful to gauge the target audience and how engaged they are with the game. The first question yielded these results:

As can be seen the variety of player ages is very expansive and it’s fairly surprising at how close the results are to each other as there is a nearly equal percentage between a few age groups. The game is dominated mostly from my survey by adults between the age of 20-25, followed by 15-20 years old which shows us that a lot of players are fairly young/early in their adult lives. I was expecting this as a lot of players I interact with in the game are around 20 whilst some are much older, as we see 7.4% are 40-45. I need to make sure I use this information to create my project and due to player ages a more mature theme would be acceptable as Rainbow Six is fairly mature in itself anyway. This allows for more slightly violent themes and depictions in my designs but without overdoing it. The second question I posed was how long people have been playing overall. The results are as follows:

As we can see from the chart again there is a fair mix. The vast majority of players (a third of responses) have all been playing for 2 years which is a middle number as the game has been out for 4. This is what I was expecting as this is when the game began to flourish due to new maps, operators and updates. A few people have only been playing a year and again I could have expected this as a lot of players have been joining the game in recent months which again is down to the addition of new content. I believe the lack of players who have been playing for 3 years is low as during that time the game was in a fairly poor state and people were losing interest in the game. The third question I looked into was how often people play the game a week.

Again these results were fairly equal but the winner was 4-6 hours a week which is not really to much. This may of course be due to people playing other games, going to work and living adult lives rather than playing games all day although this number is still surprising although 10-14 hours a week is the third most chosen which makes a lot more sense to me. The losing amount of hours was 14+ which is expected as this is a fair amount of hours to play the game for in a week. The final question I asked was simply who enjoyed the game and the response was fairly obvious:

 

Due to Reddit’s nature the 

Due to Reddit’s nature the no’s are either a troll answer, people being frustrated with elements of the game or they genuinely don’t enjoy it anymore. However as expected the majority of people do enjoy the game and what it offers them. This survey has been useful for me and the information I have gathered will help me build my project up as I will be able to make the project much more mature and will be able to present some more adult themes whilst still making sure I keep to guidelines.

 

 

Tactical shooters are a vital sub genre to the shooting genre and gaming itself. rather than sprinting across a map, gunning down 100’s of enemies in your wake you have to be much more methodical and slow with your decisions and must use your environment and equipment to claim victory. It is a genre that has existed for some time but in the past few years it has begun to grow and branch out into new ideas. Siege is a great example of a game like this as there is still a lot of fun to be had without being completely boring or dull.

Funnily enough, the two games that truly kicked off the tactical shooter were Rainbow Six and Delta Force, both in 1998. Rainbow Six was the first of these to release and introduced slow and methodical combat into the game, where one shot kills were able to occur.

Delta Force was also a great title where enemies could kill you with one bullet, meaning that you had to carefully consider your every move.

Another very popular title was the SWAT franchise, which originally began as a click and point adventure game before turning into a RTS such as Total War or Dawn Of War. However overtime it began to evolve into a first person shooter which heavily relied on tactical combat which is a massive part of the tactical shooter genre. Again in these games you had access to a variety of equipment, lethal and non-lethal to complete different missions such as recusing hostages and storming buildings.

The SOCOM games are also based upon tactical gameplay as a team where you each player has one life to eliminate the other team or capture enemy flags. These games are still thriving today and as mentioned previously are proceeding to grow.

All information fro above as well as the image was taken from the article below.

Den of Geek. (2019). The origins of the tactical shooter. [online] Available at: https://www.denofgeek.com/games/12156/the-origins-of-the-tactical-shooter [Accessed 14 Mar. 2019].

Although Siege is a little more fast paced than other tactical shooters it still follows the genre and you have to make quick but careful decisions at all time. It follows he rules of most tactical shooters which tend to be as follows:

-Small crowded spaces.

-A variety of weapons and gadgets for use in a range of scenarios and situations.

-The necessity to listen out for sound such as footsteps, shouting, crawling or gunshots.

-Communication across a team such as talking to each other via Discord or the game itself.

-A range of different maps and areas to attack or defend as well as a range of game modes to play.

-Links to real life such as different special branches, scenarios, backgrounds etc as well as their own backstories.

Overall all these elements are very vital towards the tactical genre and what it offers and I am planning to record some footage from in the game to provide evidence for what the game is about and what you are capable of doing.

I will continue to gain knowledge of the genre and what it offers overtime but for now I am happy with my knowledge.

The FSK (Forsvarets SpesialKommandos) are a special branch of NORSOF (Norwegian Special Operation Forces) and are a well trained and capable unit, established in 1982 due to he increase of terrorism, especially across Norwegian oil rigs and platforms in the North Sea.

Due to the Government denying their existence for some years, not to much is known about them however in recent years they have become much more recognised due to their support in Afghanistan. However their main purpose and goal is to deal with terrorist attacks or hostage situations on ships and oil platforms out at sea. They are commonly know to have worked it the SAS and SBS from the UK to help deal with similar encounters.

When first established in 1982 the purpose of the FSK was to act as a training unit for paratroopers and mobilisation to become a highly trained and respected unit in Norway and across the globe with talk of them growing in size and their budget increasing due to their efforts. they also have a fully female unit named the Jegertroppen. This unit also operates and carries out the same tasks as the FSK.

The FSK have aided heavily in the Afghanistan conflict, undertaking several hostage rescue missions as well as fighting in some areas and they also played a small part in the conflict in Kosovo.

The training process for the FSK is severe and harsh with a lot of pressure, commitment and strength required. Applicants must complete 45 sit ups and 50 push ups within 2 minutes, 8 pull ups, swim 400m in under 11 minutes and then march 30km whilst carrying 25kg in under 4 hours and 50 minutes. For women the application is a little easier but is still no easy feat. After passing the recruits must then undergo a one year training course which not many pass. After this is done they are well on their way to become a FSK operative and may begin training in several different specialist roles such as a sniper, combat medic and pilot.

A vital part to my planning and research of the FSK is determining which weapons they often use so I can decide which fits my operators best. Due to this research I also think it best to create an oil rig map as this is what the FSK often deals with in combat which will be unique.

From my research I can see that the FSK often use weapons manufactured by Heckler and Koch. I feel that Goliath should have a much heavier and powerful gun whilst Thor will have a much more linear assault rifle. The HK416 will be great for Thor I feel due to it’s look, common role in the FSK, high reliability and great accessibility. This gun is also not present in Siege meaning that it’ll be a great choice. It also has several variants which could potentially work. As his second option I think Thor should have the MP7, a classic Submachine gun used by many. Although already in the game I think that it’d be a good choice due to his slower movement as the fire rate is much higher than other weapons whilst still maintaining power and capacity.

For Goliath I feel that his guns should be much moe bulky. I have decided to go with two options for him also, the FM Minimi and the Benelli M1. The Minimi is a light machine gun and uses 5.56mm ammunition. It was created in the 1970’s and is a Belgium weapon. It has 3 variants, one for ground troops, one for paratroopers and finally one for vehicles. The one I would choose for Goliath is the ground troop one. He would also have access to the Benelli, a semi automatic shotgun for close rang encounters. It is a fairly popular gun and is used by civilians, police and the military.

Overall the FSK are a very interesting special division and I feel they would have a great place in Siege. I will consider the weapons I use more carefully but for now I a happy with my choices and ideas.