This document compares and contrasts the dance game Just Dance and the survival game The Last of Us. Just Dance has a bright, colorful atmosphere focused on dance and popular music. It has easy to use motion controls and aims to be fun and family friendly. The Last of Us has a dark, tense post-apocalyptic atmosphere and difficult gameplay focused on survival. It has a linear story-driven narrative that develops characters and emotions through cutscenes. While Just Dance targets all ages, The Last of Us targets older players from 15-40 due to its violent content and themes of fatherhood.

1. Ben White
Just Dance The Last of Us
Genre
Dance/Party/Fitness/Sport/Family/Simulator
Genre
Survival/Horror/Action/Adventure
Content
Strong focus on sound, music and modern pop songs.
The overall feel is quite bright, vibrant and happy due
to its many and varying colours. Just dance gives off a
positive, pleasing feel to its audience and aims to be
unique, eye catching and engenders a sense of
surrealism.
Content
Dark and dirty. Tense atmosphere. Atmosphere feels
quite claustrophobic too. Strong music
Text is large and bold but weathered and the lighting
feels quite dim and dull. Clear focus on a realistic
post-apocalyptic feel which involves broken scenery.
Construction
Has quite a large, clear interface which focuses
strongly on the user’s motion-controlled interaction.
Easy to navigate menus. Gameplay and menus are
very artistic and vibrant to create a party-like
atmosphere which is also family friendly.
Construction
Linear interface and gameplay. Extremely story driven
and contains very high standard cut-scenes.
Gameplay can be quite difficult as there is a lot to
think about and there is a lot of interaction with other
characters and the environment.
Narrative conventions
Focuses mainly on delivering a fun and entertaining
experience whilst also delivering all the most popular
modern songs to the audience. Progression in the
game is based on how well the user performs on the
‘stage’.
Narrative conventions
Linear story as it requires you to move from A-B
constantly to continue the story. Professional
standard cut scenes further develop interest,
emotions and the narrative exceedingly well. Basic
story revolves around the human infection of
cordyceps and focuses on survival to find a cure,
whilst also engendering some interpersonal
relationships with other characters.
Common Codes
Animated avatars, a lot of repetition as the game
pretty much only requires you to dance.
Informative and diagrammatic interface to aid the
user in such things as letting them know if they have
performed the move correctly as well as their overall
performance. Very good advertising as a lot of people
know of the game.
Common Codes
There is quite a bit of exploration, although it mainly
involves small side areas on the large, linear path of
the story. Also establishes a lot of objectives for the
player to keep them busy on the specific map for a
certain time. Very good advertising as the game is
well known and has sold a lot.
Profiling
Group-wise, I would say just dance focuses on all age
groups above 3 years. It is very easy to use and get
into and can be an enjoyable experience for even the
young and old
Profiling
I would say the age group for the last of us would be
15 – 40. This is because the game has quite a bit of
violence in it which attracts the younger ages of the
group, but the game also seems to focus a lot on the
main protagonist being quite the fatherly figure and I
can see a lot of fathers or fathers -to-be being
impacted by this and seeing Ellie as even their own
daughter.