HA7 Task 2 Applying Research Techniques

To apply my research techniques which I have developed while conducting research into different methods in which I can gather qualitative and quantitative information.

The first step I carried in out in conducting my research was to start the process of collecting and collating information by creating a survey with basic closed questions in which I can easily collate the data in order to find averages and percentages relevant to the game in question, which is Grand Theft Auto 5.

The first step in creating this survey was to decide what questions I wanted to ask the people I gave the survey too. When choosing the questions I had to make sure they were easy to answer, did not have to many options and I had to make sure the questions were closed questions in order to ensure that the research that I gather was quantitative rather than qualitative as the options for the questions were not open, so the research I gather can be easily collated and sorted into things like graphs to represent the information clearly and correctly. 

To collect the initial part of my quantitative I used the website survey monkey. I used this particular website as it is very useful when it comes to making an online survey, you can use a standard template and alter certain assets to suit your specific subject in question. I added different questions with minimal closed answers in order to ensure my research was quantitative.

Below is a picture of the survey monkey editor which I used to create my survey:

Below is the first question I asked in my survey:

Below is the second question I asked in my survey:

Below is the third question I asked in my survey:

Below is the fourth question I asked in my survey:

Below is the filth question I asked in my survey:

Below is the sixth question I asked in my survey:

Below is the seventh question I asked in my survey:

Below is the eighth question I asked in my survey:

Below is the ninth question I asked in my survey:

Below is the tenth and final question I asked in my survey:

When asking these questions I was sure to include questions that would apply to anyone taking part to get the best possible results, while finding out interesting facts about people who play the game.

As well as this survey monkey survey, I also used a back up paper based survey, which is probably the more reliable source of gathering this information and I will most likely use to determine my final outcomes when analyzing all the data.

Below is my paper based version of my quantitative research in which I gathered 20 responses as apposed to only 10 on survey monkey, as the questions vary on either online and paper based surveys, I am slightly limited on how to analyze my results, I will most likely gather data from the paper based survey as I have the most answers and the best questions.

To gather information to enter into my questionnaire I asked people in person and over facebook these questions and ticked the box appropriate to their answer. I did find that some of the questions don't gather either very useful or accurate information, such as where do you live, as I am studying in teh North East of England and most of my friends I asked over facebook live in Wales, so there is a very limited field for me to gather information. Regardless to slight issues, most of the information is still quite helpful.

I carried out my quantitative research on both survey monkey and on a paper based survey, but for my qualitative research I have decide to stick specifically to the online survey as it is easier to gather more detailed answers. Below is screenshots of the quantitative questionnaire I put up on Survey Monkey.

Here is a screenshot of the creation of the survey.

Here is the survey from the point of view of someone filling it in.

Analyszing data

Quantitative
From my 20 responses to my paper based form of quantitative research which I have decided to gather data from as it is the most accurate method and the method that got the best responses, I have created charts and analyzed and assessed all of the data to find out key information.

Below is the key data I have collected from my research and the conclusions I have drawn from it, I have analysed in the key information which shows interesting results.

GTA V Survey (Based on results of 20 individuals from Wales and the North East of England)

Age

By looking at the chart above, it is evident that the people I asked that play GTA V are primarily aged 18-24, 50% more so than people aged 25-45.


Type of gamer

In the chart above, it is worthy to note that only 40% of people that play GTA V would call themselves hardcore games, compared to the 60% that would describe themselves as casual gamers.

Occupation

It was quite intersting to find out that only 30% of the people that I asked who play GTA V are employed, this is probably due to the fatc that they have less free time as apposed to people in education such as college.


Played GTA V

Out of the people I asked, I was quite surprised to find that only 5% of people haven't actually played GTA V, which is evidence of the games popularity.


Played console

I had already assumed that most people would have played GTA V on Xbox 360 it often tends to be the more popular choice of gaming console, especially as GTA V is not yet released on next gen consoles.

Opinion on GTA V

Last but not least is this chart reviewing peoples opinions on GTA V, as you can see, 80% of people who I asked strongly agree that GTA V is a great game and 20% of people are neutral about it, which was quite surprising. An option to say they strongly disagree was include in the survey, which no one actually clicked so this is more evidence revolving around the popularity of the game and there is little negative feedback about the game. 

Qualitative
I conducted my research on survey monkey into qualitative data to get peoples true opinions of the game on aspects such as what the like and don't like, below are the results of what I found out based on opinions. As most were quite similar the information was easy to sort into charts. As this is qualitative research, none of the answers were put in place to pick by me, participants in the survey were free to answer how they like, I've just sorted the data out so key information can easily be gathered.

I collected the data from survey monkey before putting it into pie charts so the data can easily be assessed:

Charts:

Do you like the look/style of the game?

As you can see in the chart above, a massive 80% of people like the look/style of GTA V and only 10% mostly like it and 10%don't like it. These results were fairly surprising, as I didn't expect anyone to have a single issue with the look and style of the game.

What aspects of the gameplay do you enjoy most?

In the chart above are the results for which aspects of gameplay people mostly preferred, I was quite surprised to find that only 10% of people mostly enjoy the storyline and another 10% enjoy none, which makes little sense to me! A further 10% like collectibles which was also interesting as most do not and as expected, 40% of players prefer the online mode and 30% prefer the single player mode.


Which is your favorite character, Trevor, Franklin or Michael and why?

As you can see in the chart above, a massive 40% of people prefer the character Trevor in GTA V, 30% prefer Michael, 20% prefer Franklin and 10 percent said they don't favor any, which either means they can' make their mind up or they don't like any of them. Peoples reasons for liking the characters were as follows, peoplepreffered Trevor for his humor and general craziness, Michael for his story and family and Franklin for his "coolness".  Below are some of the more detailed answers to which character do you prefer and why?:

Trevor, really funny

Trevor, too funny!

Franklin, just too cool!

Michael because he as better storyline

Trev, fuuniest

Trevor, funny

Michael, funniest

Franklin, coolest :P

Michael, more crazy!

What would you do to improve the game?

















Lastly was the question, what would you do to improve the game? As you can see in this pie chart, a massive 40% of people would not change a thing in GTA V, which is very surprising! 30% of people would prefer no collectible as apposed to 10% wanting more collectibles, 10% of people would prefer a longer single player, and strangely, 10% of people said they would change everything, as they were not as specific as I would have liked in their answer I am not sure for what reason.

Some of the more detailed answers are as follows:

Nothing!

Nothing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Longer single player!

Everything!

More collectibles

Nothin
Nothing!

Get rid of collectibles!

I hate collectibles!

I would like to get rid of the collectibles in the story mode, they're horrible!!!!!

Final observation

After conducting my research I can accurately conclude that GTA V is clearly a very popular game, from my quntative and qualitative research I can clearly see that the preffered console to play GTA V on is Xbox 360, probably due to the fact that the release on the Xbox One, PS4 and the are not yet available. I can also see that there are little issues with the game except for the fatc that a majority of people are not overly fond of collectibles.
During this research I was quite surprised to find out that a small majority of people do not seem particularly fond of the game GTA V, for what reason I am unsure, though my findings are surprising never the less, though if there was any purpose to this research, it was definitely to find out particularly interesting information such as this.