Game Design Document

Image from Pixnio

For this weeks project assignment I had to create a Game Design Document using the website Dundoc.

Dundoc was easy to use and already had a template for a game design document that I could use to create my own, using this template I filled in the information necessary and relevant to my game idea.

Here is a link to my Dundoc game design document- https://www.dundoc.com/project/5847

As the weeks goes on I will be adding onto this document with updated information on my game concept and idea as I create my game.

My First Game Design: Unity Tutorial 04

Image from DeviantArt 

This week we went back to using the video tutorials from Jimmy Vegas with three more videos to watch.

The last video we watched went over how to create a cursor so that the player could see where their character was looking at all times and in this video we are shown how to put text instructions for the player underneath the cursor for a period of time. These instructions tell the player what button to press to perform an action. We are also shown how to place a little extra flare to the original cursor by putting rectangles around it on each side to form a box around the cursor.

These elements are then turned off so that they're not being displayed all the time before creating a C# script to make the text and extra cursor appear when the cursor hovers over the gem and make it so that when the button is pressed the gem is collected and a sound is played to let the player know they collected the gem.

In the second video tutorial he shows us how to add more things into the environment wich was explained to us in the first few tutorials we watched weeks ago. The rest of the video is dedicated to adding a weapon to the game and animating it, teaching us the basics of animating in Unity. But before we get into animating the weapon we must first contain the weapon within a cube to make the animation of the weapon swing look more realistic. The animation process in Unity is all about key frames and where you want your object to be on which frame.

The final video shows us how to create a C# script to make sure that the swinging animation doesn't just loop infinitely and to add a swinging sound to the weapon when the animation does play. The script makes it so that when the player presses the left mouse button the weapon swings and a swinging sound is played. This script can be used in the future if you choose to add more weapons to your game.

Games GDD

Image from Pixabay

This weeks reading focuses on the smaller more look over aspects of game design, the physical presentation, especially in board and card games. These are not concrete "rules" for designing games merely suggestions as this article says. Though many of these suggestions sound like common knowledge for a board game some games look over these small details.

First we must focus on the components of the games such as the tiles, cards and the board. Each tile should be its own distinct colour and should be distinguishable from one another so that people know which piece is theirs as many people suffer from some form of colour blindness. As for the board part of the game if there are spaces for the player to put their tiles on then they should be bigger than the tiles themselves to avoid the pieces being disturbed too badly if there's more than one tile on a space. In the same vein the starting tile should be clearly marked and printed in a different colour.

When it comes to the box and packaging of the game the design can be very important because it gives you the first impression of the game inside therefore a good design can really sell the game. The name of the game must be distinct and eye catching and it should be printed on the side of the box as well as the front. The sides of the box should be printed vertically and horizontally so that the boxes can be displayed both ways on a shelf and still be legible, this would greatly help shop owners.

The theme of your game should work with the rules that you create for the game and the rules for said game should be clear and concise. Don't write intentionally vague rules that the player are meant to interpret for themselves, if the player wanted to make up their own rules they would just make their own game. The rules you do create should be blind tested on people who haven't had the game explained to them by the designer and only have the rules to go on to see if the they answer the fundamental questions. The rules of any game should answer the most important questions about the game.

The things that usually get overlooked when making a game are the small things that may seem unimportant but are actually some of the most important things. One should always test their game with others.

Game Vision Statement: Single Saviour

Image from Flickr

Introduction

Single Saviour is a first-person fighting game for the PC that uses the Unity engine to place the player  into the role of a young boy in medieval times battling his way through monstrous beast in order to find the source of these creatures and stop them from tormenting his village.

Description

You are a young peasant boy from a small village that has been tormented by monsters for as long as you've lived, tired of seeing the people of your village living in fear you decide to venture out into the woods surrounding your village and find the source of these terrible beasts with the small sword you got from your father and the support of the village members.

Along the way you see and defeat many strange and terrifying creatures, when they are slain you realise you can take their weapons or anything else that they may have from them and use it to your own advantage.Many of their weapons have added strengths to them, such as extra sharpness or poison on the blade. You then use these weapons to defeat even stronger beasts as you advance into the forest, following the path of destruction they left behind, you hope it will lead you to the source of these monsters so that you can stop it and save the village you grew up in.

As you follow this path and slay these creatures you find yourself becoming stronger and you also begin to notice a pattern in the behaviour of the monsters. Some of them seem to be afraid of certain things, you're sure of it, if you can figure out what each monster is afraid of maybe you can use it against them. You figure out that some of the weapons you've gathered seem to harm some of the monsters more than other weapons.

After following the path and making surviving the onslaught of beast it leads you eventually to a large cave in the side of a mountain, you hope that the source of these creatures in the cave and that you have become strong enough to destroy it, whatever it is.

In order to make this game I will be using the Unity engine and because I am still new to this engine I will need to use tutorials to figure out how to create the monsters and the AI for said monsters in the game. Luckily there are many tutorials out there for the Unity engine, on youtube like this one which I found very informative and even on the official Unity website here. Unity also has an assets store that you can download creatures models from but you do have to pay for them and there are tutorials teach you how to create free models. I will also be using the Jimmy Vegas tutorials that I have been writing posts about for the past few weeks in order create the terrain and some of the script.

Key Features

I hope for this game to have:
-Open world exploring
-Multiple monster designs
-One on one combat
-Weapon upgrades
-Level ups

Genre

This game is a 3D adventure, first-person fighting game similar to the game Zelda but a lot more simplified. The game will be set in medieval fantasy times in an alternate reality where monsters exist.

Platform

I think the game and its mechanics would be best suited to the PC platform.

Target Audience 

The target audience for this game would be teenagers from the ages 14 onwards.

My First Game Design: Unity Tutorial 03

Gif from Wikimedia Commons

The tutorial this week was not a continuation of the video tutorials we had been using the past few weeks but it was instead a written tutorial on how to build a moving clock in Unity. This tutorial goes over many things that we have already learned form the first few video tutorials that we've seen, the main difference in this tutorial is the coding that it goes over.

The first half of the tutorial showed us how to add objects into the scene and how to manipulate them into the clock face and other extremities which we already knew how to do from previous weeks. I did this by placing the objects and setting the scale of them to the specifications of the tutorial.

Later in the tutorial it explains how to rotate objects on the clock face along the Y axis 30 degrees and  use this to create the hour indicators on the clock face. To create the arms of the clock we can use the same approach and at the end of that we have our finished clock face, next we're shown how to animate the clock.

This were the tutorial goes in depth into the code that makes the clock work. The tutorial shows how to use C# script to make the arms of the clock move around the clock face and how to make the clock tell the time, though the coding can get quite complicated, going into things like floating-point values,  I managed to complete the clock and make it work. I thought this tutorial explained how to create a C# script and code the clock very well.

Games GDD

Image from Flickr

Games are very different to books or television shows because the consumption of games is unpredictable in comparison to the consumption of books and television shows. MDA breaks down this consumption of games into their components, rules, system and "fun" and their counterparts, mechanics, dynamics and aesthetics. This article explains that designers and the players both have a different views on these components and it is important when designing a game to take in both perspectives.

Aesthetics is all about what makes a game "fun". When describing a game it's best not to use that word and instead use more directed vocabulary. Sensation, fantasy, narrative, challenge, fellowship, discovery, expression and submission are several words that can be used to describe a game. For example The Sims would be described using the words, discovery, fantasy, expression and narrative.
This vocabulary helps to define models for gameplay which help describe gameplay dynamic and mechanics.

Dynamics work to create aesthetic experiences, an example of this is challenge which is created by things like time pressure and opponent play. Using monopoly as an example we can make our discussion of dynamics as concrete as possible. In monopoly as the leaders become more wealthy it has more negative effects on the other players. As this continues the dramatic tension and agency disappear and the players who are not in the lead lose interest. Using aesthetics and dynamics we can come up with ways to keep these players interested, maybe rewarding the players that are behind or giving the player in the lead more obstacles.

Mechanics are the actions, behaviours and control mechanisms that players have in the game. This combined with the  games content, the mechanics support overall gameplay dynamics. Adjusting those mechanics can help to fine tune a games overall dynamics. Lets use our monopoly example again. Applying changes such as bonuses for poorer players or penalties for richer players could keep the players behind the leader interested for longer.

Moving between these three parts of MDA helps us to develop techniques for iterative design and improvement and help to control undesired outcomes.

Feedback Strategies: Feedforward

Image from Pixabay

Feedback can be both negative and positive but all feedback should be constructive to the work and the person that is getting feedback. Try Feedforward Instead of Feedback goes into detail about this.

Feedforward is all about changing the future and not dwelling on the past, the advice that is given is to help the person in the future, so it's showing them what to do right instead of telling them what they did wrong which people find much easier to accept.

Feedback is often taken personally no matter how it is delivered and many people find it hard to accept, where as feedforward involves no such personal critique since it discussing the future and so people find it easier to take on the advice and it would be more helpful then someone praising them in order to soften the blow of critique, this technique is known as compliment sandwich and most often doesn't work.

Praise is all well and good but as is explained in The Difference Between Praise and Feedback praise can also have a negative effect on developing children in the long run. That's not to say that you shouldn't praise your children, there are just more constructive ways to go about it.

When one is giving praise it is best to praise the process rather then the finished piece, for example, telling a child that they must have put a lot of work into their painting instead of just saying that its a nice painting and that they're very talented.

However even this form of praise can be tricky and it would be even better if parents would engage with their children by asking them questions about what they've been doing or pointing out one thing about the finished piece that they can see the child improved on. For instance, if the child plays football and the parent goes to watch they should ask the child what their favourite part of the game was or remark on how they can see that they have been practicing their kick.

Giving feedback and praise are good things, they can help people grow and learn, but only if done right and the right way is often the harder way. But this just means that the outcome of said praise and feedback will be even greater.