game design@itp v3

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Emma Westecott 1 6/20/22 Emma Westecott 1 Game Design @ ITP Games are a major entertainment form of the 21st century. As a design discipline, digital game form combines game worlds, rule sets and play to actively engage a player in an ongoing acquisition of skill. You will iteratively design, visualize, develop, document and test unique game concepts to a proof of concept stage.

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Page 1: Game design@itp v3

Emma Westecott 1Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 1

Game Design @ ITP

• Games are a major entertainment form of the 21st century. As a design discipline, digital game form combines game worlds, rule sets and play to actively engage a player in an ongoing acquisition of skill.

• You will iteratively design, visualize, develop, document and test unique game concepts to a proof of concept stage.

Page 2: Game design@itp v3

Emma Westecott 2Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 2

Game Design @ ITP

• Effective design operates within set constraints; the basic design criteria of digital game form i.e. What is the point of the game? How do you play? How does the game-play feel? etc. provide an excellent framework within which to pose wider questions. Games provide a context for a fresh investigation of the meaning of and the relationship between the roles of artist, designer and player. The basic building blocks of game structure; the game world, the game rules and the player provide a schema for experience design. Starting from an understanding of how current commercial games function this session introduces students to the discipline of game design.

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Emma Westecott 3Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 3

What is a game?Excerpts from Salen & Zimmerman (2004)

• A formal game has a twofold structure based on ends and means; Ends: It is a contest to achieve an objective. Means; It has an agreed set of equipment and of procedural “rules” (Parlett, D)

• Reduced to its formal essence, a game is an activity among two or more independent decision-makers seeking to achieve their objectives in some limiting context. (Clark C. Abt)

• [Play is] a free activity standing quite consciously outside “ordinary” life as being “not serious”, but at the same time absorbing the player intensely and utterly. It is an activity connected with no material interest, and no profit can be gained by it. It proceeds within its own proper boundaries of time and space according to fixed rules and in an orderly manner.” (Huizinga, J)

• Playing a game is the voluntary effort to overcome unnecessary obstacles. (Suits, B)

• A game is a system in which players engage in an artificial conflict, defined by rules, that results in a quantifiable outcome. (Salen & Zimmerman)

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Emma Westecott 4Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 4

What is game design?

• “Design is the process by which a designer creates a context to be encountered by a participant, from which meaning emerges.” (Salen & Zimmerman: 41)

• “The game designer envisions how a game will work during play. She creates the objectives, rules, and procedures, thinks up the dramatic premise and gives it life, and is responsible for planning everything necessary to create a compelling player experience.” (Fullerton: 2)

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Emma Westecott 5Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 5

Game Design @ ITP

• Salen, K & Zimmerman, E. (2004) Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals. London: MIT Press. ISBN: 0-262-24045-9.

• Splits field into primary schemes:

RULES

PLAY

CULTURE

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Emma Westecott 6Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 6

Gameplay modelling

Reality is amazingly complex. The only way our minds are able to get by at all is by simplifying reality so that we can make some sense of it. Thus our minds do not deal with reality but with models of reality.

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Emma Westecott 7Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 7

Gameplay modelling

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Emma Westecott 8Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 8

Gameplay modelling

Our mind does this with everything we make sense of e.g. images, human relationships, decision-making, etc.

Games work as models, they are less work for our brain than the real world.

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Emma Westecott 9Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 9

Approaches to game design

• Blue-sky (assuming no constraint)• Slow boil (given a theme uses extensive

research)• Mechanic (e.g. Mario’s jump; Katamari’s roll)• MDA (http://mahk.8kindsoffun.com)• IP (based on specific franchises)• Story• Research (e.g. flOw)

From Fullerton, T. et al. (2008) Game design workshop: a playcentric approach to creating innovative games. 2nd ed. Burlington: Elsevier Inc. ISBN: 978-0-240-80974-8.

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Emma Westecott 10Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 10

Types of design in games

• World design (back story, setting, theme)• System design (rules, mathematical

patterns)• Content design (characters, items,

puzzles, missions)• Game writing (dialogue, text, story)• Level design (layout of maps, placement

of objects and challenges)• User interface (player input, game

feedback)

• From Fullerton, T. et al. (2008) Game design workshop: a playcentric approach to creating innovative games. 2nd ed. Burlington: Elsevier Inc. ISBN: 978-0-240-80974-8.

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Emma Westecott 11Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 11

Csikszentmihalyi - Flow

Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly. (1990). Flow – the Psychology of Optimal Experience. New York: Harper Perennial.

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Emma Westecott 12Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 12

Csikszentmihalyi - Flow

Key components for flow:

1.Clear goals

2.No distractions

3.Direct feedback

4.Continuously challenging

Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly. (1990). Flow – the Psychology of Optimal Experience. New York: Harper Perennial.

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Emma Westecott 13Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 13

Iterative development

Game design, like most forms of design, is an iterative process. This means that the game is quickly prototyped, played and refined again and again before it is finalized.

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Emma Westecott 14Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 14

A game schema

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Emma Westecott 15Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 15

A game schema

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Emma Westecott 16Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 16

What is a game prototype?

Prototyping lies at the heart of good game design. Prototyping is the creation of a working model of your idea that allows you to test its feasibility and make improvements to it.

Prototypes are like sketches whose purpose is to allow you to focus on a small set of the game’s mechanics or features and see how they function.

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Emma Westecott 17Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 17

What is a game prototype?

There are many types of prototypes, including physical prototypes, visual prototypes, video prototypes, software prototypes. The important thing to remember when prototyping is that you are not creating the final design, you are simply trying to formalize your ideas or isolate issues.

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Emma Westecott 18Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 18

Prototyping tips

• Answer a question, i.e. is our core gameplay fun? How do we judge this?

• Forget quality.• Don’t get attached.• It doesn’t have to be digital• Pick a rapid development environment.• Build the toy first.

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Emma Westecott 19Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 19

Turning ideas into games

Key questions to ask yourself are:• What is the conflict in my game?• What are the rules and procedures?• What actions to the players take and when?• Are there turns? How do they work?• How many players can play?• How long does a game take to resolve?• What is the working title?• Who is the target audience?• What platform will the game run on?• What restrictions or opportunities does that environment have?

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Emma Westecott 20Tuesday, April 11, 2023 Emma Westecott 20

Fleshing out game structure

Key questions to ask yourself are:• Define each player’s goal?• What does a player need to do to win?• Write down the single most important type of player action

in the game?• Describe how this functions.• Write down the procedures and rules in outline format.• Only focus on the most critical rules.• Leave all other rules until later.• Map out how a typical turn works. Using a flowchart is the

most effective way to visualize this.• Define how many players can play.• How do these players interact with each other?

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Emma Westecott 21Tuesday, April 11, 2023

Overview:

This oft-used game design exercise enables the student to understand the nuances of the pure design underneath the art and realized through the programming. There are multiple places to start a non-digital version of a digital game:

 

GAME DESIGN PROJECT: Converting digital to physical

Adapted from Fullerton, T. et al. (2008) Game design workshop: a playcentric approach to creating innovative games. 2nd ed. Burlington: Elsevier Inc. ISBN: 978-0-240-80974-8.

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Emma Westecott 22Tuesday, April 11, 2023

Assignment Overview:

1.Literal conversions attempt to re-create the gameplay experience as closely as possible in a non-digital medium for which it is ideally suited. Super Mario Kart is an excellent example of a game that could be converted to a race to the end board game with little modification to the game structure.

2.Thematic conversions take the basic theme of the digital game and apply that to a traditional style of non-digital game. For instance, one could make the original Super Mario Bros. into something similar to a Dungeon & Dragons traditional RPG. One would borrow the storyline from Super Mario Bros., but not the mechanics. Instead, players might roll characters (or get preselected ones) and search for a princess hidden in a castle.

GAME DESIGN PROJECT: Converting digital to physical

Adapted from Fullerton, T. et al. (2008) Game design workshop: a playcentric approach to creating innovative games. 2nd ed. Burlington: Elsevier Inc. ISBN: 978-0-240-80974-8.

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Emma Westecott 23Tuesday, April 11, 2023

Assignment Overview:

3. Mechanic conversions take a particular, common mechanic in the digital game and use it as the basis for a non-digital game.

 

When doing a conversion, don’t force it. Think of a game, and consider how it might work in a non-digital format. A good match doesn’t feel forced.

 

GAME DESIGN PROJECT: Converting digital to physical

Adapted from Fullerton, T. et al. (2008) Game design workshop: a playcentric approach to creating innovative games. 2nd ed. Burlington: Elsevier Inc. ISBN: 978-0-240-80974-8.

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Emma Westecott 24Tuesday, April 11, 2023

PICK A GAME, ANY GAME

You have been contacted by Indiecade and asked to look at indie releases in the last year and create a board-game or physical prototype for one of the games.

 

GAME DESIGN PROJECT: Converting digital to physical

Adapted from Fullerton, T. et al. (2008) Game design workshop: a playcentric approach to creating innovative games. 2nd ed. Burlington: Elsevier Inc. ISBN: 978-0-240-80974-8.

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Emma Westecott 25Tuesday, April 11, 2023

Method:1.Choose your game.

2.Choose a method.

3.Determine player expectation.

4.Scavenge what you can (list all the elements you can lift immediately from the videogame).

5.Fill in the blanks (list everything you’re missing before you have a complete game).

6.Create deliverables (create a prototype and a tentative set of written rules).

7.Play the game with the group in class.

GAME DESIGN PROJECT: Converting digital to physical

Adapted from Fullerton, T. et al. (2008) Game design workshop: a playcentric approach to creating innovative games. 2nd ed. Burlington: Elsevier Inc. ISBN: 978-0-240-80974-8.