Recapping the foundations of game design

9th December - Hannah Nicklin Talk

• CEO and lead of De Gute Fabrik

• Deep Dive: Inside the narrative design and ‘multiple middles’ of Mutazione (gamedeveloper.com)

• The real reason fans hate the last season of Game of Thrones (scientificamerican.com)

• Watch video: Youtube.com/watch?v=oT0Pz4fJ3WM

• Send Emma and questions

What is Game Design (Activity)

• Say one word around the room

• Do it again, but just food (adding a limitation)

• Now introducing conditions (elimination if taking too long to answer, also creates a boundary)

  • Adding a time limit and a win/fail condition changes the dynamics

• Have to make it more challenging so players can show skill. Performance element (has to start with last letter of previous answer)

• Do we give players the opportunity to let players purposefully trip up others?

  • What dynamic will it make?

  • Think of demographic

• Dogs have rules for play

  • Tail wagging, bum wiggle, lowered torso

  • One dog has to request the other dog to play

  • Nipping happens, but if its too rough a dog will disengage

    • Social acceptability 

  • Applying rules is what frees us to play

  • Games design lays out rules

• Games design also applies values and creates a feedback loop

  • What Remains of Edith Finch

    • Different outcomes based on understanding of characters and their stories

    • Win condition is based on a person's interpretation of the game

      • Some feel they win by physically finishing the game (speedrunners)

      • Others feel they win by absorbing the story (empathetic players)

        • Should consider all types of players who will play a game

• In a nutshell

  • A game is structure for play

  • Game designers create structures that facilitate play

Modding activity

Fixing a ‘broken’ game by changing/adding/removing a rule

• Get a game

  • Change, add or remove a rule to “fix” it

  • Example: Noughts and crosses

    • The bug: Once you understand the way to win it isnt fun anymore

    • Solutions:

      • Add a player

      • Expand the grid

      • Players can take two turns

      • Reshape the grid

      • Play using an instagram grid

      • Solve maths problems, whoever solves it first gets a turn

      • Chickens - control where they stand with corn in a square. If it moves you lose the square. Winner keeps the chickens

      • Instead of X’s and O’s players have to think of words beginning to an obscure category

      • Twister/Tic-Tac-Toe mash up

      • Secret land mine square results in insta-death

• Our game - Thumb war with knives

  • Good for small hands

  • Attatch a piece of wire or a blade to the end of the thumb

  • Fight to knock the other players weapon off

Rules // Verbs // Mechanics

Understanding the power of interaction

• Video games are unique as they simulate systems and allow people to operate under certain constraints

  • Gives us systems and formulas and we then deduce the story

• Verbs

  • What the player can do

  • The dominant actions that the player can perform

  • E.g. Explore, destroy, build, steal, seduce, survive

• Rules

  • Why the player is doing it

  • Provide a structure for the players interactions

  • Quantify and evaluate the players interactions

  • Specify goals, win conditions, fail conditions

  • Establish meaningful feedback loop

• Mechanics

  • How the player does it

  • Controls, input

  • Can define genre

  • E.g, Walk, run, jump, dodge, dialogue choice, dig, shoot

• Example: Pac Man

  • Rules: Eat things, die if you hit a ghost, get all the points, navigate a maze, gain a life at 50,000 points

  • Verbs: Eat, evade

  • Mechanics: Up, down, left, right

• Example: Scribblenauts

  • Rules: Earn starites by solving puzzles

  • Verbs: Think outside the box, goof around

  • Mechanics: Left and right, click to select puzzles

• My example: Fall Guys

  • Verbs: Run, Fall, Stand, Dive, Sabotage, Win

  • Mechanics: Run around, Grab objects and players, Jump and dive around,

How can you make your verbs robust?

The key to intuitive, immersive gameplay

• Example: Pac Man

  • Eat is made robust by pacman himself just being a mouth

  • Evade is made robust by the design of the maze

• Are your verbs intuitive and compelling?

  • Communication

    • How are you communicating your rules? What are your feedback loops like? How literate is your player?

      • Wordless videogames are good for communication as they compel players to try different things

        • Communicate things in a certain way

          • Beams of light shining in the correct direction, is the character hold a tool to complete the job they need to?

  • Motivation

    • Is the player strongly motivated to behave in a certain way?

      • Example: Telltales The Walking Dead - Looking after Clementine and making sure she is safe

  • Feel

    • What does it feel like to perform your interactions? How are you orchestrating this aesthetic experience?

      • Include sound design

  • Coherence

    • Are each of your semiotic planes working in harmony?

      • Don’t confuse the player by suggesting they need to do one action, but pushing them towards another

      • Journey - Uses sound to remind players about the loss that has taken place in the games world, and the loneliness of the character

• Semiotic planes

  • Visual

  • Audio

  • Haptic - Physical experience of playing (Controller, phone, keyboard etc)

  • Ludic - Playfulness/Fun

  • Verbal - Written or spoken word

• Emotion wheel

  • Emotions of agency - How a player feels while playing the game, NOT how the player is meant to feel in relation/sympathy to the character

    • Example - Resident evil. Character is probably feeling pure terror, while the player may feel annoyance

  • How I want my player to experience the mechanics I present them with:

    • 1) Seafolk Exploration - Amazement/Surprise

    • 2) Pirate Scientists - Humour

    • 3) Submarine Builder - Fulfilment

Experimental metaphors: “Emotioneering”

Intuitive, expressive marriage of verbs and mechanics. Metaphor rather than mimesis

• Example: Brothers A Tale of Two Sons

  • Wordless

  • Story told through audiovisuals and input controls

    • Both hands control both brothers (Left hand big brother, right hand little brother)

    • Uses european fairytales

      • Further you go the more whimsical and fascinating yet scary the world gets

    • Big brother is killed at the end

      • Still have to keep hand on his control while taking the little brother through the end

        • Good metaphor for loss. Still holding on to him even though he is gone

        • Have to make little brother face his fear to finish his quest

        • Using big brothers controls will encourage little brother to face his fear

          • Having a text box tell you to do this would remove the magic and poetry of the game

            • Studies of games psychoanalysis

Telling stories with systems (Activity)

Choose a genre and make the rules, mechanics, and verbs

 

 

For my game:

Verbs: adapt, explore, descend

Mechanics: swim, read, echolocation

Rules: Explore a trench