PlanetSide 2

Planet side 2 is a free-to-play massively multi-player online first person shooter published by Sony.
This is an action/adventure game which was released in 2012
PlanetSide 2 is a re-imagining of PlanetSide featuring; the same world, teams, and time period. However now it is a faster paced game and holds the ability to feature potentially thousands of players.

The Six different player classes are:

The Infiltrator is a sniper class with special abilities of cloaking and hacking, and can use sniper rifles, scout rifles and submachine guns to deliver a devastating effect.

The Light Assault class is a scout who uses carbines, submachine guns and shotguns. The Light Assault's special ability is Jump Jets, which allow them to fly through the air for a short period of time.

The Combat Medic is a healing class. Their weapons include assault rifles, shotguns and submachine guns. The Combat Medic's special abilities allows them to heal and resurrect other players.

The Engineer class has the special ability of repairing vehicles, turrets, and MAX Units. The engineer also has the ability to build anti-infantry and anti-vehicle turrets. The Engineer's weapons include carbines, shotguns submachine guns and battle rifles.

The Heavy Assault class has light machine guns, submachine guns, shotguns, batte rifles, and also Rocket Launchers, which are effective at destroying enemy vehicles. They also have the special ability of shields to help them endure heavy fire.

The MAX class has a mobile armored suit that allows them to take significant damage before dying. However, due to the suit they are also the slowest class. They have access to anti-infantry, anti-vehicle, and anti-air weapons. Max units cost resources to use.

Story

Set 300 years after the discovery of Auraxis. After the Earth has nearly been destroyed after a war the governments come together and unite under one banner, the world wide Terran republic. Some time later a wormhole is discovered it is then said that this wormhole is a sign of extra terrestrial life and launches space expeditions.Later, the expedition discovers the planet Auraxis, and as a result, Vanu, or "ancient", technology. Among this vast array of technology is "Rebirthing Chambers", capable of reviving any person from any kind of injury with even the smallest amount of genetic code. This removed the main tool of the Terran Republic on Auraxis, fear. As a result the Republic banned the use of this technology, but some scientists continued, forming the Vanu Sovereignty, as the Terran started to militarize to control this, a collection of separatists broke off, forming the New Conglomerate, who stole weapons and equipment from the militarization process. So exactly 175 years after  leaders of the Terran Republic were killed, the war between the Terran Republic and the New Conglomerate breaks out. Following this, the New Conglomerate attacks the scientists who were still working on the alien technology, the Vanu Sovereignty, and they are as a result drawn into the conflict with the Terran Republic and the New Conglomerate. This prevented any work towards finding a way to regain contact with Earth, and the war for Auraxis has been raging ever since.

Business Model

This is a free to play game with a cash shop so that players can buy in game convenience items.

The game also offers subscription which provides players with: increased experience, cert points, and extra resources, which are used to acquire things such as grenades and medic kits. These are able to buy in order to make the players more powerful than others (most that aren't subscribed)

Some gamers dislike games which users can buy additional weapons and health as they may consider it as it being unfair because buying is not a skill in the game it is an unfair advantage.

The Factions

The Terran Republic: This is a faction which has a more traditional mind set of a military soldier i.e words like: Duty, Honour, Saviour and Justice are used to define them and the target audience for them will be mainstreamers.

The Vanu Sovereignty: This faction is one that consider themselves as more intelligent than the others. Words like; Wisdom, Enlightenment and strength are used to define them

The New Conglomerates: This faction is the most different out of the three. This is because this faction is a more rebellious, anti-establishment and against oppression.

The Target audience for PlanetSide 2 is in the age range of 13-35 with 75% of the gamers being male. The gamers will be mostly working/middle class who would be possibly in education or work living in sub-urbs

The Terran republic faction is aimed at the older gamers i.e. 20-35. This is because of the traditions that are followed by them.
The Vanu Sovereignty: This faction is aimed at the middle aged gamer who may have been educated well or possibly still in higher education
The New Conglomerates: This is a faction clearly aimed at the teenagers who are considered rebellious and go against the authority and want their own way into freedom. These gamers may also like listening to Rock or Heavy metal.

Psychographic Profiling:
Terran Republic: This faction is for the mainstreamers. This is because these people are happy with the way things are and are used to following a routine. They also like thinking about others before they think about themselves.

Vanu Sovereignty: This faction is for the succeeders who seek control. This is because they assume they are superior than others and have strong goals and self coonfidence. These gamers are normally organised.

The New Conglomerates: This faction is for the reformers and want change. These gamers are quite rebellious and like to go on the path of their own ignoring other instructions or rules valuing their own independent judgement. These gamers are usually at the leading edge of society.

Advertising Agencies

W+K Amsterdam 
The 'W' stands for Wieden and the 'K' stands for Kennedy

W+K have advertised:
Nike "Just do it"
Facebook
Coca cola "The coke side of life"
ESPN "This is sportscenter"
Microsoft "Where do you want to go today?"

I think that at the moment one of the most creative campaigns they've presented is for "Powerade" as it is the year of the football world cup and everyone will be interested and rise up the 'Hype' of football. This is also creative as it is said that it will remind young footballers that every game matter no matter where it is played.

Institutions

RockStar Games:
Founded in 1998 with HQs in New York, USA

Owner Company: Take-Two Interactive

Best Games From Rockstar:
5. Max payne 2
4. Red Dead Redemption
3. GTA San Andreas
2. GTA IV
1. GTA V

Interesting Facts: In October 2011, Rockstar creative vice president Dan Houser said that they are intentionally avoiding the 1st person shooter genre. He said this was because "It's in Rockstar's DNA to avoid what other companies are doing."

EA (Electronic Arts)
Founded by Trip Hawkins in 1982 with HQs in California, USA

Best Games From EA:
5. Medal of Honour: Frontline
4. Dead Space
3. NFS: Most Wanted
2. FIFA 13
1. Battlefield 4

Interesting Fact: EA has become so big that publishing happens from inside the same company, this means that they do not need to pay another company for publishing therefore keeping the profits.

Zynga

Founded by Mark Pincus, Eric Schiermeyer, Michael Luxton, Justin Waldron, Kyle Stewart, Scott Dale and Steve Schoettler in July 2007 with HQs in San Francisco, USA

Best Games from Zynga:
5. Mafia Wars
4. Street Racing
3. CityVille
2. FarmVille
1. Hidden Shadows
Interesting Fact:
Zynga was named after the bulldog called Zinga of Mark Pincus

Nintendo
Founded by Fusajiro Yamouchi in Kyoto, Japan September 1889

Best Games:
5. Star Wars
4. Wii Sports
3. New super Mario bros.
2. Wii Party
1. Mario Kart

Interesting Fact: The name Nintendo can be roughly transated from Japanese to English as " Leave luck to heaven". Also, Nintendo was originally founded as a card company...

Sony Computer Entertainment Inc

Parent company Sony Corporation and founded in 1993

Best games on SCEI:
5. FIFA 14
4. AC4
3. Battle Field 4
2. Killzone: ShadowFall
1. Infamous: Second Son

Interesting Facts: The President, and group CEO of SCE is currently Andrew House, replacing Kaz Hirai who himself had replaced longtime CEO Ken Kutaragi also known as "The father of playstation"

CASE STUDY Kill Zone SF

Name of Game: KillZone Shadow Fall
Release date: 15 Nov 2013
Institutes: Guerilla Games, Sony Computer entertainment

Print

Magazine: Cover of the official playstation magazine

Colour is very consistent in the cover and presents the theme of playstaion which is also blue

Central image: Looks as if the character, who seems to be a villain, is looking straight at the audience and seems as there is interaction between the two parties.

Font used for the magazine name is big and bold. This is also at the top as it makes it easy for audiences to find the magazines on store shelves.

Reviews: "Killzone shadow fall is probably the best looking FPS game right now for ps4.
A game that offers a very good solo and multiplayer. MUST BUY for every ps4 owner"

"Shadow Fall shows what Sony's new machine is able to do in terms of graphics, but behind its beautiful façade there's a by the numbers first person shooter that you won't remember in a few months."

There's no review that was very bad as they wouldn't have been used intentionally by playstation as they want people to buy the game.

This cover feature for the game will be successful in promoting the game to its target audience as they play games on Playstation and promoting the game on the front cover can start a buzz as well showing that playstation have rated this game highly and it is worth buying.

TV AD:

 This is the Killzone shadow fall gameplay trailer which was also used in E3.

The target audience wants to know why there was an explotion in the building the protagonist looked like he was going to and why it may have been attacked. Furthermore the action that takes place is also intrigues the target audience as they will be into the action games on next gen. The trailer was also effective as the audience wants to know what happens next, however they'll need to buy and play before to find out which makes this video effective.

This was an interview with the managing director of guerilla games. This is effective in promoting the game to target audiences as the interview itself is with an important member of the institute behind the game and he tells us what features are included in making the game more realistic and entertaining. Everything the target audience wants in a game is said which persuades the target market to buy the game.

E-Media: On the official website of Killzone:ShadowFall the first thing that catches the eye is the picture of the antagonists at the top. Just to the left in bold writing it states, "INSUGENT PACK OUT NOW" this keeps the interest of the audience as they want to know more about this pack as they can have a better gaming experience. The Website is very organised and scrolling down we see how to connect with them via facebook and twitter whilst we can see tweets and posts whilst still on the site to see what other gamers think of the game and what's new in the game. There is also competitions which on facebook which you can see via the site. The recent post by shadowfall:  "We are looking for the player with the most limpet grenade kills per hour. You need to play a minimum of 1 hour in the 24 Player TDM Warzone to qualify for this challenge and it will run from Friday night, 23:59 GMT to Sunday night, 0:00 GMT.

The top 10 list will be announced on Monday." This makes the audience get involved and making the audience play the game more.

This was uploaded by a player. This helps promote the game as audiences watching the gameplay get an insight and can decide whether they want the game or not. The user that uploaded the video is undoubtedly going to compliment the next gen game as they want more hits and more subs on their channel as well successfully promoting the game.

The killzone ShadowFall page has 331K likes

This appeals to the games target audience as they want the players to get involved also making them play more of this game.

This shows that they respond and care about their audience and want them to get involved.

We can conclude that Killzone on its Facebook page is trying to get the players more involved in the game and starting a buzz with the prizes, some of which are rear, and competitions.

Twitter

The hashtag for this game is  #Killzone Shadowfall

The audience playing Killzone can ask for some help and tips when they are confused in a part of the game and Killzone tries reply to the needs showing that they can help out. There is also similar competitions as are on Facebook in trying to get players more involved.