Finale Prototype

Creation through other designers, practice and tips

Creation

There are three design pillars that attract people to engage with their work. Evoking playfulness, playing with public space and playful resolutions are emphasised with importance in Sylvan Steenhuis’s speech in GameTalk #10. To evoke playfulness, you need to recognise unspoken rules. For example, social bubbles or how you can appropriately interact with strangers shapes our taught behaviour. To break this bubble in a way allows for people to get into a playful state. Playing with public space takes the ordinary and gives it a new purpose. For example, Parkour is a new contemporary sport that includes very dynamic movement in open urban spaces. Ordinary urban spaces serve only to the built intent of commercial landscaping and architecture. Parkour enthusiasts will create an obstacle course in the concrete jungle for film related purposes or just free recreation. Playful resolutions manifest when people have a motivation, responsibility or goal. This leads to engagement when people get into the task and attempt to meet the tasks goals. The result of this is a meaningful interaction for some to look back on as an experience. The experience has a high intrinsic value if the participant enjoys or feels to have benefited in a way from that programme.

Figure (1) Sylvan Steenhuis on Gametalk talking about Evoking Playfulness in a Public Space.

Practice

How can a creator enable creativity and output? Creativity is sophisticated. The research done on creativity is limited because is enormity surpasses what science can tell accurately of it. For example, science shows that creativity works best in the earliest years of your life because kids are playful and constantly learning. Being creative is not related to IQ, it is merely a way of thinking by getting into a certain mood which allows natural creativity to flourish. So, the question, how can a creator enable creativity? The best solution is by comfort and enjoyment. The way your thoughts and feelings help reflect the best and the worst parts of our experiences. This is when idea generation can take place because it is natural to recollect an experience and make suggestion on what made the experience good or bad. This leaves space for people to think of new or innovative ways to change the experience. This is reflected today in common household items like phones. Over the generations of improving communication technologies, phone have become smaller and their design has become simplified as the generation has move toward smartphone devices. When we prototype design, we are already aiming to improve something that is currently being used. It is not how you perceive the prototype; it is about how are consumers going to use or gain from the experience of your product prototype. Therefore, it is important to test with other people to offer suggestions and describe their experiences.  

Figure (2) John Cleese on creativity in management 

Resources

(1) Sylvan Steenhuis. Evoking playfulness in a public space. Public Speech. Accessed on 20/04/20. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OR1_2NjFJQ

(2) John Cleese. Creativity in Management. Public Speech. Accessed on 30/04/20. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pb5oIIPO62g

Feelings, Personalities and Tactility

Feelings.

Recently I was referred to play a game called ‘Passage’. It is a 2D pixel platforming game with a very basic set of movement mechanics. This game was provided of an example of the topic feelings within the current readings of my minor.  It is a game that play’s on time and aging. The further along you progress the older you get and the more points you get. I believe the message is “If you take the right path in life, you will life for a very long time”. The game does have obstacles you have to move around. This takes up time moving laterally. I noticed while playing that there were gifts or treasures as you played the game. I am not sure what they did whether they gave you more time or points, but the navigation was difficult going down but there were more of these reward capsules. I believe that if you took risks getting those boxes it would mean that taking risks in life may or may not pay off. When I played for the first time, I got a score or 345, and the second time I played, I think I got around 510 points. The characters visibly age as you move, going from a blond-haired man to losing your hair and eventually slowing down in game before turning into a tombstone.

Figure (1) A snapshot from the very start of the game.

Another game recommend to play was Slave of God. It’s very confusing when you start the game up. The computer screen is a visual crash of hue and saturation. When you start to move you come to understand that you are in a night club. There is a party floor and a toilet. When you go to the bathroom and stand in front of the urinal, you can see droplets of piss fly from your pants as to emulate peeing, this also suggested being a male character, but that wasn’t important. When I was on the dance floor, it was even crazier than just trying to navigate through the room. It was like tripping on drugs, the experience was wild and disorientating. The developer of the game might have had the same experience with drugs before, but I felt amused and sick at the same time.

Figure (2) Slave of god dance floor. The place moves even when you stand still.

The last game we were recommended to play was called my father’s long, long legs. The game you play is by reading it and clicking on the bolded lettering once you have read it. It paints out this scary story of a father digging a hole in the basement. Without spoiling the game, It gave me the chills and gave me these feelings of nervousness and thrill.

Figure (3) My father’s long, long legs. A gripping horror story.

Personalities

An research article called ‘Towards personalised, gamified systems: an investigation into game design, personality and player typologies’ by Lauren S Ferro, Steffen P Walz and Stefan Greuter. There are 5 personality traits labelled Dominant, Objectivist, Humanist, Inquisitive and Creative. The dominant player demands the most attention, their ego and confidence generates a self-caring perception represented by things like awards, skins, add-ons, enhancements and so-on. The Objectivist seeks to build upon their knowledge through demonstrating their dexterity and intelligence. They are not as self-focused as dominants, but they do put themselves before others if they needed help. Humanists enjoy the social aspects and engagement. They love to solve problems with others over personal decision making. The inquisitor loves to investigate new things. They are likely to thrive in a free-lancing environment to do things without structure. And the creative loves to develop things through using their skills they gain through experience. They enjoy the presence of structure but can treat it like a guide rather than instructions. An activity that utilizes these personalities the best to my knowledge is Dungeons and Dragons. Based merely on the interactions you have with the Dungeon Master are personal and stylized to the character and personality they portray.

Figure (4) A ruling of opposites on a personality scale.

Tactility

Tactility is the responsiveness to your sense of touch. Between physical play and technology, you can bridge the experiences with some cool ideas. There are many undiscovered possibilities you can utilise with people for fun. Some of the best ways to create interesting possibilities is with the use of light, motion and sound. One of my favourite tactical games available to play is beat saber. Beat saber is a VR headset game which allows the user to strike boxes to playing music. Although its not an original idea, I believe there are more ways of utilizing those three mechanics together to make something visually stunning and physically demanding.

Figure (5) Beatsaber artwork. A neon light music playing game. 

Resources 

(1) Passage. Pixel Video Game. Accessed 30/04/20. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/Passage 

(2) Slave of God. Indie Game. Accessed 30/04/20 https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/01/04/slave-of-god-review/

(3) My father’s long long legs. Horror story via reading off the screen. Accessed 30/04/20. https://sub-q.com/my-fathers-long-long-legs/

(4) r/rpg. ‘ Are you bored with the 9 alignment system? Here's a personality and motivation system that can be adapted for any system.’ A Reddit post. Accessed 30/04/20.  https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/aeb7lb/are_you_bored_with_the_9_alignment_system_heres_a/

(5) Beatsaber. VR Video Game. Accessed 30/4/20. https://www.riotgames.com/en/work-with-us/offices/dublin/bringing-pop-stars-to-vr

Political Statements

Political Statements.

I believe that games should not be banned or censored and be respected as its entirety by the game developers. The reason for this is because it can provide insight to an experience or serve the player as an educational resource. However, the only restriction around game should be age restricted as some content could provoke an unforgettable discomfort in the player. Looking at Cannon Fodder as an example shows a clear depiction of a war game and the process of war. The game serves the player as an anti-war game that shows the ridiculousness of war and the length to which governments will go to secure domination. It was controversial because it put governments and armies in bad light. But you must remember that it is just a game. People play it because its either fun and or engaging to play. No one should ever have to go to war and serve but some could argue that this game encourages violence and should be banned. No. It should be available to everyone. If you do not agree with it, do not buy it. Your opinion should not redirect the intent or focus of the game. Otherwise the world around you starts to fall in on you like it does in George Orwell’s ‘Animal Farm’.

Figure (1) Cannon Fodder PC game

One of the games from molleindustria’s website is called Operation: PedoPriest. It is a game that came to light after several Italian priests in 2019 were found to have sexual relations with minors. The aim of the game is to catch these priests preying on children and get them arrested. The game mechanics use a flat 2D world with NPCs walking around with normal behaviours. You can examine people’s feelings to check if the ordinary people have been intimidated. Your job is to intimidate witnesses of the abuse so they don’t call the police. This is very controversial, but it implies what goes on in churches and in some religious communities. It does present a stereotype to the player that all priests want to bonk children because god said so, defeats the purpose of religion.

Figure (2) Operation: Pedopriest. Game. Accessed 25/04/20

The Eurogame genre is precieved as a heterotopia, which means a world beyond comprehensible reality. Things might appear normal in a world but in comparison to our world, it is physically or theoretically impossible to re create. Eurogame turns violent histories and turns them into resource management games that to a family audience create an ideological utopia. A game like catan is not real. But it borrows from the historical and cultural belonging of medieval times or earlier. The game also has expansions that take on other worldy cultures or civilisations. Catan works with tiles and by gaining resources for having assets take up those spaces. The more spacce you have, the better your chances of winning are. 

Figure (3) Catan Board game cover artwork.

When thinking of playful situations that reflect my personality, I think of games like Skyrim where you can play in a very detailed open world. I love the adventure and the feeling of discover when completing quests. I am also an achievement hunter and love to finish games. Game like Skyrim I would beat and win all the achievements and then never seek to play again unless there was something I missed. Once I’ve done that, I can move on to the next game. To me experience is key, it’s hard to stay consistent with games like Fortnite where you play seasons and if you want cool loot you do have to invest a lot of time into it to get better, it becomes repetitive to the point that it becomes boring, the game feels like you are just playing to get the rewards and switch off when you have to wait for the next load of rewards.

Figure (4) Skyrim Game. The relfection or purpose and adventure strikes me and engages me to the point of finishing the game and achievements.

Resources 

(1) Cannon Fodder. Image. Accessed 25/04/2020.  https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2017/01/20/have-you-played-cannon-fodder/

(2) Operation: Pedopriest. Game. Accessed 25/04/20. https://molleindustria.org/en/operation-pedopriest/

(3)  Catan Board game. Image. Accessed 25/04/20. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catan

(4) Sykrim. Video Game Image. Accessed 25/04/20. https://www.gamesradar.com/uk/skyrim-guide/

Online Communities and Public Instalations

Discussion on Online Communities

‘The Dark Side Of Non-Stop Gaming: eSPORTS (Part4/5)’ is truly the lousiest documentary piece I have seen that has covered anything relatable to the gaming industry. At first the documentary is interesting; the audience is learning a lot about the ‘24-hour club bangs’ that are open in South Korea. It is in places like these internet cafés, professionals’ manifest practice with friends. The VICE host ‘Matt Shea’ flew out from North America to investigate and learn more about competitive internet gaming culture. Matts idea of making a documentary was more about subjecting people who were consumed by gaming, to enjoy things he personally enjoyed like clubbing. The documentary was somewhat formative but lacked the professional seriousness that would have made the documentary more comforting to watch. You cannot make people do things that you find fun and expect them to like it as well. It was wrong in a sense but it also clearly shows that there are people who don’t mind the playfulness of video games and then those who would much rather go out and get drunk at a club hoping to get a happy ending. This can aid presumptions when comparing the similarities and differences between eSPORTS and traditional sports. Some of the similarities in these sports include individual athleticism. Individuals in a team train like professionals. They are all working towards one goal. To win. How do teams try and achieve this? Its not just the hours that you sink in but the external components that contribute to your athletic well-being. Taking advantage of everything includes personal trainers, nutritionists, mental coaches, daily routines, and lifestyle balances. One unticked box could be the decisive moment on the day, so you best be ready to throw everything you have in you out there on display. Both eSPORTS and traditional sports do focus a lot on bringing the sport to those who play competitively. Much like supporting your nation at the FIFA World Cup, you may also find yourself supporting eSPORT teams that base in your country of origin. They are both booming industries, leveraging money off sponsorship and broadcasting rights. If there is money to be made and money to give on a global scene, you will always gather a crowd. More people equals more money. Differences just come down to time and accessibility. Your skill acquisition can be natural for some, but to get good at anything, you need a lot of practice. Accessibility matters because there is the cost for gamers of buying expensive equipment to get into games whereas traditional sports only require maybe a deflated football on the school field. Both scenes should be treated as respectfully as one another, the culture is different in all walks of life and communities. Best way to approach this is to be open minded and push yourself to try new things with no expectations.

Figure (1) Matt Shea and his documentary of eSPORTS gaming. 

Public Installations.

‘Connected Worlds’ is an installation project that emulated nature in a space built for a digital reality. It is a very interactive display for all ages, more so younger people because of the art style and 3D rendering illustrations. This to me is exciting because it creates a dynamic space for people to observe and learn. Unlike museums the information in this installation requires your kinetic discipline to interact and participate with the audience.

Figure (2) Connected Worlds in full spin. Image above is an establishing shot to help comprehend the use of space and the image below that shows users interacting with it.

Resources. 

(1) The Dark Side Of Non-Stop Gaming: eSPORTS (Part 4/5). VICE. Youtube Video posted Mar 19 2015. Accessed 24/04/2020. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=105cdUq98wo

(2) Connected Worlds. Design I/O. Project archive. Accessed 24/04/20. https://www.design-io.com/projects/connectedworlds

Emergence and Depth

The difference between a positive and negative feedback system is that a negative feedback mechanism effects behavior in a system. It neutralizes impact to keep an equilibrium across a system. Positive feedback mechanisms enhance processes in a system. If a certain condition is met, there is no return to the state prior.

Figure (1): Although the system applies to the nature of the human body, the body can be substitute to other systems in play and game design.

Between the creator of the game and the player, they both contribute to the goals of the game. There are the obvious rules presented by the creator who delivers the rules and achievable goals to create purpose when playing the game. This can be in-game achievements, flow of story and check points along the way that complete a visual or thought-provoking narrative and thus winning or beating the game. Introduce the play and their experience of the game. Initially they will follow the goals of the games design purpose, but what does the player have to offer that differentiates the goals or purpose of playing the game? Players can speed run games which allows the player to cut as much time out of the game as possible. Other players may only complete tasks that aren’t relevant to the whole game goal ie side quests or another way of playing the game for fun. Magic the Gathering for example is an easy game to grasp once the rules are clear to the user. During the 2004 Magic World Champions, some judges of the tournament banded together to play against each other with a new approach to playing Magic the Gathering. To this day Commander is one of the most popular formats in Magic. There has been a lot of economical significance that wizards of the coast has invested into to balance the format and give more opportunities to all players.

Figure (2) Wizards of the Coast. Magic the Gathering Commander. How EDH or Commander became the game that it is from the idea of its fans. Link in resources 

We play test games to prefect and balance mechanics. Without testing the game theory makes sense but there can be intervening mechanics that break the game or give an unfair advantage to any one player involved. Play testing done thoroughly can simplify game rules thus making the game reliability higher among users.

Depth in games mean there are several emergent experiential different possibilities or meaningful choices that come out of one rule set. Depth is not depth if the player cannot utilize the leveling system to create depth overtime leading to more possibilities. In other words, depth is the ability for players to think around rules given to them and by doing so the player wants to figure out the best outcome for themselves in order to reach a goal. A game creates depth by giving more qualitative enhancements, obstacles, and random ability to generate new unexplored reaches for players to conquer.

Figure (3) Process to develop and play test a game for launch to public domain.

A game with a good rule book comes from Magic the Gathering. It not only shows you how to play the game, but the blogs from some of the important officials from Wizards of the Coast give additional support to ideas that I guess are unspoken rules based on play-testing and new perspectives like Deck Building and playing in different formats and thus playing against other decks in a meta.  

Resources 

(1) BioNinja ‘Feedback Loops’. Image depiction. Accessed 23/04/2020 . https://ib.bioninja.com.au/options/option-d-human-physiology/d5-hormones-and-metabolism/feedback-loops.html

(2) Wizards of the Coast. Magic the Gathering ‘The Godfather of Casuals’. Blog Post. Accessed 23/04/2020. https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/ways-play/godfathers-casual-2016-02-23

(3) Bottomline Performance. ‘Play-Testing Games’ Image depiction. Accessed 23/04/2020. https://www.bottomlineperformance.com/play-testing-games-an-essential-step/

The Magic Circle

The term 'Magic Circle' is understood simply as, "a closed space where certain acts or behaviors might happen, that wouldn't typically happen outside of that space" (1). Within this 'Magic Circle', the context to every situation is important as it tasks people with certain roles that are not always the same, thus fundamentally generating a new narrative by engaging our imagination, feelings and behavior. By understanding more about the 'Magic Circle', we may be able to analyse key aspects about play that can help us re-imagine the way people collaborate with each other. This in turn would also provide a strength towards creating and testing a game in during its creation. So what are core values to the magic circle and what gives it relevance to play and game design as a whole.

Figure (1): Bass Speaker drum digitally manipulated. The magic circle has no physical form but is a space set by limitations.

Prof. Mary Flanagan pitched the idea of the 'Magic Circle' as "a safe space for experimentation... a place to practice what we see in our daily lives" (2). An example she used for this instance was the use of children's dolls. A Victorian doll house is a very grand and luxurious compared to a modern day one, as it does not stand to the same level or detail and scale. But this design of the doll house replicated the Victorian style of architecture and living environments, it's purpose was to replicate real houses for kids to fantasize about a reality built on their perception of social roles, norms and culture. Mary also makes it evident the critical importance of this scenario by stating that "...critical in the terms of dissecting or looking at something very carefully as a scholar but I also think of it as this critical moment that we have that popularity of games ...this is really about cultural importance, what are those games reflecting about" (3). Flanagan uses the term "critical" to signify the importance of cultural belonging and heritage as games that are popular are reflected by the number of players in a demographic, nationally or globally. I think that the relationship between the Magic Circle and Culture show a very strong link towards how we think in regards to cultural appropriation and belonging. Being able to envision and act in a scenario can help us to learn more about people's interests and behaviors given in real world scenarios that set the boundaries for sacred spaces and places to practice rituals.

Figure (2): Prof. Mary Flanagan giving her speech at TEDxDartmouth

All actions in an area marked off before hand either mentally or physically show no difference in play and contemporary practices. Temporary fictional places serve form and function with special rules much like the ordinary world. An example of this is a Theater for a play of live action performances. Actors enter their magic circle and follow their scripts while acting accordingly. Acting tries to make the audience believe the realism of their scenario. This would lead the audience to believe in their own magic circle that an actors portrayal of whatever it is they are acting is true. This can be used to make the audience believe exaggerated stereotypes of people in the real world. But the ritual or practice of a real life situation or scenario maybe be less interesting and stagnant. It is the key roles of the persons job that makes them interesting and gives them character. Sometimes these scenarios can be converted into games for people to play, consider role playing. In order to mock or have fun as a character you must change or mimic the behavior and action to that of which you are trying to copy. Games like dungeons and dragons can force people to collaborate with others. You are enabled to act in a certain way to which you wouldn't act in real life. For instance you could lie to a friend in a game to throw him off or in some way benefit towards a goal, but you wouldn't you lie with purpose to a friend for real. I think its is great to betray or lie to other players but sparingly. I love it for its tactile use and ability to read what other players are thinking and feeling. In a way I think it helps me comprehend scenarios and the actions of people better so I may be able to help a situation or evaluate decision making prior to acting on what ever is at hand.    

Figure (3): The Try Guys Try Dungeons and Dragons. Entertaining to watch them visualize what they playing as.

I was unfortunately unable to join this class on Friday due to work commitments. I can not add value or documentation of any practical work from the class but can only reflect on what I had learnt from the readings given to me by my lecturer. One of the key things that I learnt about the magic circle is that you can learn a lot through player interaction. This may include the way people can change their behavior and develop relationships with one another.

(1) = Table Talk 37 - The Magic Circle, at 1.05/11:16

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pd1_C3K8TK4

(2), (3) = TEDxDartmouth -Mary Flanagan:Critical Play-4/17/10, at 1:22/17:29 and 8.15/17:29

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZ8R9iiGk9g