Documentary Outline and Plans

Purpose

The main purpose of our documentary is to explain the serious effects that obsessive gaming has on teenagers' lives, and inform their parents that what they are doing is affecting them greatly. We will be exploring the negative aspects of excess hours of video gaming, and how it is not healthy for these youngsters in a mental way. The negative aspects will look into facts and statistics on people who have been effected by too much gaming in some way, backed up with video clips taken from some of the most violent, graphic and sexually explicit games of the modern-day. The positive aspects of gaming will be shown through the joy that gamers have when playing games alongside oen another, (this will be shown through the multiplayer gaming idea where a friend can play against another friend in a purely friendly and competitve manner). Another positve example of gaming is that it is used for social interaction, and teenagers enjoy playing it with their own peers for enjoyment an dsatisfaction and relief from stress.

Interviews

For our documentary, we will be interviewing people from different professions who we feel are appropriate and suitable for answering the questions we have planned regarding video games. The ideas for potential interviewees for our documentary's interviews are to have firstly and foremost, either a professor from a University, or a gaming expert. The reason for why we feel we should be using this person is because they will be an educated and wise person who can provide us with intellectual and unique views on gaming, and we are able to get an insight into what the knowledgable people of society feel about the topic.

Also, we will look to possibly interview game developers and experts in the field of gaming, to hopefully find out their views on the growing obsession for these games, as they will be the person/people who have created them. The benefit that this has for our documentary is that it helps us gain a view that is not just our own and biased, and we can use the view of the developers whatever it may be. Finally, and most importantly, we will be interviewing 'hardcore gamers' who play games constantly for several hours, to find out their own personal opinions on the topic and how parents perceive their gaming habits as being totally bad for their mental health and education.


Documentary Outline

The documentary will begin with a disc tray of a PlayStation 2/PlayStation 3 console being opened and a disc being inserted into the disc tray. A medium close up will be shown of a disc being put into the disc tray of the console and the disc tray being closed again, which is done to give the audience the sense that they are starting a game (relating to our whole documentary on video games). The audience of our documentary will have a retro gaming feel as they see the disc tray being closed with a game disc inside it, as we are drawing their attention instantly to the disc being put in - making them feel like they are about to begin a gaming adventure of some sort. The song that will be used for this intro will be "Has It Come To This" by The Streets, as it relates to the laid-back, lazy lifestyle that young men have at home, where they simply play console games all day and have no fear of the consequences of their actions in their lives. The artist Mike Skinner from The Streets says "This is the life, playstations, 64's", which of course links to our documentary as we are focusing on the effects of video games on yougnsters.

The voiceover of the documentary will be of the "Voice of God" style, where facts and statistics on gaming are going to be explained over cuts of news articles relating to the issue. After the facts of serious gaming from youngsters have been explained, there will then be a series of video clips showing the most hardcore of gamers playing games, focusing on the intensity of their faces and seriousness. The clips will show games on shelves in shops, the game discs and covers, stacks of games, as well as gamers playing them. After this, a reconstruction of an interview with a 'hardcore gamer' will be shown, where the person's face and uppper body is not shown and there is no light on their face - this is done to keep their identity secret. We will be showing the view of the actual gamer, who represents the passionate gaming community, and they will say whether or not they agree with the idea that teenagers are playing video games at home for too many hours.

Then, the voiceover will question whether excessive hours of video gaming is taking over the young generation, and an interview with an expert on gadgets/gaming or a pshychologist of some sort will be shown, showing his views on the matter. There will then be clips of violent video games shown, such as Manhunt and GTA: San Andreas, and the voiceover will say how these games have taken over the innocent minds of teenagers nationwide. The views on these violent video games from the expert/professional will be shown.

After this, we will show clips of retailers who sell games, such as GAME or GameStation, and find out the views of the manager of the stores. The reason for this is to find out whether or not they have policies where they cannot sell 18+ games to people under 18, as nowadays many retailers are known to allow youngsters play games of a violent or explicit nature that they should'nt be. We will be questioning the manager of the store on how these youngsters gain access to these games over their age even if their strict in-store policies are set.

We will conclude the documentary by saying through the voiceover that parents should monitor the serious gamging habits of their teenage children, as it is having an effect on their minds and their education. We will inform parents that the teenagers are underperforming in education and feeling a great amount of stress as a result of many hours of gaming, especially violent/gruesome games which damages their young conscience.