Introduction

The contents of this course are only a brief, and biased, summary of the excellent book Challenges for Game Designers by Brenda Brathwaite and Ian Schreiber. You are strongly advised to get a copy for yourself.

Pictures from Nikon Small World Competition.

Main Goals

• To know the main concepts of game development, tasks, techniques, problems and related methods.
• To build experience with specific tools, their models and workflows.

Course Basics

• Is the challenges process for the course assessment clear?
• Bibliography: Challenges for Game Designers by Brenda Brathwaite and Ian Schreiber.

Game Design, an Overview

"So what does a game designer do? Are you an artist? Do you design characters and write the story? Or no, wait, you’re a programmer?"

• Game Design is not Game Programming, see "The Door Problem".

• We are going to need one essential tool: the godot engine.

  • While other tools such as 2d/3d drawing software can be used, we'll try to avoid loosing focus.

Tasks

After installing the stable standard 64-bit version of godot, you must complete the following Getting Started tutorials from the documentation:

1. Introduction.
2. Step by step.
3. Your first 2D game.

Challenge

Use the godot engine to develop a turn based game.

• In a turn based game there are at least two players that play in turns.
• At any given time only one player can play.

• Think in turn based games you already know: tic-tac-toe, chess, etc.
• You can use one of the tutorial games as a starting point.

Consider these questions:

• What are the actions of each player?
• When does the game ends? What is victory?
• Is the game fun to play?

The Basics of Game Design

What is Game Design?

Game Design is the process of creating the content and rules of a game.

Good Game Design

... is the process of creating goals that a player feels motivated to reach and rules that a player must follow as he makes making meaningful decisions in pursuit of those goals.

It’s also all about the player.

Think about the player’s viewpoint:

• What’s this game about?

• How do I play?

• How do I win?

• Why do I want to play?

• What things do I need to do?

Meaningful Decisions

Whenever the player is allowed to exercise choice in a game and that choice affects the outcome of the game, then designers are creating meaning.

• In order to create choice, there has to be another option that has meaning as well.

• The gameplay itself should inherently motivate the player in the direction the designer wants her to go.

• Games like Tetris and Chess keep the player’s mind busy by forcing her to consider which one of several possible moves she wants to take next.

What Game Design Is Not

• Game Art.
• Pure Programming.

Types of Design

• World Design

  • Is the creation of the overall backstory, setting, and theme of the game.

• System Design

  • Is the creation of rules and underlying mathematical patterns in a game.

• Content Design

  • Is the creation of characters, items, puzzles, and missions.

• Game Writing

  • Is the writing of dialogue, text, and story within the game world.

• Level Design

  • Is the crafting of levels in a game, including the layout of maps and placement of objects and challenges within those maps.

• User Interface (UI) Design

  • Consists of two things: how the player interacts with the game, and how the player receives information and feedback from the game.

What is a Game?

A game is an activity with rules.

It is a form of play often but not always involving conflict, either with other players, with the game system itself, or with randomness/fate/luck.

The Core of a Game

The core or core dynamic of a game is the single thing gameplay is about — the single play experience the designer is trying to convey.

• A core is usually tied to a specific core mechanic.

• These core mechanics can, in turn, lead to core dynamics, which is a particular pattern of play.

• Core statements reflect the core mechanic or the core dynamic and sum up what the game is about, often in a single sentence.

Types of Game Cores

• Territorial Acquisition

  • With this core, things are usually “zero sum”.

• Prediction

  • Some games are about doing the right thing or being in the right place at the right time.

• Spatial Reasoning

  • Puzzle games often incorporate spatial-reasoning skills into video games.

• Survival

  • Human beings are naturally wired to survive and thrive, and it’s no different in the game world.

• Destruction

  • The flip side of the survival dynamic, or the companion side if it’s a player versus player (PvP) game, is the wreck-everything-in-sight dynamic.

• Building

  • In addition to their drive to survive, human beings are also naturally wired to build, even though they’re not told that it’s the point.

• Collection

  • As humans, we’re also natural pattern matchers.

• Chasing or Evading

  • Ancient humans had to run a lot, either to capture prey or escape predators.

• Trading

  • With games that have multiple kinds of resources that belong to each player, it is common to see players trading and negotiating with one another.

• Race to the End

  • Like survival, building, and collection, humans will also intuitively try to do things more quickly, in large part because the brain signals us that faster is better and is a sign of mastery over a given skill.

Game Features

In considering a feature list for a given core, designers tie every feature in the game back into that single core mechanic (or set of mechanics) in some way that ultimately makes the game stronger.

• Feature Sets
  • List all the individual features of the product.
  • Designers generally try for part innovation, part improvement, and part convention.
  • For a game’s feature set, game designers use the standard conventions that define the genre and that players expect
  • But they try to find some way to innovate on previous games.

Where do Ideas come from?

Anything can be turned into a game.

• Play lots of games.

  • You develop a vocabulary of mechanics and dynamics.

• Network with other designers.

  • Two designers talking about the possibility inherent in a topic is a sure-fire way to produce a game.

• Everywhere.

  • Look for game ideas in everything you do and challenge yourself to make a game or think about making a game about a topic at least once a day.

• Apply to learn.

  • Create and play your own designs.

Common Terms in Game Design

• Feature List

  • A list that details key features or selling points of the game.

• Brainstorming

  • A process to generate ideas, usually done in a group.

• Prototype

  • A prototype is a playable early version of the game or part of the game constructed by the designer to assist in understanding and enhancing the player experience.

• Balance

  • When the play is unbalanced, it is too easy, too difficult, or optimal for only certain groups of players. When play is balanced, it provides a consistent challenge for its target audience.

• Mechanics

  • The rules of a game.

• System

  • A collection of game mechanics that is responsible for producing a given outcome within a larger game.

• Dynamics

  • The result of putting rules in motion.

• Avatar

  • The direct representation of a player in a game.

• Playtesting

  • The systematic testing of gameplay, systems, balance, and interface to find all the errors, inconsistencies, or issues and report them to the design team.

• Platform

  • The console, device, or system upon which the game will be played.

Common Terms for Digital Game Design

• Pitch

  • A brief “elevator speech” given to a game publisher or VC (venture capitalist) to solicit funding for the project.

• Concept Document

  • A one-to-three page document that provides a high-level overview of a proposed game.

• Proposal

  • A five-to-20 page document that provides a more in-depth view of the potential game than a concept document.

• Design Document

  • A “living” document that is continuously undergoing revision, it contains the entire design vision for the game.

• Engine

  • The core program that runs the game.

• Game Jam

  • A timed period during which a group of individuals attempts to create a complete game while working around the clock.

• Milestone

  • A point at which the developer is expected to deliver some type of predetermined content.

• Alpha

  • The milestone at which all systems have been implemented and all code is theoretically complete.

• Beta

  • The milestone at which all systems and content are in the game.

• Gold

  • The final version of the game that is then released.

Common Terms for Non Digital Game Design

• Game Bits

  • The informal name given to the pieces and parts that ship with a game.

• Card Game

  • A game that uses playing cards.

• Board Game

  • A game whose board serves as the playing field for the game.

• Tile Game

  • A type of game where the game “board” is made out of tiles.

• Dice Game

  • A game that uses dice as the main bits, typically lacking a board, cards or tiles.

Approaches to Game Design

Game design has different approaches, depending on the situation and target medium.

• Blue-sky

  • Pure blue-sky design allows designers to consider lots of possibilities and ideas with few restrictions.

• Slow boil

  • Sometimes, the design of a game takes days, but other times, it may be weeks, months, or even years.

• Mechanic

  • The strength of a game is based on the sheer strength of a key mechanic.

• Story

  • Developing a game based on a story is also a common design approach, to stick closely to the story of the book, television show, or movie in question.

• Iterative Design

  1. Rapid Prototype: The key point of prototyping is that it has to be rapid. The more iterations a game can undergo, the higher quality it will be.

  2. Playtest: This is a full or partial play session to identify strengths and weaknesses in the design.

  3. Revision: Changes are made in the design to fortify weaknesses and build upon strengths.

  4. Repeat: Go back to the prototype and start the next iteration.

Also

• Don’t write your rules down until you have to write your rules down.
• Be wary of putting a “Band-Aid” on top of a problem, but leaving the problem in the game.

Constraints on (Digital) Game Design

• What is the approximate budget for this game?
• What is the desired time frame for completion?
• What is the desired platform for the game?
• What is the target audience for the game?
• What is the desired rating for the game?
• Do you have any particular genre or category of game in mind?
• Are there any features that you’d like to see in the game?

Overcoming Designer’s Block

Make a Resource Limited (or Unlimited)

Make a list of all the resources in your game and note whether they are limited or unlimited. Next, and one at a time, change the resources from unlimited to limited (or vice versa), and play a session of the game.

Interact with Your Friends

Look at the various actions your players are performing in a game. Next, ask yourself, How could someone else stop that from happening or make it happen even faster?

Mess with the Play Order

Consider allowing players to mess with the sequence of events in your game.

Kill a Rule

Identify the core of the game and start by killing every rule that doesn’t directly affect the core of the game.

Use the "Rule of Two"

Take one of the game’s values and either multiply or divide it by two.

Game Design Atoms

Game State, Views, etc.

• Game state

  • A collection of all relevant virtual information that may change during play.

• Game view

  • A part of the game state that a player can see.

• Game space

  • The entire "area" of the game, where game pieces exist.

• Avatar

  • The thing which represents the player in the game space.

• Assets, or Game Bits

  • The icons, sprites, models, or physical items required to play the game.

The current condition of all avatars and assets is part of the game state in the overall game space.

Mechanics

Game Mechanic is another term for "rule".

• What really makes the game space a very interesting place to be are game mechanics.

• Mechanics act upon the players, avatars and game bits, game state and game views, ...

• ...and describe all of the ways to change the game state.

• A mechanic makes every game designer ask, "What can I make with this?"; It is all about possibility.

Mechanics and the Game State

Here are some common classes of mechanics that are usually found in games:

• Setup

  • There must always be at least one rule that describes how the game begins.

• Victory conditions

  • There must always be at least one rule that describes how the game is won.

• Progression of play

  • Rules that answer "Who goes first, and how?" or "Is the game turn based?"

• Player actions

  • Sometimes referred to as "verbs," some of the most important mechanics describe what players can do and what effect those actions have on the game state.

• Game views

  • The mechanics that define exactly what information each player knows at any given time.

Dynamics

• Game Dynamic
  • The pattern of play that comes from the mechanics once they're set in motion by players.

The dynamics are part of the play experience, but not all are explicitly defined or enforced by the mechanics.

Goal and Theme

Layered on top of all things are game goals.

• Goals can also be called "missions" or "quests" and provide rewards to motivate the player.

• The ultimate game goal is, of course, the victory condition.

What the game is "about" goes by many names: theme, colour, etc.

• It describes the aspect of games that lies outside of the mechanics and yet somehow, when chosen well, can make the mechanics feel more natural.

• None of the theme information is strictly necessary to the gameplay.

What Comes First?

Game state, avatars, mechanics, dynamics, theme...where does a designer begin?

• A theme. If a game is going to be heavily themed, the designer might set the mechanics and core around that theme.

• An individual mechanic. In this case further rules, the core, levels, etc. can be designed to further explore that specific mechanic.

Putting It All Together

At first, you won't get much of a game.

• The point is to get a basic game, and then make it more interesting to the player through the addition of elements of strategy or chance, or by adding or removing mechanics to strengthen the game.

• Learn to experiment and take joy in your designs and in the process of design.

• Remember that you can make a game about anything.

• It's normal to feel intimidated by the process at first.

Design a game and be hooked.

Puzzle Design

Basic Puzzle Characteristics

A puzzleis very broadly defined as a non-combat event or series of events that requires the player to complete a task or an action or some series of tasks or actions in order to progress play.

Necessary Traits of Puzzle Design

• Affordances:

  • It should be easy to figure out the rules and controls.

• Identifiable patterns:

  • Patterns should be clear so that players are able to identify a series of possibilities.

• Ease of use:

  • Good user interface (UI).

• Reward player skill:

  • The player should be able to improve his or her skill if is encountering the puzzle many times.

The following additional traits generally cause the puzzle to be more interesting to the players:

• Immersion:

  • Smooth transition between the main game and mini-game

• Meaningful consequences

  • in the game, outside of the mini-game: Not just "you unlock a door" but "you get cool items."

What Makes Puzzles Fun?

The inclusion of puzzles should only be done to support the core of the main game.

• Puzzles are a direct obstacle to reaching a goal.

• The fun in a puzzle generally comes from the thrill of victory, the sense of achievement of solving a difficult puzzle, and the gradual sense of mastery that precedes those moments.

Puzzle Types

• Riddles

  • Are questions that have one right, not obvious, answer.
  • Involves a play on words that requires a non-standard interpretation in order to solve it.
  • Require time and effort to create, yet is only encountered by a player once.
  • Aren't particularly fun to try to solve for the majority of players.
  • Some techniques to make riddles less frustrating are:
    • Make riddles optional.
      • For example, giving useful but non-essential items.
    • Offer clues.
      • For example, how many letters are in the answer, or getting hints by talking to NPCs.
    • Allow alternate solutions. - By giving the option to complete a different challenge.

      There are two sisters: one gives birth to the other and she, in turn, gives birth to the first. Who are the two sisters?

• Lateral Thinking

  • Pose tricky questions that have a single correct answer.

  • Lead players make assumptions that are not true.

  • Solving requires the player to question his or her assumptions.

  • Like riddles, lateral-thinking puzzles:

    • Are expensive to create; can only be experienced once and cause frustration from blocking the game.
    • Are addressed by the same game design solutions.

    

    Place a pencil on this sheet of paper. Without removing the pencil from the page, draw four straight lines in such a way that all nine dots are connected. (solution)

• Spatial Reasoning

  • Involve the manipulation of objects, either in the mind or on the playing surface.

• Pattern Recognition

  • Require the player to look for and identify a pattern when presented with information.

• Logic

  • Require the player to take a set of given information and derive additional information to find the solution.

  • You have four orbs, coloured black, blue, red and yellow.
  • You must place them on four pedestals in the correct order.
  • Black is on the left.
  • Red is next to blue.
  • Yellow is to the right of red.

• Exploration

  • For many players, exploration is fun in and of itself.
  • Locating a specific person in a large town,
  • finding a path through a maze-like series of corridors,
  • or finding all of the treasure chests on the current level.

    It can also become an obstacle when players encounter an area they cannot enter or cross.

• Item Use

  • The player must figure out which item(s) to use, in what order, to solve a particular challenge.
  • Are more challenging if items can be combined or used on each other, or if they are used in non-obvious ways.
  • Clues can be given about non-obvious item use.

All for One and One for All

Once it's determined that a puzzle is too easy or too difficult to solve, there are a few things the designer can do to balance things accordingly

• Add or remove additional clues.

  • Giving successive hints makes puzzles easier to solve.

• Move the clues around.

  • If clues are located right next to the puzzle, players can see the connection easily. If they are found far in the map, the player may not immediately make the connection, which increases the difficulty.

• Allow multiple solutions.

  • If many of your testers are trying a particular invalid solution, you can either change the puzzle to make that solution correct, or provide additional clues to make it clear that the invalid solution will not work.

• Offer dynamic, play-sensitive help.

  • Some games offer the player additional help after he has failed at a task the first time.

• Make use of dynamic difficulty adjustment (DDA).

  • The game makes itself easier or harder based on how the player is doing in order to preserve a proper level of challenge.

• Remove linearity.

  • If players are prevented from going in a particular direction they should have another direction to go or other options — replace a single goal with multiple ones.

• Add a time limit.

  • A relatively simple puzzle becomes more challenging when the player is under time pressure.

• Add or remove feedback.

  • With no feedback, the player must continue trying with no additional information. But if some indication of why their solution did not work is given, they can adjust their approach.

• Test the game on a variety of players.

  • Some game designers make the mistake of using skilled players as their only gauge of difficulty. Nothing reveals potential stuck points like a fresh battery of testers introduced to the game on a regular basis.

Elements of Chance

The Role (Roll?) of Chance in Games

Delaying or Preventing Solvability

A game is solvable if the entire possibility space is known ahead of time and can be exploited such that a specific player, playing correctly can always win (or draw). Once solved, a game loses the fun: the uncertain outcome, and struggle toward a goal. Something must be done to keep the game "fresh".

• Random elements prevents us from mastering the game.
• The same exact decisions may lead to different outcomes.

Making Play "Competitive" for All Players

If all games were all about skill (like Chess), the strongest player would always win. The weaker player simply gets up and walks away determined to never play the game again.

Random elements offer an advantage and occasionally allow a less experienced player to win and keep all players interested for longer in two ways:

• There is always the chance of victory.
• The sting of defeat is lessened by blaming bad luck.

Increasing Variety

Games with no random elements always start exactly the same, and patterns emerge.

• When a random element is introduced, players must cope with a wider variety of situations.

Adding random elements in the right ways can increase the variety of a player's experience, thus increasing the replay value of a game.

Creating Dramatic Moments

When a player carefully crafts a strategy and then has to depend on the roll the dice (or what have you) to see if his plan succeeds, that moment of truth can be deliciously tense.

• Even without strategy, watching a random process play out can be extremely compelling in the right circumstances.

The level of excitement or tension created by chance increases in direct proportion to how much one has riding on the results.

Enhancing Decision Making

The essence of most games is the decisions that the players make. In a pure strategy game, players have complete information and know the exact outcome of every move that they make. Since all variables are known, some decisions aren't particularly exciting.

• When random elements exist in a game, there is no longer a strategy that is always right.

• A player thus analyses the different moves: their relative risks and benefits, and weighs them with respect to their perceived position in the game.

Since there are unknown elements, the decisions become more complicated and thus more compelling.

Mechanics of Chance

Dice

Rolling a single die creates a random number between 1 and the number of faces on the die, with each number having an equal chance of being rolled.

• We write $nDm$ to refer to $n$ equal dice, each with $m$ sides.

• With a $1Dn$ each value $1,\dots ,n$ has an equal chance; Rolling a single die is as random as you can get.

• Rolling multiple dice and adding them together, the result is no longer equally random.

  • The numbers in the middle are rolled more frequently while the numbers at the extreme ends are rolled only rarely.

  • The frequency of rolls becomes similar to a "bell curve."

• More dice, less randomness (the center results are more probable).

• More faces, more randomness (the results range increases).

With dice, previous results do not influence future ones.

• Gamblers often ignore this fact and assume that the dice are "hot" or "cold," a fallacy that game designers cannot afford to make.

Cards

Cards are wonderfully versatile game elements. Cards can be:

• Shuffled, randomizing their order.

• Played face-down on the table, making their information hidden from all players.

• Dealt to players who can only look at their own cards and no one else's, giving each player privileged information.

• Used as resources, either by being kept in a hand, in a pile, or played in an area in front of an individual player.

• Used to track game information without adding randomness.

Since there is a finite number of cards included with any game, revealing a card affects the probability of other cards. The probabilities are reset when all cards are collected and reshuffled.

Pseudo-Random Number Generators

A pseudo-random number is a number generated by a computer that is technically not random, but that is close enough for the purposes of most games.

• Pseudo-random numbers can be of every type imaginable, making them extremely versatile if a designer wants to include defined amounts of chance to a game.

• For example 1 + randi() % 6 simulates a $1D6$.

Care must be taken to ensure that the numbers generated are sufficiently random.

Hidden Information

When non-random information is concealed from the players, it is still random from the player's perspective.

• Even without any other randomness, the uncertainty of how best to respond to the unknown threats creates random dynamics.

• When hidden information is also random, there is the danger of the player becoming confused or frustrated.

Players should be able to understand the consequences of their actions and be able to form some degree of strategy that takes into account the random elements of the game; If the systems are hidden from them, their task of understanding the game is much more difficult.

Most other forms of randomness are variants of the above.

Spinner	Dreidel

• Spinners and dreidels behave just like dice.
• Flipping a coin is $1D2$.
• Cardboard tiles drawn from a bag are similar to cards.

All Randomness Is Not Created Equal

Is Poker a game of luck, or a game of skill?

Both are present. Which dominates the game? It depends on how many hands are played:

• For small number of hands, luck dominates because one player will have more "good games".

• For large number of hands, each player ends up with about the same number of "good hands".

  • There, the advantage goes to who can maximize the money he earns from each winning hand — The game shifts to a game of skill.

Unlike a pure random game, in one with measured randomness:

• The nature of the random elements are known and can be planed by the players.

• Each individual hank, spin, roll, etc. can be random, but with a large number of them, the randomness decreases.

Completely Random Games

Most games have at least some small component of skill.

• Two general kinds of game involve pure chance: Children's games and Gambling games.

• Some children's or gambling games also involve skill.

• But if you find a pure chance game is is probably one of these two types.

Children's Games

Young children have not developed the cognitive skills necessary to understand complex decision-making in more strategic games.

• They enjoy the games of pure luck—watching what happens as the random elements collide.

• Many children will attribute this to their own "skill" in rolling dice or selecting the right cards.

• In these games, the decision making is rather limited. You do what the game tells you to do based on the random outcome.

• Luck games that appeal to children tend to have a level of building tension that is resolved by a random event.

• They also allow sudden changes of fortune.

• Also allow the possibility of always coming from behind and winning so that the end result is never certain.

Gambling Games

The defining mechanic of gambling games is that real money is won and lost in the process.

• Without money at stake, pure-luck gambling games quickly lose their appeal.

• Most gambling games, even those that are pure chance, still offer choices.

• The element of choice gives players the illusion of control, since different choices lead to different outcomes.

Elements of Strategy

The Role of Skill in Games

A good game is a series of interesting decisions. The success of decisions is a measure of player skill.

Good games cause players to exercise their skills frequently and reward them with immediate and obvious feedback.

By constantly making decisions, the player enters a psychological state called "flow."

It is an optimal play state and one designers work hard to achieve.

Types of Decisions

The extent that the player's actions affect the outcome of the game is broadly classified as skill, as opposed to factors outside of player influence, called "chance" or "luck".

• The player skill influence the outcome of a game depending on the decisions the game lets the players make.

• The player experience involves making decisions that influence the game state.

A game designer should consider what these decisions are, and why making them is fun or interesting or compelling.

Obvious Decisions

When the winning decision is obvious the choice is not compelling because there is no reason to make any other choice.

• When the decision is blindingly obvious, a designer can remove the choice and make it automatic.

• Or, to take an obvious decision and add time pressure, changing it from a strategic decision to a test of dexterity. .

Meaningless Decisions

The only thing more frustrating than an obvious choice is a choice with no right or wrong answers at all.

• The choice has no effect on the game's outcome.

• It's usually better to eliminate these from the game entirely.

• The exception is related with the player's perception:

  • Some games offer a narrative that doesn't affect the overall outcome.

  • But the player perceives that it does, due to the way the game responds to those choices.

• Only on replaying the game is obvious these choices had no effect.

Blind Decisions

Roulette has a real decision of what number to bet on:

• Not obvious: the answer if not known.
• Not meaningless: affects the outcome.
• But not interesting: no information to base the decision.

Only the hard cash reward makes the game compelling.

• Blind decisions can be turned into other kinds of decisions by giving the player enough information.

• Ongoing decisions can be quite interesting because they change as more information is revealed over time.

Tradeoffs

A tradeoff happens whenever a player doesn't have enough resources to accomplish all of his goals.

• No option is clearly "right" or "wrong" but each has advantages and disadvantages.

• All of a sudden this feels like a real, important, choice.

• If one option is clearly better it becomes an obvious choice.

• In a balanced choice the options are weighed so that there is no single best one that always "wins".

With several viable paths to victory, players must choose based on their personal styles and environmental factors in the game, the decisions made are quite interesting.

The Prisoner's Dilemma

Two prisoners are independently asked which committed a crime. Each can choose to cooperate (saying nothing) or defect (denouncing the other).

• If both cooperate: each pays a small penalty.

• If both defect: each pays a big penalty.

• If one cooperates but the other defects: the first pays the maximum penalty and the defector pays the minimum penalty.

• One (possible) payoff Matrix is $$\begin{array}{lcc}& \text{A cooperates}& \text{A defects}\\ \text{B cooperates}& -1,-1& 0,-5\\ \text{B defects}& -5,0& -2,-2\end{array}$$

• The optimal joint state is when both cooperate.

• But the optimal player option is defect, that avoids the maximum penalty.

So, each player will defect and the final state is not joint optimal — This holds for one-shot games. But for iterated games, the dynamic become quite different!

Dilemmas

A dilemma is a tradeoff where all options will harm the player.

• Variations of Prisoner's dilemma are common in turn based strategy games.

• If a game poses a series of these decisions the dynamics change greatly.

Adding multiple players also changes the dynamics, especially if players have the ability to seek retribution against those who defected.

• If players don't know who cooperated and who defected, that can likewise change things, bringing in feelings of paranoia.

Risk Versus Reward Tradeoffs

Risk versus Reward, happens in situations that have multiple outcomes, but whose level of risk is different.

• These kinds of tradeoffs are common in board games with dice, cards, or other random mechanics.

• Players often have the option of making a safer move with a smaller reward, or a risky move with a greater reward if it succeeds and a penalty if it fails.

In these games, typically, a player who is behind tends to take more risks in order to catch up, while a player in the lead prefers to play it safe in order to preserve his lead.

Frequency of Anticipation of Decisions

A designer's goal, at the physical level, is to keep the player's brain busy with possibilities.

• The frequency with which the players make decisions is paramount.

• There are some cases where decisions are not frequent...

  • ...but the anticipation of a known pending decision sustains the player with thoughts of what she may do when decision time rears its head.

Strategy and Tactics

A grand strategy is the overarching means to achieving an ultimate, long-term goal.

• A grand strategy consists of several supporting strategies, that must be performed in order to achieve the ultimate goal.

Tactics are the lowest-level micro-decisions made when carrying out a strategy.

• Players make strategic decisions when planning for the long term, and tactical decisions when achieving short-term goals.

Tradeoffs make for interesting strategic or tactical decision-making.

• Fast decisions ("twitch" mechanics) are limited to tactics.

• So, "more strategic" games do better to focus on tradeoff decisions.

• "More tactical" games can use tradeoffs or fast decisions, with very different gameplay.

Completely Skill-Based Games

Pure skill games have no chance elements thus can be "solved".

• Games that focus on strategy and tradeoffs tend to have at least some elements of chance.

• In pure skill games, decisions once interesting can become known and therefore obvious.

• Designing a pure-skill game requires that there be enough depth of choices in the game that it cannot easily be solved.

Many pure skill games are physically based action games.

• Unlike tradeoff decisions, it is not about getting the right answer but getting it quickly.

• Human reaction time can continue improving over time forever, especially in games where humans play against each other.

Mechanics of Skill

Auctions

Players bid some resource in order to earn an item. The winner of the auction pays his bid and takes the item.

• Open auction: players call out bids at any time, each one being higher than the last, until everyone is silent.

• Sequential auction: players make a bid in turn order.

• Silent or Closed auction: players make their bids simultaneously and in secret.

• Fixed-price auction: the item is offered at a named price; the first player to accept the price gets the item.

• Dutch auction: offer the item at an initial high price, that falls over time until a player accepts the current value.

• Reverse auction: the item is a disadvantage and players bid to avoid it.

Designers can vary auction mechanics. For example:

• Items can be grouped into lots.
• Multiple auctions at once lead players to resource management.
• All players can loose their bids.
• The second-highest bidder gets a lesser item.
• The auction winner pays to some or all the losers.

Purchases

Players have the ability to purchase items, abilities, or actions at fixed prices. The choices come from which stuff and when to purchase.

• The players will be limited in the currency used to make the purchases.

• The resource is limited.

• The item may not be available later in the game.

Limited-Use Special Abilities

Special abilities give players the ability to break the standard rules of the game in specific ways.

• Players can gain advantages only once (or twice, or n times).

• The choice of when to use that ability becomes a compelling decision.

• Use it now or will there be a better use later?

The strategic nature of the decision is amplified by varying the strength of special abilities based on space, time, location, or some other factor.

• Using it now or saving it until later presents the player with an interesting decision.

• Weighing the immediate benefit against larger future rewards isn't always an obvious decision.

Explicit Choices

Simple, immediate, choice between clear options.

• A game gives a choice to a player, making clear the effects of each option.

• The player must then weight the relative values of the options.

Limited Actions

Managing allocation of resources.

• Having only one "avatar" all actions are taken by that character.

• When the player controls many avatars, choosing which one takes which action becomes a difficult decision.

• For example, in board games.

Trading and Negotiation

Whenever multiple players are working together toward mutual goals, a whole host of social choices come into play. There's the mix of cooperation versus competition.

• Alliances can be forged and broken.

• Promises of future considerations in exchange for help at present can be made: formally binding; non-binding; or else with a penalty when the contract is broken.

• There are even the metagame considerations of the social relationships of the players outside of the game itself.

• one plays a board game differently with close friends than with total strangers.

Strategic Evaluation

How do game designers assess the success of the strategy and tactics they hoped to create?

• A designer can gather a lot of information by interviewing players or watching them play.

• The level of strategy in your game should fit the audience's desire for the same.

Do players care when other players are taking their turn?

A strategic game requires players to care about the outcomes of each player's move, because those moves will, in turn, affect their move.

• In a game with a high degree of strategy, players are reluctant to leave the table, let alone the room.

• They are constantly reassessing the play state as each player takes his or her turn.

Are players making long-term plans?

Strategic games invite the player to form strategies that can be carried out over multiple turns.

• If players are stifled by the existing mechanics of the game or allowed too much latitude, they may be unable to see how their strategy could be sustained or achieved over multiple turns.

• When playing a game, ask the players what they plan to do or how they think they will win the game.

• These answers usually reveal a strategy or lack thereof.

Are there multiple strategies for multiple games?

The more rich the strategic opportunities are, the more diverse the answers will be.

• At the beginning of any given game, the player should have an idea of how he will approach the play of the game.

• A player may have literally dozens of different strategies to play against different players or to compensate for different starting states.

Elements of Twitch

Challenging the Player

Players play games because they present challenges.

• By responding to a challenge again and again, players eventually achieve mastery.

• Too many, too quickly twitch challenges may overwhelm and frustrate the player.

• Too easy challenges make the player bored.

• Tuning, finding the balance between challenges, is one of most important tasks for a game designer.

• To keep the game interesting, designers also have to allow for the game to become progressively more difficult.

Twitch challenges must challenge the player at an optimal level of difficulty.

Tuning

How to get the optimal level of difficulty?

Most forms of twitch skill can scale easily:

• Every player's ability level is different.

• Any level will be too hard for some players and too easy for other players.

Tuning: Difficulty Levels

Scale the game to be easier or harder, and then allow players to choose his own level of challenge.

Most forms of twitch skill can scale easily:

• How fast a player must react in a pure speed challenge;

• The window of opportunity for a timing challenge can be widened or narrowed;

• A precision challenge can be made more forgiving or can be assisted by some form of automatic aiming;

• The number of things to avoid in an avoidance challenge can be modified;

• A strict time limit for a timed challenge can be changed to ease or increase the time pressure.

Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment

Some games not only have multiple difficulty levels but also can change them on the fly.

• If the player is doing too well, the difficulty can increase until the player is sufficiently challenged.

• If the player is losing frequently, the game can ease up a bit so that the player is not frustrated.

Difficulty Curves

Some games simply start off easy and become progressively more difficult as time goes on.

This continues until the player is finally overwhelmed.

Playtesting

When tuning a game, a steady stream of playtesters is indispensable.

• Designers are too engaged with their own games to discern new players experience.

• The skill level of experienced testers can no longer objectively test for difficulty.

• New playtesters are required on a continual basis.

  • Their first reactions to the difficulty of the game should be constantly monitored.

Twitch Decision Making

In a twitch environment the player makes decisions many times per second.

• Most twitch decisions have an obvious correct action that the player should take.

• The challenge comes from executing that action quickly and accurately.

• It is not the thinking part of the player's brain that is involved...

  • ...but the instinctive, reactive part of the brain.

Pure Speed

• Perform a routine task as fast as possible...

• ...or repeat a task as many times as possible within a time limit.

In non-digital games pure speed shows up in causal and children's games.

Timing

For example, press the right button at the right time...

Precision

Besides simply to do something fast or to perform an action at a particular moment, a challenge can be to do something accurately.

Avoidance

Staying away from harmful enemies or projectiles.

• Some games show all of the surrounding area.

• This is mostly a challenge of keeping threats in view and heading for safer areas.

• Where the field of vision is limited, there is an additional challenge of identifying where the threats are.

• Sometimes, players are provided with an overhead view mini map;

• Other times, they are expected to just look in different directions a lot.

• When projectiles or enemies are very fast, locating areas of cover is important.

• If everything moves slower the concept of "cover" is non-existent.

Time Pressure

Any task becomes more difficult when a time limit is added.

• This can be an explicit time limit, such as solving a puzzle within three minutes...
  • ...or implicit: find and shoot your opponent faster than they can do the same to you.
• Time limits can be added to all types of skill (strategic and twitch) ...
  • ...and change quite drastically the game dynamics.

Balance Chance and Skill

Consider the Target Audience

Who is the player?

• This is an important question, often the first one that a designer asks.

• Different players have different levels of tolerance for chance and skill.

Children

• Many adults assume it's easy to design a game for children.

• However, to make a game that is simple and compelling is quite complicated.

Competitive Gamers

Players with a competitive streak tend to prefer games with more elements of skill.

Why would designers add luck to skill-based games?

• It keeps things unpredictable, increases replayability, and allows players of slightly differing skills to compete.

• The greater the amount of luck in the game, the greater the potential difference between the players' skill levels while still allowing for a good game.

Even a small random element can take some of the sting out of losing.

Social Gamers

Social gamers play to socialize and to talk with friends.

• Those who like to play for primarily social reasons don't care much about intense strategy.

• Some may perceive that strategy takes away from the "fun" of the game.

  • It's all about the play experience, win or lose.

• A greater range of luck is tolerated but there still needs to be enough interesting decisions.

• Especially decisions that affect other players, which leads to social play.

  • Again, the greater the luck in a game, the more even the playing field.

Professional Players

Games that can be played professionally tend to have extremely strong skill components.

• Many of these games have no luck at all.

• Others do have some luck, but the skill elements outweigh the luck.

Families

Some games are targeted at families that play games together.

• These groups may contain a mix of young children, older children, competitive teenagers or adults, and social adults.

• Designing a game that can appeal to all ages is challenging, but not impossible.

Generally, family games tend to have certain traits:

• Short playing time, so as not to outlive the attention span of youngsters.

• Relatively simple rules, so they can be taught to children.

• Some elements of luck, to allow children and social players to have a chance of winning against the more competitive players.

• Some elements of skill with interesting decisions, to keep the adults entertained and engaged.

Playtesting for Luck/Skill Balance

How do game designers know if their game has too much luck or not enough?

• There are some warning signals when observing playtesters.

The players are bored.

There is too much luck in the game, or have too low frequency of interesting decisions.

• To fix this: convert some random elements to player decisions, or else shorten the length of the game.

The players are bored on all but their turn.

Odds are your game isn't as immersive as it could be.

• To fix this: Find a way for players to engage with other players through gameplay, or else make turns shorter.

The players never become engaged, or seem confused about what to do.

The game is too complicated, or that there are too many decisions, or there is too much information for the players to process.

• To fix this: Remove some decisions, automating them or making them random, or reduce the complexity of the rules in general.

One player beats all of the other players by a wide margin.

This suggests the game has too many skill elements.

• To fix this: Add some randomness to the game, or add mechanics that make it easier for players who are behind to catch up.

Exchanging Luck and Skill

There are many specific ways to alter the mix between chance and skill in a game.

• Adding randomness increases the amount of luck in the game.

• Removing random elements results from automating them or replacing them with player decisions.

• Decisions can be added by replacing automatic rules.

• Player decisions can involve thinking, or twitch.

  • When a twitch game exceeds a player's skill, it becomes luck.

This means that adding an extremely difficult twitch element to a game can actually widen the gap between beginner and expert.

Combining Luck and Skill

Games may have elements of chance, twitch skill, or strategic skill, but one always has the strongest influence on the game's outcome.

Games of Chance

Games that are primarily chance tend to fall into one of two categories: children's games and gambling games.

• For children's games, adding elements of strategic skill is acceptable in small amounts.

  • They can even make the game into more of a family game that's palatable to adults.

  • Adding twitch skill is also possible but care must be taken not to give an unfair advantage to the adult.

• For gambling games, adding elements of skill (either kind) is quite possible.

  • If those elements are strong enough, they can even convert the game to being primarily skill-based.

  • Even the illusion of skill is enough to make some gambling games more interesting — Some players feel that winning or losing is always in their power, since they have free choice, and this adds a compelling element to an otherwise dull game.

Games of Twitch Skill

It is difficult to add much luck or strategy to a primarily twitch-based game: The fun of twitch games comes from the mastery of a difficult dexterity challenge.

• Any elements of chance serve to remove control of the outcome from the player, which reduces the ability of a player to master th:ame, which in turn makes the game less fun.

• Tactical elements are common in twitch games, especially those that involve shooting.

  • However, heavier strategy can be disruptive and can remove the player from the flow of the game.

Twitch games are an adrenaline rush, and stopping the action so the player can strategize breaks the immersion in the gameplay.

Games of Strategic Skill

• Adding minor twitch elements to a strategy game can be a pleasant way to break up long stretches of strategy with a bit of action.

• Adding luck to a strategy game can widen the audience by allowing players of differing skill levels to play, while still allowing the weaker player to win occasionally.

  • Too much luck can take the thrill out of winning, if a player feels that he only won because of random events.
  • The acceptable amount of luck to add depends on the target audience.
  • Competitive gamers will generally tolerate only a small amount of luck, while social and family gamers can accept larger amounts.

Targeting a Market

Why Do I Care? Isn't This for Marketing People?

Targeting a Market

• Not to mitigate risk.
• But to break into an opportunity or a purpose.
• Tradeoff for marketing professionals:
  • Targeting a market increases "market penetration" but decreases "mass-marked appeal".
• For serious games: Achieve a specific purpose, not sell as much as possible.

Learning About Your Target Market

Probably you know very little about what kinds of things will appeal to the market.

Where to learn about a market:

• Scientific Research in psychology or advertising.
• Previous Work from the game publisher.
• Outside Experts.
• Do Research: Contact people in that market; Ask what they would like.

Many targeted games fail miserably, often because the development team trying to make a game for a specific market get it wrong.

Abilities of the Target Market

It's important for a designer to take into account the whole picture of a target market.

• Reading Abilities Mostly age related.
• Learning Curve Using interfaces and controllers.
• Cognitive Abilities Mostly age related.
• Learning Style Men and women learn differently.
• Physical Abilities Ergonomic and motor control aspects.

Reading Abilities

• Children start reading by ages four or five.
• Even "Save Game","Load Game", etc. can stop a kid.
• In certain markets people besides children might have difficulty reading.

Echoing game text with voice-overs or using spoken dialogues can help here.

Learning Curve

• A game controller might be something older individuals don’t understand.
• If the perceived learning curve is high, people will dismiss it.
• Controllers that resemble a pen or a tv remote control use perceived knowledge to their advantage.
• Common conventions for experienced players may be unfamiliar and confusing to someone else.

Explain carefully what these elements are and how to use them, without initially overwhelming the player.

Cognitive Abilities

• Young kids give up on strategic games, disinterested or frustrated.
• Competitive players find chance games boring.

The cognitive challenge present in the game is dependent upon the target market... or will define it.

Learning Style

• Men use exploratory learning: grab the controller and go.
• Women use modelling behavior: watch first, or at the very least read the manual.

Take these different learning styles into account when creating game tutorials.

Physical Abilities

• Young children have yet to establish good motor control.
• A precision game, provided that’ not the main goal, might cause more frustration than fun. Older individuals, particularly those with arthritis, may have difficulty with the repetitive pressing and clicking required by many games.

In creating your product, consider the motor skills of your target audience.

Focus Groups

Focus groups are invaluable to game designers, particularly those targeting a market outside their own experience.

• Focus groups bringing together a group that represents the desired target market.
• They give an opportunity to:
  • Solicit questions.
  • Test theories.
  • Watch their game being played or considered as a concept.
• Often illuminates unanticipated problems, suggests improvements, and validates design decision.

Encourage your testers to give feedback by responding positively and not defending your ideas.

The Mass Market

Targeting a range as wide as possible across all demographics requires an understanding of a broad range of demographics in order to avoid excluding anyone.

Eurogames, in general, are family games that can be enjoyed by all ages, male and female. Their main traits are:

• Playable in 20–90 minutes. If shorter, adults feel it ends too quickly; If longer, children get bored.

• Short setup time. Setup is not part of the fun.

• Simple rules, short learning curve. Sitting still and listening rules for too long is boring.

• Cooperative, not confrontational. Confrontational mechanics tend to bitter fights among younger children and steer adult into non-optimal directions to avoid that. This does not mean the game can't be competitive

• Mix Strategic decision-making along with chance. As in "Chance and Skill: Finding the Balance".

• Minimal player downtime. Players of all ages tend to dislike a game where most of their time is spent waiting. Keep turns short or allow actions on other players' turn.

Adding and Subtracting Mechanics

Why Add Mechanics?

Often a feature must be added to the game. Sometimes there's just no way to know how good or bad something is without putting it into motion.

Publisher Demand

• The publisher funds the production of the game.
  • ...and may request changes from time to time.

The producer or senior-level designer's job is to play the various builds of the game, assess playability, and recommend course corrections or additions.

Changes in the Marketplace

Game industry is competitive, secretive, and constantly changing.

• An amazing new technology can alter the whole playing field.
• If your number one competition added some feature, you might feel compelled to also add one — particularly if fan and press reaction were favourable.

Developers stay on top of the market, regularly playing games, networking with others in the industry, and following industry news to keep their product competitive.

The Game Sucks

Developers never really know for certain how something's going to turn out until they have a chance to play it.

• Sometimes, the game just doesn't turn out — players don't feel at all compelled to go back and play it again.
• A feature that a designer thought was going to make all the difference seems pointless.
• Testers can't figure out what is going on.
• The game doesn't let people perform a certain action they want to.

All of these suggest additions.

A Sequel

• New mechanics are almost always wanted on a sequel.
• Industry moves ahead, players want more, and the blogs light up with cool suggestions.

The Brainstorm

You're playing the game when it hits you: something that would truly take your game to the top or at least move it up a notch.

• When a new idea hits there won't be enough time in the schedule to do it.
• Time scheduled for that was already used on unforeseen problems.
• The by-product of brainstorms, "feature creep", is a common problem in the industry.

Sometimes sudden ideas are truly worth the extra work and time.

Why Cut Mechanics?

Removing a mechanic in a game can have amazingly destabilizing and costly effects.

• Having spent design, programming, and possibly art time to realize it, to remove a mechanic doesn't always come easily.
• The first three reasons to add a mechanic also apply here.
• Publishers, Market Conditions, and Bad Gameplay might give reasons to remove features and associated dynamics.
• Also, there are some unique reasons to remove mechanics of a game.

Ratings

Toward the end of a game’s development, it is submitted to a ratings board for review and ultimately a rating.

• Hoping for a "Mature" rating and getting an "Adults Only" severely limits distribution of a title.

A developer must remove something before resubmitting again — maybe cutting some mechanics.

To Deliver on Time

Toward the end of a game’s production, features thought great suddenly don’t seem so critical after all. So they get cut.

• Mechanics go along cut features.

Core Check

It's not uncommon to review existing feature list and check it against the core of the game—the one thing that game is about.

• Does that feature make the core stronger?
• Is it superfluous?
• Will you spend time and money on it, and not really make your game stronger?
• Could that same time be used to make a necessary feature better?

After the Tinkering

The iterative process of game design works the same whether you're on the adding or the cutting end. Change it, play it, and evaluate. Repeat.

• Altering mechanics can have unintended side effects that are overpowering or underperforming.
• Stuff like this happens all the time:
  • A new spell, weapon, or ability is too powerful or too weak.
  • A new profession, race, or role is so good no one selects anything else.
• Even the simplest change can have adverse, unintended side effects.

The only way to uncover side effects is to play the game and evaluate how your present change affected other things in the game.

Multiplayer Games

Looking Forward

There are many opportunities left to explore multiplayer computer games.

Being Alone Together

In many games (incl. MMO games) players are alone as individuals or small groups within a much larger world.

• "Instances" force almost the same missions one after the other.
• There is a sense of not truly experiencing the same world.
• But, the social landscape is real and massive.
• "Instances" addressed having thousands of simultaneous players in the same area.

"Alone together" led to question whether there isn't something more to be had from MMO design.

Multiplayer, Multiplatform

Multiplatform is quite different from multiplayer.

• Adapt display, options, etc. to device.
• Unlike multiplayer, not yet well adopted.
• Content is visual and high priced.
• Not easy to adapt.

Why not a game playable in a mobile phone, a desktop, and a console?

Multiplayer, Multipurpose

Most (massive) multiplayer games are for entertainment.

• Also for training and education.

Consider the possibilities for virtual worlds used to their fullest extent.

Social Networking

Social networks feature game communities.

• The small scale of people's networks keep those communities from "massive".

Eventually, evolve to draw upon it for extensive socialization, recruitment, and play.

Types of Multiplayer Games

Multiplayer digital games evolved and diversified since the 1990s.

Quantity-Based Distinctions

Number of supported players.

• Massive: thousands plus.
• Different design approaches.
• No social interaction in two-player games.
• Four plus players possible trading and negotiating.
• Players grouped in teams: team dynamics.
• How to make the player feel like he makes a difference?

Besides technical issues, the number of players entail different design questions.

Play-Based Distinctions

Usually multiplayer games mix types of play.

• Four common types of multiplayer play:

• Real time: allow players to move simultaneously.

• Turn based: force players to take turns when playing.

• Competitive, PvP: player (or group) against player to achieve a goal.

• Cooperative, PvE: play together to solve a problem.

Most MMO games mix and let choose PvP and PvE.

Time-Based Distinctions

Real-time and Turn-based.

• Real-time synchronous: play together.
• Real-time asynchronous: allow play at any time, either together or alone.
• Some games mix real-time and turn-based.
• E.g. Real-time exploration and Turn-based combat.
• Turn-based allow players to consider their moves.
• Timers can limit turns or the game can be ``Show up when you want''.

Technology-Based Distinctions

Multiplayer games have many names.

• MUD Multi-user Dungeon, text-based worlds.
• MMO Massive Multiplayer Online.
• LAN Local Area Network.
• BBS Bulletin Board Game, hosted client-side.
• IP Bound to services like Steam, Valve, Switch.

Issues in Multiplayer Game Design

Multiplayer game design present unique issues.

Dynamic Scalability

The game should remain playable as players come and go.

• Consider a MUD:

  • It starts with only a couple of players.
  • Then players show up by the tens and then by the hundreds.
  • The world needs to react to the number of players.
  • E.g. spawn creatures with the number of people in a zone.

• Other kind of games have a different questions.

  • If the connection drops, should an AI bot takeover?
  • Can a new player join a game in progress?
  • Is there a limit to the number of players in a match?
  • Should player's rank each other reputation?

Griefing

Attacking or negatively affecting other players for enjoyment.

• It is rarely enjoyable for the targets of the griefer.
• To combat griefing:
  • PvP servers.
  • Reporting and Recording.
  • Block Communications and Contact.

Attract the Old or the New?

Several kinds of players must be considered with online games.

• Players who never played an MMO: Everything is new.
• Players familiar with MMO but new to this game: Tend to move in groups of friends.
• Players familiar with the game.
• Some mechanics make the game friendly to new players but less compelling for experienced ones.

Serious Games

Types of Serious Games

There are many serious games, grouped by purpose, not dynamic, mechanic, perspective, or play pattern.

Training Games

To put a person through a specific scenario to gain comfort and mastery over it before attempting to do the real thing.

• Military Flight Simulations.

• Teach Proper (Measurement) Techniques.

• Practice and Gauge (e.g. Selling) Approaches.

• Disaster Preparedness.

• For the most part:

  • Small Budget.
  • Very Specific Purpose.
  • Target Specific Audiences.

Play is a practice run for real-live scenarios. Games had always a serious purpose.

Health Games

Games that train people to perform health-related tasks and Games that make people healthier (exergames).

• Opportunity to train in a forgiving and instructional environment.
• Exergames perhaps larger market.
• E.g. Wii "console" = "exercise machine".
• DDR and alike not intended as exergames.

Social-Commentary Games

Games are an incredibly powerful means to get a point across and to spread that point via the Internet throughout the world.

• Political Games: to show a party's policies or show the fallacy of their opponent's.
• Art Games: when there is an artistic statement.

Advergames And Anti-Advergames

Some games are created for the primary purpose of advertising a brand. Other are created to actively damage a corporation's reputation.

• Many companies have at least a small game on their site.
• Trivia game for fans of, say, a television series.
• Related to "Intelectual Property".

Educational Games

Akin to training games, educational games usually target school-age children.

• Use the game's natural ability to teach in order to promote active learning.
• Related to "Games as a Teaching Tool."

Social-Awareness Games

Games created to draw attention to the plight of people.

• Particularly good at putting players in an incredibly uncomfortable situation.
• Even if players merely contemplate playing the game.

"This War of Mine" In the 21st century one thing is inevitable. War can break out anytime, anywhere. And if your city gets under siege, be sure you were not prepared for it.

The Purpose Is the Core

• Every game has a core: blasting enemies, bouncing from platform to platform, etc.
• For serious games the core is the purpose.
• Every feature must be measured if actually helps that purpose.
• Unlike traditional games, the means to that purpose are a bit different than in traditional games.

The Focus Test

Many serious games come with some serious funding, and those that provide the funds may want to see how well the game actually teaches what it was intended to teach.

• Focus Groups are setup to this goal.
• Setting up, monitoring the process of play is project specific.

Why Serious Games?

Why would someone want to make serious games?

• To get a job in a much less competitive field.
• To educate.
• To persuade.
• To present a personal belief in the digital realm.
• To make a real difference in the world.
• To avoid consumerism of mainstream game industry.

People come to serious games for many reasons. It can be fulfilling to design a game that persuade people taking vaccines, for example.

Casual Games

About Casual Games

Games that generally involve less complicated game controls and overall complexity in terms of gameplay or investment required to get through the game.

• Many people are playing casual games.
• Popular with people who ignore other games entirely.
• Lucrative and growing market.
• Traits, but with significant exceptions:
  • Be slower-paced.
  • Have simple rules.
  • Don't require a large time commitment.
  • Have a low difficulty level and be forgiving.

Pac Man, Centipede, Tetris, Solitaire, Bejeweled, etc.

Why Casual?

Casual games fit the lifestyles of many individuals.

Easy to Learn

Have very limited instructions and take advantage of assumed knowledge; Drag, drop, click.

• Begin with a two- or three-sentence description of play followed by actual play itself.
• Mechanics are almost always obvious just by looking at the game.
• Offer excellent feedback.

Contrast with regular FPS: What weapon? How to fire? Change weapon? Move?

Reduced Complexity

The rule sets in many of these games are rather simple.

• Use patterns already know.
• Repeat the patterns - this holds players.
• Simplicity allow for relaxed play.

Casual players want a break, not a commitment.

Casual Conflicts

Conflicts mast be casual.

• Player versus game: The pattern gets progressively more difficult.
• Player versus score: The player is trying to beat his or her last score, or the score of another player.
• Player versus time: The player is trying to do a task within a set period of time.

Short Play Time

Measured in minutes, not hours.

Lack of Commitment

Casual games are willing to wait for the players.

• If the player gets up, talks on the phone, answers the door, and comes back to the game, nothing’s changed and nothing’s lost.

This ability to come and go is one of the key features that draws people to these games.

Family Friendly

A casual game, is, by default, family friendly and contains no objectionable content.

Extra Material

• The godot engine and tutorials.
• Godot project for the formal game description

About Challenges

Challenges are the grading activities in the Game Design course.

• A challenge has two phases: author and reviewer.
  • In the first, author, you must develop a game according to a set of conditions and instructions.
    • In the end of this phase you submit your resolution.
  • In the reviewer phase you are going to score the resolutions made by your colleagues, by following a questionnaire.
• Your final grade in the challenge depends on both the author and reviewer phases:
  • The author grade is the average score your work got from your colleagues, working as reviewers.
  • The reviewer grade weights how much your score of each question deviates from the scores given by the other reviewers of that question. The smaller the deviation, the grater your grade as reviewer.
• You must submit a game in the author phase in order to access the reviewer phase.
• There are scheduled five scoring challenges.
  • You must submit, at least, three challenges (> 50%).
  • The final grade always considers the full set of challenges (100%).

Concept Document Structure

Your concept document must be a one to three pages document that provides a high-level overview of a proposed game.

The usual contents are:

• A pitch line.
• An introductory paragraph explaining the theme of the game.
• demographic breakdown, including target audience, genre, and intended platform(s).
• A bullet-point feature-list.
• A feature list breakout that explains each of the features in more detail.

Consider the following points while solving your project, and use them to organize the concept document.

• Outline
  • The target audience (at your choice), its key characteristics and how you addressed them.
  • The goals that motivate the player, and the meaningful decisions that keep him engaged.
  • The core of the game, its mechanics and dynamics.
  • The elements of chance and strategy, the reasons to include them and how skill balances chance.
  • The types of strategic decisions, tradeoffs, frequency, and mechanics.
  • The types of twitch, and respective mechanics.
• List
  • The System Design: the rules of the game.
  • The Content Design: the characters, items, levels, missions, etc.
  • The Game's Features and mark which are convention, which are improvement, and which are innovation.
• Describe the User Interface
  • How the player interacts with the game.
  • How the player gets information from the game.
• Explain
  • The game balance and design decisions you took to compensate unbalanced difficulty and luck vs. skill.
  • How the game mechanics keep challenging the player, without causing frustration or boredom.
• Describe the mechanics, ballance issues and other relevant design points.
• Identify key questions that you wold like to see addressed in play-testing sessions, considering the player engagement, game balance, and chance, twitch, and strategy elements.

Formal Description

Additionally, in the context of the Game Design course, it should also include (one to three) pages with a formal game description, guiding the data structures and functions in the implementation deal with:

• Game State,
• Game Setup,
• Game Views,
• Player Actions,
• Victory Conditions,
• Progression of Play.

Formal Game Description

We want to provide a formal, mathematical description of the key elements in a game:

• Game State
• Game View
• Game Setup
• Player Actions
• Victory Conditions
• Progression of Play

---
config:
  theme: neutral
---
flowchart LR;
s((setup)) ==> s0(state 0) === p0[[progress]] ==> s1(state 1) ==> e1{{victory?}} ===|no| p2[[progress]] ==> s2(state 2) ==> v2{{...}}

s0 -.-> v0([view 0])
a0[action 0] -.-> p0
s1 -.-> v1([view 1])
e1 --->|yes| e((end))
a1[action 1] -.-> p2

Game State

The essential information about the game.

• The set of players is $P=\{-1,1\}$.
• The set of boards is $B=\{-1,0,1{\}}^{3\times 3}$ the set of $3\times 3$ matrices with entries from $\{-1,0,1\}$.
• The set of states is $$S=P\times B=\left\{(p,b):p\in P,b\in B\right\}$$
• If $p\in P,b\in B$ we also define the following functions: $$\begin{array}{rlrl}s=(p,b)& =state(p,b)\in S& & \text{create state}\\ p& =player(s)& & \text{get player}\\ b& =board(s)& & \text{get board}\\ place(b,x,i,j)& =b^{\prime }\in B\text{ such that }\{\begin{array}{ll}{b}_{ij}^{\prime }& =x\\ b_{mn}^{\prime }& =b_{mn}\text{ for }(m,n)\ne (i,j)\end{array}& & \text{action outcome}\\ next(p)& =-p& & \text{next player}\\ col(s,j)& =\left\{board(s{)}_{1j},board(s{)}_{2j},board(s{)}_{3j}\right\}& & \text{column }j\\ row(s,i)& =\left\{board(s{)}_{i1},board(s{)}_{i2},board(s{)}_{i3}\right\}& & \text{row }i\\ dd(s)& =\left\{board(s{)}_{11},board(s{)}_{22},board(s{)}_{33}\right\}& & \text{desc. diagonal}\\ ad(s)& =\left\{board(s{)}_{13},board(s{)}_{22},board(s{)}_{31}\right\}& & \text{asc. diagonal}\end{array}$$

Game View

What part of a state $s$ is shown to player $q$?

If $s\in S,q\in P$: $$view(s,q)=s$$

Other games might show only some part of the full state. For example, imagine a card game; the state describes each player's hands plus the deck and the stack; but, for each player, only her's own hand and possibly the cards on the desk are visible.

Game Setup

How does the game starts, i.e., what is the initial state?

$$setup()=s_0=\left(1,\left[\begin{array}{ccc}0& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0\end{array}\right]\right)$$

Player Actions

What are the players actions and how do they define the next state.

The effect of action $i,j$ by player $q$ in state $s$ is defined by: $$action(s,q,i,j)=\{\begin{array}{llc}s& \text{ if }q\ne player(s)& \vee \\ & i<0\vee i>3& \vee \\ & j<0\vee j>3& \vee \\ & board(s{)}_{ij}\ne 0& \\ \left(next(q),place(board(s),q,i,j)\right)& \text{ otherwise }& \end{array}$$

Legal actions define a new state while illegal ones keep the state unchanged.

Victory Conditions

When the player $q$ wins the game.

$$victory(s,q)\iff \{\begin{array}{rlrlrlrlr}q& \ne 0& \wedge & & & & & & \\ & (& ad(s)& =\{q\}\vee & & & & & \\ & & dd(s)& =\{q\}\vee & & & & & \\ & & col(s,1)& =\{q\}\vee & col(s,2)& =\{q\}\vee & col(s,3)& =\{q\}\vee & \\ & & row(s,1)& =\{q\}\vee & row(s,2)& =\{q\}\vee & row(s,3)& =\{q\}& )\end{array}$$

Here we also define a draw state as: $$draw(s)\iff \neg victory(s,1)\wedge \neg victory(s,-1)\wedge \forall i,j\in \{1,2,3\},board(s{)}_{ij}\ne 0.$$

[!IMPORTANT] Note that e.g. $col(s,3)=\{q\}$ states that, in state $s$, all the elements in the third column are equal to $q$.

Progression of Play

Given a state $s\in S$, the progress (next state) that results from action $i,j$ by player $q$ is: $$progress(s,q,i,j)=\{\begin{array}{ll}action(s,q,i,j)& \text{if}\neg victory(s,next(q))\wedge \neg draw(s)\\ s& \text{otherwise}\end{array}$$

The state only progress if it is not a ending state and the action is legal.