by Can Tran

Created on: December 13, 2008

Video games are a medium of entertainment no different from novels, Japanese anime, TV shows, comic books, and movies. For the latter four, you have these genres: horror, action, adventure, fantasy, science-fiction, romance, romantic-comedy, nonfiction, war, political, romantic-drama, martial arts, and noir.

In that respect, video games are no different. There are films, TV shows, novels, comics, manga, and Japanese anime for different ages, demographics, and interests. The same goes for video games. In the last few years, the video game industry has undergone a revolution and an evolution. Now, it is giving mainstream Hollywood a run for its money. The video game industry grosses billions more dollars than the movie industry each year. Video games have become a formidable rival to mainstream movies.

Yet, Hollywood
is recognizing the power and potential of the game industry.

Video games have their own genres and themes. The themes are the same as genres of the different mediums of entertainment. Here are the genres:

EXERGAMING

The genre of "exergaming" is a fairly new coined genre. This is a genre of video games that do provide actual physical exercises. It was brought into the mainstream because of the release of "Dance Dance Revolution," which was a rhythm n' dance game which required the use of a step pad. It was a game mainly for female gamers. But DDR appealed to a wide demographic of gamers. That is one example of a game in the exergaming genre.

From there, there was the "EyeToy: Kinetic." This was the next step as it was multi-functional. The game would be controlled by the player's physical body movement. Soon, there would be "Wii Fit" that came with the Wii Balance Board.

SURVIVAL HORROR

The survival horror is a sub-genre of action and adventure. But it revolves around adventure mixed with suspense and horror.
It uses elements from both Western and Japanese horror films. While "Alone in the Dark" is the father of survival horror, "Resident Evil" was responsible for coining the genre as survival horror. Its roots stems from the conventions of your horror fiction in books, anime, movies, and comics.

The player has to "survive" the horrid ordeal while conserving health and ammunition.

STEALTH GAME

The stealth game genre is from other genres of games. But, its main emphasis is on "stealth." It seems to be most realistic of action-adventure games. The player cannot rely on going around and shooting enemies. Instead, the player needs to rely on intelligence and rationality

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