Theme

Here you will find research into the theme i are going for in our game which is 1500s London where the black plague has returned with the aim to further my understanding on this theme to help me make higher quality animations and models that are appropriate for this theme in our game.

For this research I will primarily be conducting secondary research as I will be looking at reports , books from the time and written about is to help me understand what building materials where used in this time , what events took place and some the symptoms of the 'black death' .

Conducting this will be the most effective way of giving me and understanding of theme and understanding of to help make my models and animations better and fit the theme as they will be more inline with the culture of the time.

All links to research sources can be found in the bibliography

First I am going to look at what it was like in 1500s London and some events that happened in this time period to do this I will look at wikis and historical findings from that time.

Here is a map of 1500s london. This shows the layout of london and can help us see where certian buidlings and places are this will help with the level design.

Here i will list a few facts about london in this time period that will be able to enhance our game then talk about how this information will help with the games design and help in my specialization.

In this time there was a population of 60,000 in london.
The roads in this time where very narrow and dirty with lots of people living close together.
Fires where really dangerous in this time due to the living arrangements of people.
The cloth and wool trade where also very popular in this time due it fetching high prices on the market.
due to the rise in popularity more land had to become available for sheep.
Most of the roads where dirt tracks that where only able to be seen as people used them often to make sure they didn't get overgrown.
There where a few cathedrals in london where people apart of the catholic faith went to pray.
most of the population of london was catholic in this time with very few believing catholicism was not the true religion.
Education was growing importance in this time and most towns and places especially london had grammar schools where they taught Latin grammar.
Education was very important in this time especially to merchants who wanted to trade in europe.

Above are some facts about London in the 1500s these were chosen as they help me further understand the theme. I wanted to make sure I researched the living conditions of this time and how people primarily travelled around this would help me understand how fast a plague would spread around and also how it was spread l, finding the population of that time was crucial too as this would help determine how many people were infected and helps with the story of the game.

Finding out about religion to was also important because this would allow me to understand what influences religion had in that time on the buildings design and the people which I will go more in depth on here. As well as this I wanted to research what the trade was like during this time as it would help us enhance the levels with time period accurate assets to make the levels more accurate to the time.

I researched this information with the primary aim to gain more knowledge on the time period which would not only help with my models and animations but with the overall design of the game.

Next I will be researching into the kind of building materials used and the buildings used in this time for this I will make mood boards and to present the information I gather in a clear and presentable way.

Below you can find the link to the miro board which these moodboards will also be accessible on.

(All links used for the images will be attached on the moodboard)

FMP board

Above is a mood board that talks about the building style and materials used in the construction of homes in the 1500s one of my main aims with this was to make sure that i not only researched the materials but also their properties to help give me an insight into why they where used.This information would help enhance my models that i make as no i have more of an understanding of what the materials use actually looks like. Doing this also gave me a visualization of how close people live in proximity of each other which tells me why the plague spread so quickly. Yet some minor improvements to this would be to get images of these building i took myself in real life so i could get a better sense of scale of these buildings and maybe a chance to see first had the interior of one of these style buildings.

Reflection on moodboard

Overall this moodboard was effective in giving me the knowledge on the style of buildings in the 1500s and what materials they used this will help me create my 3d models for the asylum level.The only improvement to this would be to get more primary research pictures as i could gage a sense of scale and see the interiors of these type of buildings. This moodboard was also effective in giving me a visualization of how close people lived together in this time and the difference between the poor and rich in this time.

Now I will research the different effects of the black plague and look at its symptoms this will help me understand the effect that the plague had on people and how it impacted there body.

To do this i will make a concise list of informative and reflective bulllet points and images to show the information I have gathered with an explanation of why and how this research helped me.

Below are some pictures of artwork form the time when the black plague was in London.

below will be some facts about the black plague that will be useful for me using concise bullet points to gather effective information that is both useful and of high quality.

For this I will research into its effects on people and how it was spread throughout not only London but of europe too.

25 million died to the black death across europe making it on of the most catastrophic events in history.

The black death was actually a result of a plague as it was almost a combination of multiple symptoms from other plagues that include Bubonic , pneumonic , septicemic plague.

During the black plague trade was abandoned and wars where put on hold.

Many people where put out of employment due to the plague.

A lot of wars broke out in the aftermath of the black death.

The themes of death in poetry in art , sculptures and paintings become more popular due to the Black Death having a physiological impact on people

Landowners where in ruins due to the lack of people as a lot of them died to the Black Death

As there where almost 3 plagues in one for the Black Death there where a lot symptoms to it like :

Fever , fatigue ,shivering,vomiting ,buboes (massive swollen parts on the body),

Death , insomnia ,internal bleeding ,memory loss and speech disorder.

These are just some of the symptoms of the Black death.

The Black Death originated on china and the proceeded to spread and ravage Europe

Above are some facts about the Black Death which 'ravaged' Europe between 1347 and 1351 and killed 25 million people.

During the black death there where many quarantines to stop the spread of it.

Another way they stopped the spread of the black death was to burn infected peoples house

Due to the devastation of the plague many religious belief came under question.

Reflection on research on the the black death effects and symptoms

My overall aim , for this research into the Black Death was too look at how deadly the Black Death was and the effect it had had on the people of the time and what impact it had on the culture and environment . The research into the effect it had on people as morbid as it sounds also will help enhance my animations as I can use these effect it had on people and portray them through my animations using characteristics from these symptoms that where apart of the Black Death. In addition, it is important to note that in our game it is about if the Black Death game back during the 1500s but with more of a mutation effect on the infected with many of the symptoms listed above yet it was still important to research the symptoms and effect it had as I can not only implement them into my animations but also the overall games design and the themes present throughout. It was effective for me to research into the the physiological impact the Black Death as it give me insight into the thoughts of people after the event which will help with the animations and the games design as then I know what influences the social climate and culture of the time and help me to implement it into my products .Another one of my aims was to gather information on the way it affected landowners and other business owners and workers as this would enhance my overall knowledge of this time period which would only make the quality of the story and game better due to me understanding the time more and also helps me understand how I can implement the culture of the Black Death and its effects on society and the world into the 1500s where the effects where not as prominent but still lingering. This information also gives me basis on how to make these worse the black death in our game will be which we will call 'Venenum Vires Pestilentia' in latin with the english translation of Poisonous Green Power Plague.

Conclusion on research into the black death

Overall the research into the effects and symptoms of the black plague was extremely effective in producing the information I needed to accurately depict this plague in my animations as I now now what emotions I should try show through my animations escipally for the enemies and make sure they reflect the symptoms that where caused by the Black Death. This research also helped develop my knowledge on the overall culture of the time period and how it affected people physically and physiologically which will only benefit me as I no have a richer understanding of the theme and the time period we want to show through our game.Although the information i gathered was not a large amount this is due to quality of the research and how i didn't want to get facts that didn't benefit me with enhancing my knowledge on the black death that i needed for the game and also helped my research workflow be more effective.

Reflection on research into the theme

Overall i believe the research i conducted into the theme of our games was fruitful and informative as i looked at what london was like in the 1500s , the effects and symptoms of the black death which is what we are basing the plague in our game on and finally i also researched the style of buildings and materials used to build them. I did this with the aim of further developing my knowledge in the theme of the game which in many aspects would help with the overall design of the game. In other aspects it would also help me in the areas iam specialising in for example some of the symptoms of the black death will help me make my animations of higher quality and the research into the materials used for will help me with the few models i make escipally the textring part of the workflow.

While i am happy with how effective my research into the theme was i think there was still some improvements to be made like including primary research methods but due to the nature of the theme we are going for this proved quite difficult to preform a method of primary research that i had not previously done before. Yet to overcome this i would try to include time to go to museums and take pictures as this is the only affective way of collecting primary research on this specific area of research.

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