Experimental Game Design
DETAILS
Game
design document templates:
Game design structure
template
Pre class prep:
* Bring in one sample of best work (this does not have to necessarily be “art”, but the
best work you have done to date.) Not for critique, but to know each other’s
talents
Week 1: Jan 26
Personal Game
Archaeology
& Look at best works (not a critique)
Discuss
* overview of course
* creative practice in cross disciplinary collaborations
* review of studio practice & endeavor:
working in class on class work only
* Technical info for studio lab
* drop box info
* What is a game? * definitions.html
Jesper Juul The
Game, the Player, the World: Looking for a Heart of Gameness
* G. Frasca - Simulation vs. Narrative:
Introduction to Ludology http://www.ludology.org/articles/ludology.htm
* why do people play games?
* questionnaire
* Rensselaer Folsom Library Game Research Resources review
Experimental Games: Beyond FPS
Innovation Challenge, new interfaces, new
paradigms, digital and non digital.
We will embark upon a new experimental study using
the world as a site for a new kind of interactive experience that goes beyond
the ordinary fps type game.
We will work with interdisciplinary teams of
students from Experimental Game Design class to design and then play-test the
concept of using a space as theme or location or inspiration for this short
study project. Your game can be either physical or digital or combinations of
both, but it must create new types of experiences beyond existing paradigms or
use parody of fps.
Some Extraordinary Ideas:
XML, APIs and Apps for Walking
Artists
http://www.walkingtools.net/
The Graveyard
http://tale-of-tales.com/TheGraveyard/
http://tale-of-tales.com/
Spectre
http://www.spectregame.com/index.php
Paper Moon: http://www.indiegames.com/blog/2008/11/freeware_game_pick_paper_moon.html
Indie Games Blog: http://www.indiegames.com/blog/
The Emotiv
EPOC uses a set
of sensors to tune into electric signals produced by the brain to detect player
thoughts, feelings and expressions and connects wirelessly to most PCs. http://www.emotiv.com/
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/07/arts/television/07uncharted.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUPAyGWKd6c
Experimental gameplay project - How to Prototype a Game in Under 7 Days
This project is somewhat like a combination of the
artists/researchers:
Janet
Cardiff’s camera walk pieces
http://www.cardiffmiller.com/artworks/walks/ps1.html
http://www.cardiffmiller.com/artworks/walks/index.html
http://www.cardiffmiller.com/
Blast
Theory’s “Can You see me now” project (which is played
on-line and in the physical world) http://www.blasttheory.co.uk/bt/work_cysmn.html
modified PK Parkour ("the
physical aspect of getting over obstacles in your path as you would in an
emergency. You want to move in such a way, with any movement, as to help you
gain the most ground on someone or something, whether escaping from it or
chasing toward it."),
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEeqHj3Nj2c
and other pervasive convergence (or blended reality) genres of games such as in the research of Annika Waern
http://www.pervasive-gaming.org/index.php
, and Jane McGonigal
http://avantgame.com/McGonigal_THIS_MIGHT_BE_A_GAME_sm.pdf
.
Collective
problem solving in Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) as part of distributed campaigns. Possible collective games based on
puzzles no individual could solve alone, often use mobile technologies and are
solved by teams working together online. Each ARG develops an online community
dedicated to solving the puzzles put forth by the game. Storytelling, implementing an analytic system to
analyze and simulate the process by which distributed individuals contribute to
and shape a collective story.
We will experiment with the idea of restructuring
the everyday in ways to creatively see and perceive new perceptual
opportunities and awareness in everyday surroundings, not so much created by
the game experience, but rather revealed by it.
Augmented Reality Board Games:
ARhrrrr
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNu4CluFOcw
Augmented Environment Lab:
http://www.youtube.com/user/AELatGT
PIT Strategy is an Augmented Reality Game that uses a game board, cards to determine
your pit strategy, a webcam to look at the board and a screen to show the 3D
objects.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGsfDDxhFN0&feature=related
Augmented Reality Tower Defense for Nokia N95
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyWVH6jkDHg&feature=relate
Tools:
http://www.artoolworks.com/
https://ar.qualcomm.com/qdevnet/
More information on the AR SDK:
http://developer.qualcomm.com/dev/augmented-reality
PLAY, FASHION, & STYLE, REBELLION:
toxiclibs is an
independent, open source library collection for computational design tasks with
Java & Processing
http://www.vimeo.com/6644720
1.0:Promo http://www.vimeo.com/6417194
Blender Dome:
http://local.wasp.uwa.edu.au/~pbourke/papers/blender09/
Whiffle
Hurling? Bag Tag? Hey, It's Art
By ALEX WILLIAMS
Actors and artists in New York City are inventing high-
concept sports that are meant to be both games and art.
Video
Library Player: Arcade Games As Art
Melena Ryzik reports from the opening of Deluxx Fluxx, an interactive art
arcade created by the street artists Faile and Bast, on the Lower East Side.
Eva and
Franco Mattes: http://www.0100101110101101.org/
Micha
Cardenas is a 31-year-old man
taking hormones to become a woman. So, it's not surprising perhaps that
Cardenas views the boundaries of gender as being somewhat fluid and has
questions about what it means to be male and/or female.
http://ucsdopenstudios.com/2009/artists.php?a=Micha_Cardenas
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHEDym1aOZs
Wardrip-Fruin, Noah and Pat Harrigan,
Editors. First Person: New Media as Story, Performance and
Game http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=2&tid=9908
http://www.electronicbookreview.com/thread/firstperson
How adding fun can change the world:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbEKAwCoCKw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lXh2n0aPyw
http://www.thefuntheory.com/
Aram Bartholl http://www.datenform.de/
Ripsaw model by WoW
papercraft blog: http://datenform.de/1heng.html
Jump and Run Shanghai
workshop and public intervention http://datenform.de/jumpnrun.html
Pedestrian
Art in Odd Places is taking over 14th Street: That
means gold trash, mutilated stuffed animals and weirdo performance artists everywhere.
We asked nine of them to explain their WTF creations.
By Jennifer L. Nelson
Road Kill Stuffed Animals
What it is: Fake roadkill
on 14th Street between Broadway and University Place, between Third and Sixth
Avenues, and between Ninth and Tenth Avenues
What it means:
“Stuffed animals are nostalgic childhood objects,” says artist L Mylott Manning. “Destroying them is an expression of the
frustration, anxiety and pain of life.”
Ultra-Violet Beauties
What it is: A photo shoot—starring
you!—with a special UV filter that reveals what’s going on underneath your skin
What it means: “It’s about people directly confronting their flaws,”
says former makeup artist and photog Cara Phillips.
“I spent years helping women buy products to hide themselves, and I wanted to
expose the flaws that can’t be seen with the human eye.”
Midas
What it is: Busted, abandoned and otherwise
ignored objects painted gold
What it means: “We miss so much of what’s around us,” says co-artist
Boris Rasin. “The simple act of putting on a fresh
coat of paint in a color you wouldn’t expect lets people see objects as if for
the first time. We’re assigning value to things that otherwise have no value.”
The Pedestrian Project
What it is: Artists donning custom-made
costumes that look like the faceless figures you see on road signs
What it means:
“The characters get us to humorously see ourselves through these generics,” says
artist and costume designer Yvette Helin. “We all
want to be someone and yet we’re more like those icon people than we care to
admit.”
No Deliveries Today
What it is: Brightly colored boxes
continually moved from one location to another; they never make it to their
destination, wherever that is
What it means:
“The boxes are become a metaphor of displacement and forced social nomadism,”
says artist Miryana Todorova,
who collaborated on the project with Hatuey Ramos-Fermín. “It points out the changes that render
neighborhoods unrecognizable.”
Alegrias-
What it is: The artist pulls ski masks over her head (17 masks is her
current record), then slowly peels them off.
What it means: “New Yorkers will be forced to consider the many masks
and layers of identity we wear and their suffocating quality, as well as the
simultaneous desire to be seen and not seen,” says video and performance artist
Arielle Falk. “I just hope nobody thinks I’m robbing a bank!”
Landscrapers
What it is: Tape frames shapes in the
landscape, including bricks, sidewalks, crosswalks and windows
What it means:
“How it is, isn’t how it has to be,” says artist and designer Aakash Nihalani. “We need to see
the city more playfully.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHGbJ_SbTcQ
http://www.todayandtomorrow.net/2008/10/28/aakash-nihalani/
Elements of Creating the User Experience by Adams & Rollings
1. Concept
2. Elaboration: primary Game Play
Interaction model
Camera perspective
Gameplay challenges
3. Tuning
Assignments:
Projects: due Feb 2
* If you have not done so already, bring sample of best work to next class
* FPS / Virtual Violence Paradigm
Challenge:
Design Blitz Playable Prototype Individual Game #1
Readings:
due Feb 2
*
Play as Design by Brenda Laurel
Play as Design by Eric Zimmerman
* Ernest
Adams Design Philosophy
* Experimental
gameplay project - How to Prototype a Game in Under 7 Days
*create a short, one page, printed reaction paper to each of the above
Week 2: Feb 2
* Review FPS / Virtual Violence Paradigm Challenge:Design Blitz Playable Prototype Individual Game #1
* Temporary Teams formulate
The Oxymoron of Virtual Violence
Dead Rising
Violent Videogames as Pedagogical Devices
http://www.theonion.com/content/video/are_violent_video_games
Game
Over: http://www.vimeo.com/6426372
* show artists’ work:
- Kathleen Ruiz Bang,
Bang (you’re not dead?) multiview
website
- Gonzalo Frasca Sept 12
http://www.newsgaming.com/games/index12.htm
- Welcome to the Desert of the Real: Paolo Pedercini http://www.vimeo.com/4750691
- Wafaa
Bilal Domestic Tension
Description from an
on-line exhibition publication:
Iraqi born Wafaa Bilal
has become known for provocative interactive video installations. Many of
Bilal's projects over the past few years have addressed the dichotomy of the
virtual vs. the real. He attempts to keep in mind the relationship of the
viewer to the artwork, with one of his main objectives transforming the
normally passive experience of viewing art into an active participation. In
Domestic Tension, viewers can log onto the internet to contact, or shoot, Bilal
with paintball guns. Bilal's objective is to raise awareness of virtual war and
privacy, or lack thereof, in the digital age. During the course of the
exhibition, Bilal will confine himself to the gallery space. During the
installation, people will have 24-hour virtual access to the space via the
Internet. They will have the ability to watch Bilal and interact with him
through a live web-cam and chat room. Should they choose to do so, viewers will also have the option to shoot Bilal with a
paintball gun, transforming the virtual experience into a very physical one.
Bilal's self imposed confinement is designed to raise
awareness about the life of the Iraqi people and the home confinement they face
due to the both the violent and the virtual war they face on a daily basis.
This sensational approach to the war is meant to engage people who may not be
willing to engage in political dialogue through conventional means. Domestic
Tension will depict the suffering of war not through human displays of dramatic
emotion, but through engaging people in the sort of playful interactive-video
game with which they are familiar.
http://www.youtube.com/mewafaa
Iraqi-born artist Wafaa
Bilal presented a lecture/performance at
West Hall Auditorium, RPI Campus
Mar 5 2008 Second in the series, “Art and
Islam: Electronic Representations and Local Communities”. This is what
happened:
http://www.wafaabilal.com/html/virtualJ.html
*
Screening of film: Gamer
Revolution
* Discussion of
- Behavior:
- Two contrasting ideas about Play:
* Play creating culture
Homo Ludens written in
1938 by Dutch historian, Johan Huizinga
Huizinga_ Nature Significance of Play.pdf
"play-instinct" as an instinct that
emerged very early in human prehistory - in fact, he sees it as one of
humanity's primary instincts, one which provides the fundament for other
elements of society, such as religious ritual, war, and poetry. Huizinga sees play as a free and meaningful activity,
carried out for its own sake, spatially and temporally segregated from the
requirements of practical life. He has an esthetic approach to history,
where art and spectacle play an important role. He was held in detention by the
Nazis where he died in 1945.
* Play as a “safe” place to learn unsafe things:
The Ambiguity of Play
Brian Sutton Smith_ Play and Ambiguity.pdf
by Brian
Sutton Smith, a
Play shows us the dark underbelly of the world
Catharsis and inoculation against the dangers of
reality
Symbolic side of human culture
A child gets the chance to make mistakes
Adaptation, teaching skills
Introducing us into certain communities
Fate, power, communal identity, frivolity, the
imaginary, the self
Jenny Terry: Killer
Entertainments: Conditions and Consequences of Remote Intimacy. The project
theorizes remote intimacy by tracing the relationship between entertainment
technologies and militarism in the
The technology brings its military weight to
creators.
Problematics of Warcraft:
http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20060222/sirlin_01.shtml:
http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20060224/qhong_01.shtml
- Are virtual “violent” games cathartic or desensitizing?
- Screening & Discussion: An interview with Lt Col.
Grossman, author of Stop Teaching our Children to Kill
Col. Dave
Grossman believes that returning veterans are less likely to engage in violent
acts than civilians, despite the psychological effects of war, because of the
discipline learned while in service. However, he also cautions that "with
the advent of interactive 'point-and-shoot' arcade and video games there is
significant concern that society is aping military conditioning, but without
the vital safeguard of discipline. There is strong evidence to indicate that
the indiscriminate civilian application of combat conditioning techniques as
entertainment may be a key factor in worldwide, skyrocketing violent crime
rates, including a sevenfold increase in per capita aggravated assaults in
America since 1956."
LoPiccolo, Phil. Editor-in-Chief, Computer
Graphics World, Vol 23, Issue7, July 2000
From the
FTC youth violence report http://www.ftc.gov/os/2000/09/pitoftestst.htm
Trigger Happy : Videogames and the
Entertainment Revolution by Steven Poole
Videogames first came on the market thirty years ago as a marginal
technological curiosity. Now they are virtually everywhere. Videogame sales
have equaled movie sales. They are played by more adults than children, and
game design can even be studied in college. Yet videogames are still often
viewed as a minor form of entertainment, at best shallow, or at worst harmful.
Now, Steven Poole argues that videogames are a nascent art on track to
supersede movies as the most popular and innovative form of entertainment in the new century.
Media Violence:
THE
SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY
Theorist -Albert
Bandura
& overview
and The Bobo
Doll Experiment
US
| January 23, 2010
Simulators
Prepare Soldiers for Explosions of War
By JAMES DAO
The Pentagon is trying to
harness the high-tech wizardry of the entertainment industry to train soldiers.
Violence
and video games: http://www.news.iastate.edu/news/2010/mar/vvgeffects
Justices
Split on Violent Video Games:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704462704575590333558912068.html
WAR GAMES:
War Games the movie
Issues & ethics:
osma
games nytJanuary 10.htm
www.americasarmy.com (note absence of
extreme blood and gore)
- tried and true: www.counter-strike.net
(lots of blood)
- Tom Clancy based games: http://www.redstorm.com/
(minimal blood)
-Beyond Shoot your Friends by Celia
Pierce http://www.cpandfriends.com
Violent video games lead
to brain activity characteristic of aggression, MSU researcher shows http://news.msu.edu/story/337/
Philosophical ideas in cultural
products and the ideological and political factors at play in the formation of
new conventions in intellectual enterprise.
June 22, 2010 Grand Theft Auto Is Good for You? Not
So Fast...Most evidence suggests ill effects from violent video games By Dara Greenwood
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=grand-theft-auto-is-good
Rendition: Guantanamo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rendition:_Guantanamo
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/06/01/tech/main5054176.shtml
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLf0saVg4fs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mR_8fkAmuEc&feature=fvw
Breakaway Games
http://www.breakawayltd.com/about/overview/
Assignments:
Project: due Feb 16
FPS
/ Virtual Violence Paradigm Challenge:
Design Blitz Playable Prototype Group
Game #2
Readings: due Feb 9
* From
Sun Tzu to Xbox: War and Video Games by Ed Halter
* Baudrillard and Hollywood: subverting the mechanism of
control and The Matrix by Jim Rovira
* The Oxymoron of Virtual
Violence, J. Baudrillard
*create a short, one page, printed reaction paper to each of the above
Optional Extra Credit Readings:
* Homo Ludens: A study of the Play Element in Culture by Johan
Huizinga
* Man,
Play, and Games by Roger Caillois
Week 3: Feb 9
* Collaboration:
Issues in interdisciplinary endeavor
Beyond
Productivity: Information Technology, Innovation and Creativity
http://books.nap.edu/html/beyond_productivity/ch2.html
(near footnote 43)
Tips for successful collaboration:
some from my research
http://www.nwrel.org/cfc/frc/collabtips1.html
Scenario Planning
Scenario planning is a method for learning about the future by understanding
the nature and impact of the most uncertain and important driving forces
affecting our future. It is a group process which encourages knowledge
exchange and development of mutual deeper understanding of central issues
important to the future. The goal is to craft a number of diverging stories by
extrapolating uncertain and heavily influencing driving forces. The stories
together with the work getting there has the dual purpose of increasing the
knowledge of the business environment and widen both the receiver's and
participant's perception of possible future events.
The method is most widely used as a strategic management tool, but this
and similar methods have been used for enabling other types of group discussion
about a common future.
Scenarios are narratives of alternative environments in which today’s
decisions may be played out. They are not predictions. Nor are they strategies.
Instead they are more like hypotheses of different futures specifically
designed to highlight the risks and opportunities involved in specific
strategic issues.
http://www.well.com/~mb/scenario/#What_is_Scenario_Planning
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scenario_planning
Teams present mini overviews of their working game ideas.
Comics as cultural barometers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comics
COMICS: A TOOL OF SUBVERSION?
http://www.albany.edu/scj/jcjpc/vol2is6/comics.html
Machinima
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machinima
http://www.machinima.com/films.php?id=1232
http://www.zeitbrand.de/machiniBlog/WhatIsMachinima.htm
Paul
Marino
http://www.machinima.org/
Oblivion Tributé machinima http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=DaggeH#p/a
Interactive Machinema Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjqP-DlcPcs&p=E440830E85845B64&index=1&playnext=2
Machinima that Matter: A list of machinima films with a
Social / Political Message:
http://www.betterverse.org/2009/07/machinima-that-matter-a-list-of-machinima-films-with-a-social-political-message.html
Game Engines:
Game Engines:
List of Game Engines:
Unreal: http://www.cliffyb.com/rants/ut-ld-tips.shtml
Torque: http://www.garagegames.com/
Python: http://www.python.org/
XNA: runtime environment http://www.gamecareerguide.com/features/328/index.php?cid=GCG_MARK_022007
Ogre: http://www.ogre3d.org/
Unity 3D: http://unity3d.com/
others
* Artists working and hacking with game engines:
Kurt Hentschlager
Workspace
Unlimited
Assignments: due Feb 16
Project:
* FPS
/ Virtual Violence Paradigm Challenge:
Design Blitz Playable Prototype TEAM Game #2
Readings: due Feb 16
*
Lenoir-Lowood_TheatersOfWar
* Origins of FPS by
Galloway
*create a short, one page, printed reaction paper for each of the above
Week 4: Feb
16
INNOVATIVE
IDEAS IN GAMES
Consider
Delivery Systems
Arcade
PC
Mac
On-line
Dedicated systems
Hand held
emerging
Physically Based Games
Interaction
Survey: Cinekid
by Kyle McDonald http://vimeo.com/16215568
Kinect
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinect
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkSV1rXJ0pU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQUajj634Qk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPIbGnBQcJY
Kinect mods:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/22/technology/22hack.html?_r=1&emc=eta1
http://www.youtube.com/user/okreylos
Open source MS
kinect driver
http://git.marcansoft.com/?p=libfreenect.git
The plot
thickens...
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/open-kinect-contest/
and an OSX port http://vimeo.com/16734124
Physically
based games facing issues of Obesity, Coronary Heart Disease
& Diabetes ErGoGenic Games
Robert
Woods Johnson Foundation
http://rwjfblogs.typepad.com/pioneer/2010/01/as-we-mentioneda-couple-of-weeks-ago-games-for-health-is-convening-a-half-day-meet-up-in-new-york-city-this-coming-tuesday.html
http://www.rwjf.org/pr/product.jsp?id=29171
Eyetoy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au4d5anfjnA
DDR
http://www.ddrgame.com/?gclid=CLLE7u7p4oCFR4cgQodbStGqA
ParaparaParadise
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=paraparaparadise&search=Search
Wii
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73yDRm8KaWY
PlayStation Move
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9ybHddDMgM
Guitar Hero
http://www.guitarherogame.com/gh1/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PW_Zkc7WAS8
POSTMORTEM
Rockband
http://www.rockband.com/games
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmWJNidyqKM
Physics
and “real world” feel:
Soda
Constructor http://www.sodaplay.com/
NGame:
http://www.addictinggames.com/ngame.html
Crayon Physics
Game Art in
public spaces:
TheStreaming Museum: streamingmuseum.org
Education and Games:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/19/magazine/19video-t.html?ref=magazine
Simulations to test driver reactions: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/09/technology/09distracted.html?_r=1&hp
Games &
Simulation in Instruction:
http://www.seriousgamegroup.com/R347/readings.html
Mashable - College Curriculum Requires Undergrads to Play
Video Game “Portal”
http://mashable.com/2010/08/24/portal-college/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fz2_NkyTv8E
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A88YiZdXugA
In-Q-Tel
of Arlington, Virginia,
United States is a not-for-profit venture capital firm that invests in
high-tech companies for the sole purpose of keeping the Central Intelligence
Agency equipped with the latest in information technology in support of United
States intelligence capability.[4] started by Gilman Louie http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilman_Louie
a video
game designer and then ran the CIA venture capital fund
http://www.iqt.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-Q-Tel
The Idea Incubator Goes to Campus
Econopocalypse: the Marxist animated whiteboard explanation
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/07/04/econopocalypse-the-m.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
Augmented Reality' on Smartphones Brings Teaching
Down to Earth
http://chronicle.com/article/Augmented-Reality-on/65991/?sid=cc&utm_source=cc&utm_medium=en
Fast Company
Design: iPad App Lets You Sculpt Virtual Clay, Then
Print Out Your Art
Doodle jump http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doodle_Jump
http://vimeo.com/7263306
Assignments:
Project:
Feb 23:
Final Project: Experimental Game
Trajectory: Prototype 1 Concepts
working with permanent teams
Deliverables:
First iterations
(you
will build on this framework over the course of the semester as your refine and
reiterate your game.)
Include the following:
* concept ideas and sketches
* storyboards
* rough Game Design Document
(see templates here: Simple or Elaborate)
* Game design structure
template )
* list of technical information and methodologies of production: any necessary software, SDKs, and APIs, etc.
needed.
Please remember that your completed
game project is an innovative, original, purposeful work which goes beyond
conventional style gaming paradigms and shows depth of creative goals, sensitivity
to social issues, and quality of interaction. The game must be functional, or
at the very least demonstrate some dynamic game play with a high end trailer
illustrating the core game play concepts, and it must be accompanied by a
completed, (web ready, stand alone) game design
document and a well designed poster.
Readings: reaction papers due
Feb 23
* Complete
Freedom of Movement: Video Games as Gendered PlaySpaces
by Henry Jenkins
*create a short, one page, printed reaction paper
Week 5: Feb 23
Teams show Final Project Prototype 1
Concepts
Something
interesting:
Co-opting and commercialization of GTA
Gender
Extreme Volleyball:
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DOAX
* Dead or Alive Extreme Volleyball (Microsoft Xbox)
*http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=peDgQ64PdQs&feature=related
* Laura Croft
* The Game: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Uht63rvl2g
* The Movie:
Laura Croft film excerpt
Women of GTA:
* http://www.gametrailers.com/user-movie/graphic-women-of-gta-iv/210696
*http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6CgDLqo_oc&feature=related
* play “Hey Baby” http://www.heybabygame.com/info.php
Ridiculous Life Lessons From
New Girl Games
http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2009/07/games-for-tweens/
* Genderizing
HCI by Justine Cassell
* Skins,
Patches, and Plug-ins
Does Lara Croft wear fake polygons? http://www.opensorcery.net/lara2.html
Woman in the New Gaming Culture http://www.genders.org/g34/g34_polsky.html
Videogame
Firms Make a Play for Women
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704882404574463652777885432.html
Life follows Game: STYLE | December 24, 2009
Style:
The Year in Style | Lady Gaga
Michael Buckner/Getty Images
When Lady Gaga makes an appearance, so do her many influences.
And the all-important designer meat
dress
* 50
of the top Female Game Characters
Race:
*
GTA & Race
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRiD6EFFfUU&feature=related
*Celestine
Arnold and Digital Multiculture
http://www.psfk.com/2009/04/video-psfk-conference-nyc-celestine-arnold-and-digital-multiculture.html
Addiction?:
WORLD | May 29, 2010
South
Korea Expands Aid for Internet Addiction
By CHOE SANG-HUN
The government plans to open rehabilitation centers for adult addicts and
expand counseling for students and the unemployed.
Addiction:
show film excerpts from Second
Skin
-
Video Game Addiction No Fun
Compulsive video gaming is a modern-day psychological disorder that experts
tell WebMD is becoming more and more popular. http://www.webmd.com/mental-health/features/video-game-addiction-no-fun
-
The Addictiveness of Games, Steve Meretsky
- Addictive Technologies http://www.cpandfriends.com/writing/addictiv.html
Engagement & Social Formation:
- social conditions in MMORPGs:
http://research.yale.edu/lawmeme/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1222
- From
See:
http://www.gamestudies.org/0302/castronova/
-----------
Blended Reality & Some Emerging Genres
Immersive
Reality:
majestic
Play
the News
Documentary Games
Papers
on Pervasive Games:
http://www.pervasive-gaming.org/design_space2.php
Pervasive Play & Blended
Reality:
Inhabiting a
virtual space: gamers
maximize their play experience by performing belief, rather than actually
believing, in the permeability of the game-reality boundary. http://www.avantgame.com/writings.htm)
* McGonigal—A Real Little Game: The Performance of Belief in
Pervasive Play (download pdf, top paper listed at: http://www.avantgame.com/writings.htm)
Augmented
Reality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augmented_reality
Live
action role-playing games
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_action_role-playing_game
*
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yk2vR8w2sjc
Location Based Mobile Games
Bot Fighters
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BotFighters
Location
based Games
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Location-based_game
Geocaching
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geocaching
* http://www.geocaching.com/about/default.aspx
Can You See Me Now? by Blast Theory
http://www.blasttheory.co.uk/bt/work_cysmn.html
Activating Play
http://www.arts.rpi.edu/%7Eruiz/ExperimentalGameDesignSp04plus/EGD_Prof_Ruiz/ACTIVATINGPLAY/newwebsite/index.html
Life, Art, Game as one:
The Situationist International: Formed
in 1957, the SI was active in Europe through the 1960s and aspired to major
social and political transformations. They were a small group of international
political and artistic agitators with roots in Marxism, and the early 20th
century European artistic and political avant-garde (people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect
to art, culture, and politics.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Situationists
The SI stemmed
from the radical tradition of Dadaism , a
European artistic and literary movement (1916-1923) that scorned
conventional aesthetic and cultural values by producing works marked by
nonsense, travesty, and incongruity. They did this as a reaction to the
carnage of the First World War, replete with mustard gas (a chemical-warfare
gas, blistering the skin and damaging the lungs, often causing blindness and
death: introduced by the Germans in World War I), which was a war between the
allies (Russia, France, British Empire, Italy, United States, Japan, Rumania,
Serbia, Belgium, Greece, Portugal, Montenegro) and the Central Powers (Germany,
Austria-Hungary, Turkey, Bulgaria) from 1914 to 1918. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dadaism
John Heartfield
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/davepalmer/cutandpaste/heartfield.html
Hannah Hoch
http://www.understandingduchamp.com/
http://www.marcelduchamp.net/today_picture.php
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Some problems with reality: http://videogames.suite101.com/article.cfm/video_game_realism
Sony patent
towards real life MATRIX
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Visionaries of the Future
the Future: In a linear conception of time, the future is
the portion of the timeline that is still to occur, i.e. the place in
space-time where lie all events that still have not occurred. In this sense the
future is opposed to the past (the set of moments and events that have already
occurred) and the present (the set of events that are occurring now).
The Future becomes the past
* The 1939 New York World's Fair:
http://xroads.virginia.edu/~1930s/DISPLAY/39wf/front.htm
http://xroads.virginia.edu/~1930s/DISPLAY/39wf/frame.htm
Artists as “visionaries”
visualizing the future…..or ?
http://www.unknown.nu/futurism/
Futurists The
Futurists explored art, including painting, sculpture, poetry, theatre, music,
architecture and even gastronomy. The Italian poet Filippo
Tommaso Marinetti was the first among them to produce
a manifesto of their artistic philosophy in his Manifesto of Futurism (1909),
first released in Milan and published in the French paper Le Figaro (February
20). Marinetti summed up the major principles of the Futurists, including a
passionate loathing of ideas from the past, especially political and artistic
traditions. He and others also espoused a love of speed, technology and
violence. The car, the plane, the industrial town were all legendary for the
Futurists, because they represented the technological triumph of man over
nature.
Marinetti's
impassioned polemic immediately attracted the support of the young Milanese
painters —Boccioni, Carrŕ, and Russolo—who
wanted to extend Marinetti's ideas to the visual arts (Russolo
was also a composer, and introduced Futurist ideas into his compositions).
The Italian
painter and sculptor Umberto Boccioni (1882-1916) wrote the Manifesto of
Futurist Painters in 1910 in which he vowed: “We will fight with all our might
the fanatical, senseless and snobbish religion of the past, a religion
encouraged by the vicious existence of museums. We rebel against that spineless
worshipping of old canvases, old statues and old bric-a-brac, against
everything which is filthy and worm-ridden and corroded by time. We consider
the habitual contempt for everything which is young, new and burning with life
to be unjust and even criminal.”
Other Related Art Games
Natalie Bookchin
‘The Intruder’ [1999] an experimental adaptation
of a short story by Jorge Luis Borges, and represents a new hybrid form of
narrative that exists on the border of computer and video arcade games, cinema
and literature.
http://www.calarts.edu/~bookchin/intruder/
Eric Zimmerman GAmeLab
‘Sissyfight’ [2000] an intense war between a bunch of girls
who are all out to ruin each other's popularity and self-esteem.
http://www.sissyfight.com
Michelle Teran & Amanda Ramos
The Playgirls [2000]
http://www.ubermatic.org/playgirls/
Thomson & Craighead
‘Trigger Happy’ [1998]
Jodi
‘sod’ [2000]
http://sod.jodi.org/
selectparks.net games by artists
http://selectparks.net/
GAME PATCHES
Josephine Starrs & Leon Cmielewski
‘Bio-Tek Kitchen’ [1999] is a Marathon
Infinity game patch. In Bio-Tek, the player cleans up
the kitchen laboratory of a home biotech enthusiast using weapons such as dish
cloths and egg flippers.
http://lx.sysx.org/biotek/index.html
Anne Marie Schleiner
‘Madame Polly’ [1998] a video game whose eponymous heroine engages in first
person shooter style combat. The premise of this experimental game is
that the near future is characterized by data "population overcrowding"; it is flooded with human controlled
avatars and software personalities of all ages, sexes and gene lines. This
problem is exacerbated by the emergence of a prolific hybrid breed of software
agents called data ghosts, which are imprinted personalities of humans who
continue to participate, to learn and thrive well beyond the life span of their
physically human bodies.
Playskins
Robert Nideffer
Tomb Raider patch [1999]
http://switch.sjsu.edu/CrackingtheMaze/robert.html
So simple
but so wonderful:
Passage
http://sourceforge.net/projects/hcsoftware/files/Passage/v2/Passage_v2_Windows.exe/download"Passage,
created by Jason Rohrer, is an exercise in gaming minimalism. Made for korokomi's gamma 256 competition,
It's only five minutes long, it weighs in at less than 500kb, it takes place on
a 100x16 field of pixels, and it only requires the arrow keys. "--John
Schwartz, EGD Fall 09
Exhibits:
http://switch.sjsu.edu/web/v5n2/index2.html
http://www.re-load.org/
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
*
on Storyboarding: http://www.mediaed.org.uk/posted_documents/Storyboarding.html
Storyboard examples: http://movies.warnerbros.com/ed/cmp/storyboards.html
http://movies.warnerbros.com/eraser/cmp/sketches.html
http://sleepers.warnerbros.com/cmp/storyboards.html
What
went wrong so things can go right:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Assignment: due March 2
Work on Phase I Proposal
& Formal Group Presentation
Readings: due March 2
* Adams
and Rollings, Creating the User Experience
* Adams
and Rollings The Level Design Process
**create a short, one
page, printed reaction paper for each
extra credit readings:
* The Construction of Experience: Interface as Content David Rokeby
*Everything But the Words: A
Dramatic Writing Primer for Gamers
by Hal Barwood
* Storytelling in Action by Bob Bates
Week 6: March 2
Teams show Phase I Proposal & Formal
Group Presentation
Character Design
Matt
Musante emac ‘07
Character Development
- Building
Character- An Analysis of Character Creation by Steve Meretzky
- Building Character By Toby Gard
- Motion
SPORTS
| July 04, 2009
College
Stars Sue Over Likenesses in Video Games
By KATIE THOMAS
Two quarterbacks contend the N.C.A.A. and a video game manufacturer should pay
college athletes for using their likenesses in popular electronic games
Are we
constructing our game characters or are they constructing us? and
http://hyperdivine.deviantart.com/art/Retribution-Male-Civilian-75371711
http://hyperdivine.deviantart.com/art/Realtime-Photo-Realistic-Male-83834185
http://hyperdivine.deviantart.com/gallery/
http://furipon.deviantart.com/art/3D-Chibi-Yosuke-138169644
STYLE | December 24, 2009
Style:
The Year in Style | Lady Gaga
Michael
Buckner/Getty Images
When Lady Gaga makes an appearance, so do her many influences.
Realism in Virtual Characters:
Making of
La espera by Jorge Suarez
http://www.3dm3.com/forum/articles.php?action=viewarticle&artid=176
http://www.3dtotal.com/galleries/
Realism in 3d: Krishnamurti Martins Costa, aka Antropus
http://www.cgcon.net/public/speaker/speaker.php?id=29&imgId=1
http://www.antropus.com/gallery/displayimage.php?album=80&pos=6
http://www.antropus.com/gallery/
http://www.antropus.com/gallery/displayimage.php?album=80&pos=6
http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread.php?t=45504
http://www.cgcon.net/public/news/news.php?id=36&page=1
Sculptris:
http://www.sculptris.com/
Specular
Mapping:
http://www.digitaltutors.com/forum/showthread.php?2210-Specular-map-doesn-t-show-up-on-SSS.&p=69893
http://characterdesignlinks.blogspot.com/
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/01/business/media/01disney.html?hp
Techniques:
Vector character design:
http://vector.tutsplus.com/tutorials/web-design/learn-a-professional-workflow-for-illustrating-a-comic-style-header-image/
http://www.blog.spoongraphics.co.uk/tutorials/illustrator-tutorial-create-a-gang-of-vector-ninjas
http://pinkzap.com/tutorial/drawing-a-characters-face-in-illustrator/
Digital painting:
http://www.studioqube.com/tutorials/painting/index.html
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/02/13/drunken-monkey-photoshop-tutorial/#1
Comic strip approach: Traditional Drawing, then digital painting
Tutorial
Environment painting http://airage.deviantart.com/art/Inside-Environment-Painting-2-29149738
http://concept-on-mac.deviantart.com/art/Speedpaint-step-by-step-34278775
Digital
Painting Tutorial by Vitaly Alexius
Clouds http://tutorials.epilogue.net/tutorials/perfect-clouds-in-5-easy-steps
Wet Canvas
Digital Painting Overview
Digital
Paint Portrait Techniques
A Concept Artist
Daniel Dociu
Combining photo and digital painting
http://fantasyartdesign.com/free-wallpapers/digital-art.php?best=1&i_i=241&u_i=68&srt=3&count=1
Feng Zhu Design http://www.fengzhudesign.com/tutorials.html
“avatars” – computer generated visual representations of users
– have become a crucial link between users and the digital spaces they
navigate. While the term “avatar” reaches back to Hinduist
scriptures ca. 200 BC, and the use of player representations in games can be
traced to the earliest known games played more than 4.000 years ago, it was
only in 1985 that the multi-user domain Habitat introduced the term for user
representations in virtual worlds. Today, avatars are used in digital games as
well as e-commerce applications, social virtual environments, virtual meetings
and conferences, and many more digital spaces and applications.
However,
avatars are not just an interface users manipulate to access and act in digital
spaces – avatars and their human users form complex relationships. For
instance, avatars may represent the users’ own or created identity, users may
develop an emotional attachment or parasocial
relation to their avatars, or the design or activities of an avatar may
infringe rights or develop an economic value.
Realism in Rendering:
http://www.cgchannel.com/2010/10/video-is-this-the-future-of-real-time-rendering/
The Uncanny Valley
In
1978, the Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori noticed
something interesting: The more humanlike his robots became, the more people
were attracted to them, but only up to a point. If an android become too
realistic and lifelike, suddenly people were repelled and disgusted.
The Uncanny Valley
Assignments:
Phase II Reiteration continue addting and
reiterating your work and reflect it in your Game
Design Document
due
March 9
Midterm assessments (please
upload all perfected work to drop box
for evaluation)
Readings: personal team research
Week 7: March 9
MIDTERM ASSESSMENTS
* Students show Phase II Reiteration Informal presentation
* Reality Check Studio
Reality check on scope of project, semester schedule
for everyone in the group including individual responsibilities and deadlines,
more refined game design document, research with artist statement including
treatment, narrative, more refined story board, and at least 5 citations of
games/ websites/readings/ literature/ films that have influenced you.
(conceptual geography,
maps, scenarios, trainers, strategies, symbolism, scoring, rules, etc.)
Discuss
- Genres
Genre and the
Video Game
Graphing
Taxonomies
Taxonomy - the science or technique of classification.
(in Biology - the science dealing with the description, identification, naming,
and classification of organisms - such as Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order,
Family, Genus, Species.)sample:
Taxonomy of your Brain:
http://www.thebrain.com/?gclid=CM7p6puvgpYCFQgRFQodcSCYEw#-47
ontology
noun1. the branch of metaphysics which
studies the nature of being and existence, (what “is”?)
2. (computer science) a rigorous and exhaustive
organization of some knowledge domain that is usually hierarchical and contains
all the relevant entities and their relations
:::::::so…a
taxonomy starts somewhere, but where will be entirely bounded by the needs,
goals, interests and perceptions of its designer.
To find taxonomies of use
to you, you need to first know what your own "needs, goals, interests and
perceptions” are in regard to the purpose of your search.
A
Taxonomy of Computer Games by Chris Crawford: from "The Art of Computer Game
Design", 1982 old classification, but contain the roots of most later
classifications:
http://www.vancouver.wsu.edu/fac/peabody/game-book/Chapter3.html
General Taxonomy of Game Genres:
“Flash” Games
First-Person Shooters (fps)
Action Games
Real-Time Strategy
Turn-Based Strategy
RPGs
Sports Games
Simulations
Adventure Games
Emerging
Empirical (focused on experience/observation, rather than
theory)
Literally any videogame specialized website:
http://gametunnel.com/ (categories on the
right of the site)
http://www.gamespot.com/games.html?type=games
(use the "All Games" menu below "Most Popular games") http://uk.pc.ign.com/index/games.html
(use the "Choose" menu left to "Show Genre" Button)
Ernest Adams & Andrew
Rollings, "Ernest Adams & Andrew Rollings on Game Design", New Riders. A well detailed synthesis of such empirical
classifications
For a Critical Refinement of Empirical
Classifications-
Mark JP Worlf, "Genres and the Videogames", 2000 (42
categories, available online : http://www.robinlionheart.com/gamedev/genres.xhtml)
Alain & Frederic le Diberder, "Qui a peur des jeux vidéos", 1993.
Some New Ideas about Research in Taxonomies of
Games:
Jan Klabbers
Principles of Gaming
and Simulation
Jesper Juul
* A
Multi Dimensional Topology of Games
* The Open and the
Closed: Games of Emergence and Games of Progression
Readings: Personal
team research
Assignments:
Prep for Phase III Game Prototype & Formal Group Presentation due March 23
Definitive
schedule for entire project which will be used for milestones for further project
development, continuation of incorporating critical feedback, game play,
polishing and refinement of content, methodology, delivery system, and game
design document
Week 8: Spring Break off
Week 9: March 23
Students show Phase III Game Prototype &
Formal Group Presentation
Guest Critique by Karthik
Bala,
CEO/Chief Creative Officer
Vicarious Visions Inc.
Player Created Content:
Ideas & Issues
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User-generated_content
http://www.gogaminggiant.com/2009/09/18/top-10-usercreated-content-games/
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/issues/issue_4/22-Player-Created-Content
In World of Warcraft the closest to user
created content we have are add-ons. But is it time for users to create
their own content in WoW?
Is it
Time for User Created Content in WoW?
Legal issues in UGC and Virtual Worlds:
User-Generated
Content & Virtual Worlds
Monitoring User-Created Content:
http://kalibreonline.com/2010/08/05/starcraft-2-blizzard-will-monitor-user-created-content/
Why
User Generated Content Has Failed to Change The Face
of Gaming
Revenue generating and UGC:
Leveraging the dominant format of user
generated content for World of Warcraft
players offers the ad instant credibility among the Warcraft
community
OTOinsights: "Design Lessons from User
Generated Content: An ...
Visiting Artist/Game Professional:
Ian Stead from 1st Playable
Assignment: prep
for Phase IV Game Content Informal
presentation due March 30
Week 10: March
30
*
Teams present Phase IV Game Content Informal presentation
Previous Rensselaer Student Projects from EGD:
http://www.arts.rpi.edu/%7Eruiz/ExperimentalGameDesignSp04plus/index.html
http://www.arts.rpi.edu/~ruiz/EGDSpring09finalprojects/index.html
http://www.arts.rpi.edu/~ruiz/EGDFall08finalprojects/index.html
http://www.arts.rpi.edu/~ruiz/EGDSpring08finalprojects/ruiz/index.html
Other
The Pervasive nature of Games:
Video
Makes the Movie Star (With Help From Adam Sandler)
Readings:
project research
Assignments:
work
with your team on
Phase V Refinement & Formal
Group Presentation
due April 6
Hooking up assets to game, further development of
game play
Week 11: April 6
* teams
present Phase V Refinement & Formal Group Presentation
VideoGames are Dead??
http://www.koreaittimes.com/story/4706/video-games-are-dead-%E2%80%93-part-2
Game Trailers
http://www.gametrailers.com/
Casual Revolution
http://www.jesperjuul.net/ludologist/?p=688
The Beatles Rock Band
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/06/arts/television/06schi.html?_r=1&hp
http://www.thebeatlesrockband.com/videos/trailer/
Kiri
Miller's entry "Just Add Performance" on FlowTV
http://flowtv.org/?p=4019
http://journals.sfu.ca/loading/index.php/loading/issue/view/3
Push. Play: An Examination of the Gameplay Button |
|
Stephen Griffin PDF |
|
Articles
J R Parker PDF |
|
Because the push button was an inexpensive way to
send control signals to a computer from a user or game player, it became the
most common aspect... |
A
Visual-Inertial Hybrid Controller Approach to Improving Immersion in 3D Video
Games |
|
Alexander Wong PDF |
|
Advances in various areas such as graphics, sound,
physics and artificial intelligence have improved the level of player
immersion into the gaming... |
Becoming
Machinic Virtuosos: Guitar Hero, Rez, and Multitudinous Aesthetics |
|
Henry Adam Svec PDF |
|
Media scholars Nick Dyer-Witheford
and Greg de Peuter view digital play as a complex, conflicted
site on the terrain of global capital; although... |
Dominic Arsenault PDF |
|
This paper studies the Guitar Hero video game as
a simulation. This is done by examining the game controller and the visual
interface, and how they... |
Interfaces:
Rockband:
http://josh.thegeekmovement.com/Tanenbaum-Bizzocchi-SIGGRAPH09_prepub.pdf
Rez -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHuQvctStmw
Sega's quirky, abstract
art-influenced shooter, an endorphin machine, video game inspired by the
abstract artist Kandinsky aims to overload the senses with its psychedelic
visuals and pulsating dance beats.
Rez for the Playstation 2
seeks to create a sense of synaesthesia, literally a
crossing of the senses, so that you can "see" sounds or
"taste" colours.
"Rez is an experience, a fusion of light,
vibration and sound completely immersed in synaesthesia,"
said its creator, Tetsuya Mizuguchi of Japanese game
developers United Game Artists.
The game takes place in a virtual world inside a computer. You play a hacker of
sorts, flying through six levels of cyberspace in search of the artificial
intelligence at the heart of this world.
But there is a twist to the traditional shoot-em
approach that makes Rez stand out.
Virtual DJ Every time you destroy one of the insect-like enemies, a
sound is generated. This sound becomes a form in the scrolling, flashing 3D
computer world rushing past.
Katamari Damacy-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqpPyhE5x2M
When the King of All Cosmos
accidentally destroys all the stars in the sky, he orders you, his pint-sized
princely son, to put the twinkle back in the heavens above. The only way you
can do that is by rolling everything on Earth into clumps so that he can replace
what's missing in space. "Everything" includes cookies, lawn mowers,
lamp posts, sumo wrestlers, bulldozers, brontosauruses ,
cruise ships, and more. Katamari Damacy
also includes a two-player battle mod e where you and a friend can see who can
grow the biggest ball of stuff. For one to two players.
Features:
Simple play controlled with analog sticks only; no buttons to press
Dimensions change drastically as clumps grow; 2-player battle mode
Ball-rolling and object-collecting gameplay with quirky, infectious humor
throughout Insanely cosmic animations; wacky musical stylings; royally contagious storyline
Readings:
project research
Assignments:
teams
prep Phase VI Further Refinement
due April 13
Informal
presentation
Week 12: April 13
* Teams present Phase VI Further Refinement
informal presentation
Refinement for
pre-review and three week trajectory for individual team work with assistance
in class.
The
Emotional Divide by Lee Sheldon
Studio: catch up and intensive work on
improving projects
Discussion:
Emotion & Poetics+
Emotion and Games:
*For the
past couple of years, Dom has been searching for his wife. He gets word that
she was captured in a Locust (the enemy monsters of the game) slave camp. He
finds her.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9eTN9Kxzco
Noah
*Here is the
clip that made me cry in Shadow of the Colossus. The best place to start is
around the 1:30 point.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SclbRYmGG9A
Evan
“Emotioneering”: Game Developer magazine cited David Freeman, (a noted film, television, and game
industry writer and producer) explaining the important role of emotion in
games.
"First of
all, many more people watch film and television than play games. Most will
never be lured into playing games until games begin to offer the emotional
range and depth of the entertainment that they're used to enjoying.
Also, a more
involving game experience means better word of mouth and more buzz. The press
likes to write about these kinds of games, which results in more sales. Those
creating games with stories and characters without investing in putting
emotional depth into their games will find themselves further and further
behind, and their games will be eclipsed."
David Freeman's webpage http://www.freemangames.com/idea/6_3.php
http://www.xeodesign.com/xeodesign_whyweplaygames.pdf
Poetics and
Aristotle
(Greek
philosopher 384-322 B.C.)
Aristotle was born in Stagirus,
Macedonia, Greece in 384 BC and died at age 62 in 322 BC. He was a student at Plato's
Academy and later became one of the greatest philosophers of Ancient Greece. He
is one of the fathers of Western Philosophy and
wrote over 400 books on nearly everything from mollusks to immortal
souls. He believed there was something wonderful about the whole of the natural
world.
In one of
his treatises, The Poetics,
he outlines the Six Elements Of Drama, based on the
Ancient Greek belief that tragedy was the highest form of Drama. This outline
has become a guideline for many playwrights throughout history, and is
especially emphasized in the works of William Shakespeare.
Aristotle’s Definition of Tragedy
“A tragedy is the imitation of an action that is serious and also, as having
magnitude, complete in itself; in appropriate and pleasurable language;...
in a dramatic rather than narrative form; with incidents arousing pity and
fear,
wherewith to accomplish a catharsis
of these emotions.”
(Catharsis being a purification or
purgation of the emotions primarily through art or a purification or purgation
that brings about spiritual renewal or release from tension or an elimination
of a complex by bringing it to consciousness and affording it expression)
A type of
emotional orgasm
Aristotle’s Six Elements of Drama
4 kinds of
tragedy:
Complex;
Pathetic;
Ethical
Simple
Epics: "The Iliad is at once simple and 'pathetic,' and the Odyssey
complex (for Recognition scenes run through it), and at the same time
'ethical.'
"Armchair Arcade" (www.armchairarcade.com).
Matt Barton's 'Treatise on
Videogames', in which he applies Aristotle's Poetics to (among others)
Space Invaders. http://www.armchairarcade.com/neo/node/223
He writes: "Like tragedies in Aristotle's time, Space Invaders' story is
obvious and irrelevant. We also know how the story must end--eventually, the
player will be destroyed. The 'fun' of this videogame is not the story, but
rather the gameplay. In the case of Space Invaders and other tragic games, the
player's satisfaction arises not from the literary contemplation of a story,
but the measurement of his gameplay skill as represented by the score."
Matt thinks Space Invaders is tragic, and - as he
later points out - even cathartic. But is it really? And why do we keep playing
it if it clears our souls of eleos (mercy, pity,
compassion) and phobos
(fear)?
For
more information on Aristotle: http://www.philosophypages.com/ph/aris.htm
Aristotle invented deductive logic:
Premise:
all frogs can swim
Premise: This is a frog
Conclusion: Therefore it can swim
Similar logical structures or syllogisms can be produced with: No frogs” and
“Some frogs”
He is known for induction: These frogs can swim, therefore all frogs can
swim.
His teleological (circular) approach relies on methodological, cautious
tendencies which rely only on what one knows from what ones’ 5 senses tell
them. (This is in opposition to Platonic
tendencies which strive to seek hidden, unrealized (forms) and ultimate mystical
truths through the use of reason.)
Narrative Revisited:
The art of telling a good story…..
Akira Kurosawa
The Tunnel ::::
and::::
Excerpts from Ran The famous
Japanese filmmaker uses Shakeapear’s King Lear to
tell the story of an old man’s quest for meaning within and incomprehensible,
unframed war. To enable the audience to see the clash of armies, Kurosawa
silences their clashing armor and the screams of the wounded before he immerses
the carnage in music. He imposes a spectacular order on chaos.
-Everything But the Words: A Dramatic Writing Primer for Gamers by Hal Barwood
- Storytelling in
Action by Bob Bates
Assignment:
prep
for Phase VII Project Pre-Reviews & Formal Group Presentation
due April 20
Week 13: April 20
* teams present Phase VII
Project Pre-Reviews & Formal Group Presentation
Formal presentation of group work to date which
incorporates suggested improvements from individual critique. Additionally
fully updated and perfected game design document is printed and formally handed
in.
* User evaluation test plan talk
& testing guide
* Craft
your User
Evaluation Test Plan
Game
Theory
History
of Game Theory
Factors::
Flow and Action
Csikszentmihali, M., Flow: the Psychology of Optimal
Experience.
Inherent in the escape from reality are factors that are akin to Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s
concepts of flow experience where the following occur: 1) a challenging
activity that requires skills, 2) the merging of action and awareness, 3) clear
goals and feedback, 4) concentration on the task at hand, 5) the paradox of
control, 6) the loss of self consciousness and 7) the
transformation of time.
see
also see "Communication and Community in Digital Entertainment
Services" prestudy research report by Aki Jarvinen, Satu Helio and Frans Mayra, University
of Tampere, Hypermedia Laboratory pg.20-26.
http://tampub.uta.fi/tup/951-44-5432-4.pdf
Game
Play Gestalt
http://www.tii.se/zerogame/pdfs/CGDClindley.pdf
Readings: team research readings
Assignment:
prep
for Phase VIII Final Project Reviews & Informal presentation due Dec 1
(second to last class)
Week 14: April 27
(second to last class)
Teams present Phase VIII Final
Project Reviews & testing results
Informal presentation
Intensive Studio: completing work and incorporating new findings from testing and critical
feedback
Printing your Poster: Instructions from
Nate:
The
plotter paper is 36 inches wide, but the actual content space is 34 inches. So
your document should be 36 wide, but have an inch of whitespace on either side.
The
minimum height is 24 inches, but I would recommend the same amount of padding
there. If your poster is vertical you can of course rotate it to fit into this
space for the lowest cost.
You
should make a PDF. I usually use Illustrator (on the VAST lab if you don't have
it), create a document 36" by height + 2", then
use File->Place to insert your document. You can then do "Save As"
and switch the filetype to PDF.
Take
the PDF file to the VCC and open it in Acrobat (or Reader? whatever it's called
these days). Switch the printer to vcplt or vcpltg for glossy ($0.25 more per foot, not bad for the
shiny effect). I think the checkboxes are something like:
"Automatically
select paper size"
"Allow
use of custom sizes"
Select
both of those and the rulers in the preview should update to be your document's
size. Then you should be able to send it.
The
printout shows up in the rack on the right side of the building, near the
glass-enclosed classroom. In general, they will put obviously bad printouts up
without saying anything, but you can get a refund if there was a problem on
their end by going to the help desk.
You
should cut your poster out as well so it doesn't have the white border and the
little label that they print on it. There is a cutting board in the VAST lab
with a meter stick and an xacto
knife, but the knife is a little dull. Be careful with your fingers, an xacto knife and my thumb
hanging over the edge of the ruler put that thumb in a bandage for weeks.
Knives are sharp...
Readings: team research readings
Assignment: due
May 4 LAST CLASS
Phase IX- Perfected Game Festival-Ready Games, Formal Group Presentation
Week 15: May 4
LAST DAY OF CLASS
Phase IX- Formal Presentations of Perfected Game Festival-Ready
Games
All perfected work due this day. NO EXCEPTIONS.
Complete
and refine all work on final projects for
Final Completed Game Project:
* submit on a cd or dvd:
* Your game
and all elements including all art, programming files, etc.
* Your game design document in .html format with all
relevant files
* Your poster file
* Your project summary in .doc format with summation
image
*
high quality edited .mov
of game play
Also submit:
*
Printed posters
* Printed Final Game Design Document
*
Printed project summary
* also if applicable: User Evaluation Testing Summary and Recommendations
Please
ensure that all work is spell checked.
All work must be
printed and also submitted on labeled CDs or DVDs
Discuss the future of games, simulation and upcoming
developments.
The Game Industry by Hyman, The
Studio Stance
Projects meeting the highest standards are then shown at the
Annual Game Festival May 6 & 7th .
questions asked of game entrants have been:
For GameFest more Questions for Game
Overview:
What is the Genre of the game.
What did the team learn from the project?
Describe your game in one sentence and additionally provide 3 keywords that
best describe your game.
What tech was used – XNA, Unity, etc.?
What IDE, if any, was used – Visual Studio?
Any middleware used – what?
What Tools were used? – Maya?
How did you test it your code / game play?
What is the architecture? Provide a UML diagram, if possible.
What language was used (C#, C++?)?
Were any design patterns utilized? If so, what?
Did you use source control? If so, what?
Were any coding standards used?
What key emotions are the music supporting.
What SFX is the most important in the game.