FOCUS

OK been a long time since I posted on here and its about time that I tried to reign in a proposal and gain a much more direct focus in terms of how it relates to my practice as well as my own vested interests.
In response to my tutorial with Lorraine, I cannot just use history as a focus, but as a context, which is more than fine, I think it was just because I had do so so much historical research in terms to verify using New Vegas as a basis for my universal mirror study.
She also mentioned that the hyperreality aspect works hand in hand with the interaction element, but it must have another design related element. So an easy and good way to go about this would be to look at semiotics and how it relates to the branding of products in game. 
Virtual branding must have an effect on us and our purchasing habits, considering that there are so many real world products that are situated in New Vegas, just with slightly changed graphics and name changes. Nuka Cola is a prime example, the funny thing is most of the food is irradiated which supports the notion that most of our food is GM treated or something similar to a minor poison. 
This aside, the amount of in game design that is relative to the propagating of products, be it interactive (food, drink, weapons, armour, clothes) or merely a place or object of high value (space shuttle, minuteman missile, HELIOS ONE, vegas strip) the effect of advertising is the same: it creates a notion of unfulfillment that can only be sated by trying the product, visiting the place or in some cases, picking up a novelty like a t-shirt or snowglobe.
So I suppose this actually holds some amount of weight considering that I could just dissect the entire Fallout inventory and do a largely semiotic grilling of it as well as elaborating on the point by putting it into some form of hyperreal context that is actually a universal mirror for pan-capitalism.


Another idea could be the focus of technology, how technology has shaped and shifted various social factions into evolution or disparity. For the elitist advancement of technology and its preservation, the Brotherhood of Steel would be the focus, whereas on a much further end of the scale would be the tribal people of Zion National Park, UT who rely entirely on their craft skills, survival skills and general know-how of their surroundings.
Although this would be a good focus, and would indeed tie in with the sort of work I am producing in my practice, I am unsure of how it could be directed back to design. Which may lead me to leave this in the ground considering I will only be looking at social theory and technological aspects which probably wont link back into my studio practice. 


Once again another focus could be the propaganda that you see in game, which in itself is intrinsic to products/branding anyway as the same methods are applied, just that the imagery and tone of voice is altered slightly when dealing with products, not people.


So I think ideally it would be best to take a semiotic stance in relation to branding in fallout, as well as linking it into the hyperreal cohesion in our world.