Journal Week 12: Serious games

I think that serious games is a good concept of getting a point across towards to masses. There are, however, some problems.

1. The word games is associated with all things fun, casual. Having a “serious” game which deals with real-life issues is usually hard to swallow for a average person.

2. Sensitivity. When creating a serious game, it is usually influenced by real-life issues which are/have happened before. That being said, it means that there are people who have gone through some nerve-wrecking situations. Having their experiences being re-played in front of them in a form of a game is not usually the best way of getting a message across.

The gameplay of serious games has to be able to convey a message across properly. A serious game has to “stand out”. Be it in a good or bad way. This would be one of the ways to get a message across to the masses.

I personally do not think that serious games are a good idea in most cases. Having life-wrecking experiences play out in front of people in the form of a “game” is not the best way to convey a message. Especially when all the player is seeing are pixels and polygons. One thing that games have a problem of conveying is emotion. Emotion is the best way to bring forth a message. Having maybe a presentation or video documenting experiences is a much better way to get a message across.

However, if a designer of a serious game is able to juggle both sensitivty towards the “victims” and the conveying of a message, it will be a good “serious game”.

Design idea: Art driven design

My idea for a art driven design game is for players to understand some of the more famous art paintings done.

The game will have a set number of famous art paintings. The player will be able to choose these paintings and customize them in whatever way that that want. The game will allow the player to mix and mash different types of famous art paintings together to allow different combination of art pieces. This will allow the player to explore the different types of art paintings done.

The aim of this game is to provide the players with a brief understanding of what the paintings “mean”. Sort of an art appreciation software of sorts. The game will allow the player as much freedom as possible in creating their own paintings. If possible, a art analysis tool should be used as well. Something like a art appraiser, it’ll be able to tell how close the players “style” is to a famous art painting.

Journal Week 10: Improv

The three rules of improv are:

1. Be fun to play with.
2. Serve the narrative/
3. Make your partner look good.

Improv games seem to be best player among people that do not know each other. In a sense, the entire idea of improv games is to encourage sociable behavior. A good example is the 3rd rule, in a social game with strangers, you wouldn’t want to make fun of someone that you have just met. Rather, the temptation of making fun of someone you already know for a long time is pretty high.

I wouldn’t make improv games to be played without seeing each other, I.e over the internet. It would lose much of its self-expression if it was played without actually interacting with each other. By allowing each person to express themselves in person, it creates an atmosphere where it encourages people to express themselves more.

Design Idea Week 10: Art Game

My idea is to have a tablet like hardware to allow users to draw their own drawings into the game. The game allows the player to link their drawings together with actions and speech.

This will allow the players to create and design their own art and story. It would be something similar to scrabbnauts, where the player has free reign of what happens. There will be some limitations to what players can do but as more and more people link and upload their designs to a central server, the games that can be designed can be more and more complex.

Journal Week 9: Interactive Fiction

Re-playable games often have a challenge in a sense that they need to keep the player entertained after multiple instances of the game. These mechanics have to change each time the player plays the game.

The other important aspect of these types of games is the player. The player has to be the sort of player that actually “wants” to view all the endings, exploring every single available option, or the game will not work. For a casual player, playing normally once through for the enjoyment of it would be enough. There wouldn’t be much incentive for them to play the game again, when they can play a totally new game.

Design Idea Week 9: Fairy Tale

Design a game which retells and reinterprets a popular fairy-tale of your choice.

The game that I’ve chosen is puss in boots. The fairy tale is about a cat who tries to help his owner build up his fortune, by tricking the king.

The game should be something like a puzzle game. Where the cat has to go around gathering items and finishing puzzles in order to help his master. The cat would be able to customize his master as well, which adds a new twist to the game. Instead of customizing yourself, you’re able to customize your master.

Journal Week 8: Mafia

The game of mafia takes into consideration the amount of information that each player provides and gets. It it sort of a information trading game, whereby each player will try to determine which types of information is true or false.

A good strategy would be to try and question each player and try to determine which player is trying to spin a tale, be it the mafia or the assassin.

It would work as a online game but it would have to allow voice chat rather then typing. This would allow the game to go a lot faster. A time limit would be implemented as well along with how much time each player can talk. Small things like these would have make an online game of Mafia more enjoyable.

Design Idea Week 8: A Social Game

My idea for a social game is to use the facebook network to try and find hidden clues about your friends~!

The idea is that everyone will post a short clue within their tags about one of their friends that they’ve chosen. It can be something simple like “James is a #$@#$” or something hidden in a long essay.

After which, each player will go around collecting tags and at the end of the game, the player with the most number of correct tags wins.

The objective of the game is to allow you to understand your friends better and have some fun while at it.

Design Idea Week 6: Hardware-Driven Game

I’m sure that many of us remember the computer system from minority report, where one could control images using special gloves in 3D motion.

With accurate motion tracking, you could make a game that paints for example. This would eliminate the problem of precision that computers have and yet still have all the advantages of working on a computer.

My idea would be to design a game which not only centers around the movement of your fingers but rather around your whole body. Something like a motion sensor suit. This would allow for more realistic games to be created. For example you could have yourself in a fight where what you do in real life is what your character does.

Reflection Week 6: Player-Centered Design

Having do user-centered designing before, I understand that when designing a game, it should be centered around the player. Perhaps if one were doing a game which was not a commercial game, e.g. Hobby it would be possible since the designer would probably just be doing it to test the idea.

However, in a commercial environment, every game that goes out has to be centered around the player in order for it to sell well. Having a game that just cathers to the designers interests may/may not sell well which is risky for commercial entities.

Of course, if you were developing a game solely on your interests without any commercial value, by all means go for it. Designing games is meant to be a fun and challenging experience. Unfortunately, with anything that money touches, we often end up doing this which make money and not things that interest us.