The idea that a game that I have played for a few years can be considered in any way, shape, or form something beyond just a game never truly crossed my mind. In fact, if you were to ask a person “Can a game be considered a piece of professional work?”. Whether they say “Yes” or “No”, they wouldn’t be able to concretely answer the follow-up question : “Why?”. I have decided to analyze a patch note for a game, League of Legends. The findings are eye-opening, in the sense that it completely blew me away. I was basically on two separate standpoints and was switching in between them. I was on the fence between the writer and the reader. To analyze this document, I had to put my perspective as the writer and try to understand the thought process behind how and why they decided to give us information about the changes to the game. After that, I had to think of myself as the reader and how  well I’ll be able to understand the information handed to me, which wasn’t as hard as the former since I am a devoted player already. My findings gave me a new found respect for the game that I play and the company behind it. The format, language, images, and information are concise, organized, clarified, and easily understandable. As a bonus, the patch notes allows comments from other readers and players to allow some feedback. These are things which I have taken for granted for years. To help players understand and get used to the changes to the game as quickly as possible, all these subtle things are being conveyed all at once, which hides the amount of professionalism put into it. Perhaps we, as a community of consumers, don’t need to worry about such trivial things. However, we would fail to appreciate the amount of work behind the process of “conveyance”. Anyone can give you a fact or formula (2+3=5) but it is the process of getting us to understand the meaning behind it which is truly an art in and of itself.

Document : http://na.leagueoflegends.com/en/news/game-updates/patch/patch-53-notes
Analysis : https://www.dropbox.com/s/ivvtsb1dnl146vg/ENG2700-Audience-Analysis-Sheet%20YC.odt?dl=0

A champion, Varus, with the Heartseeker skin from the game, League of Legends. Happy Valentines!