Creating an Intro Game Design Course
Posted on
January 18, 2013
Over the course of this break from classes, I’ve managed to accomplish a fair bit, and not just recuperating from the end-of-semester burnout. In this case,
Dave Brown and I sat down and put together what we feel is a good start for an Introductory Game Design course for MATC. There is an Intermediate and an Advanced Game Design course already in place, but there is no Intro class. One of the conclusions that both Dave and I reached after having been through the early versions of those classes is that while they are great for practicing design skills, they never build a good foundation to work from, hence this idea.
Each semester consists of 16 weeks, so that’s how many we planned around. First we figured out the topics we wanted to make sure we covered, then planned out how many weeks we’d spend on each topic. Please note that students will be required to keep a blog of their activities, as with most MATC Computer Simulation & Gaming classes. Below is the breakdown we came up with:
1) Welcome to Game Design – Weeks 1-2
This first section is for two things: one, the obligatory explanation of how this class is going to work, and two, to ascertain where different class members are in terms of their familiarity with Game Design. Given that this is an Intro class, it’s doubtful there will be much, but it’s important to tailor the material to the class’ mastery level. To start them off, we’ll be playing some games. Students will be asked to take turns and analyze as best they can while either playing or watching one of their classmates play. Everyone will get cycled through at least once. While we have not set in stone what games we will bring in for use, we have come to the conclusion that one should be obscure, so they are less likely to have seen it before.
2) Mechanics, Dynamics, Aesthetics – Weeks 3-5 weeks
Once we have a sense for where the students are, we launch into one of the most important aspects of Game Design: how to start to think about it. This will be based heavily on a
paper by Robin Hunicke, Marc LeBlanc, and Robert Zubek, but this
Extra Credits episode gives a great overview of the aesthetic part of what I’m talking about.
One of the biggest issues I see with some of the newer designers I work with is that it is hard for them to articulate the underlying reasons why we play games, what draws us to them, and so on. Naturally, this makes it rather difficult to use that underlying appeal to guide your choices when designing a game. So, some of these three weeks is going to be a little bit of lecture, but the rest of the time will be spent pulling examples and having people practice discerning the aesthetics, dynamics, and mechanics of various games out there. This includes homework along these lines.
3) How to Playtest – Weeks 6-7
Related to how to analyze different aspects of a game, is learning how to do effective playtesting. This includes both playtesting with specific objectives, and paper prototyping a system before it’s even coded. Both are invaluable techniques during game development, as the earlier you find the problems in your ideas, the less work is required to correct them (usually). As you might expect, they’ll get some hands-on instruction for each, and be given an assignment to have them practice it on their own.
4) Articulation Workshop – Weeks 8-9
One of the key aspects that a Game Designer has to be able to do is communicate, specifically describing things in sufficient detail that anyone on the team can read their documentation and understand what the need from it. Students will be randomly assigned an object to be put into a fictional game, and told to describe it such that an artist, programmer or another designer can understand everything they need to know about it. When these are turned in, they will be redistributed (with no names) and with the new object, the student will be asked, after reading the description, to explain the object as best they can.
5) Game Analysis – Weeks 10-12
Now that the class will have spent a large portion of our time working on how to understand games, it is time to bring them back to what we did at the beginning, and take it further. We would like to spend one week on a game from one genre, the second week on a game from another, and the third on a game that blends the two. As an example, one of the things we were considering was playing a modern First-Person Shooter, then a JRPG, then Bioshock, as the latter combines elements of the gameplay seen in the FPS, and the grand narrative seen in most JRPGs. Doing it this way will allow us to not only review what we’ve shown them thusfar, but help tie together some of the other concepts, in particular the Aesthetics of a game.
6) Final Project – Week 13-14
The final project for this class is a big enough deal that I would like to give them in-class time to work on it and get feedback. The idea is simple: randomly assign an aesthetic and a set piece (e.g. “Competition” and “whales”), and tell them to come up with a rough game design based on it. Obviously they don’t need to get the mechanics part hammered out down to specific numbers, but any stats that are present should at least give an indication of how they interact.
7) Final Project Review – Week 15
The second to last class period is going to be an in-class review of the finals by the entire class (with names removed, of course). This gives the students a chance for actual feedback concerning their game concepts, rather than the simple “here’s your grade” found in many finals.
8) Peer Reviews and Retrospectives – Week 16
The last class period is going to be for taking a look back on what you and others in your class have done, finding ways to improve next time, and providing feedback for others to do the same. Whereas the review from the previous week is about a specific piece of work, this is aimed more in general, towards a person’s work over the course of the whole class. It will also be where we evaluate each student’s blog, how well they can represent their own work.
Admittedly, this is just our first draft of how to run this class. We think it’s a good start, but some adjustments will be necessary as we get feedback from students and others. We’d like to run a free prototype of it this summer and then begin offering it in Fall 2013. At this moment, it seems likely that either
Dave and I will be teaching it, but it has not been finalized, as we both have a definite interest in doing so.
