Before taking this class, I thought I was fairly well acquainted with the principles of game design. I had taken 247G, after all, and many of the readings and topics we cover share some material between the two classes. I definitely felt that my time in that class was beneficial to approaching the work of this class; however, the two are definitely distinct and focus on different skills. In this class, I got a lot more hands-on experience actually making a variety of different games, both in creative vision, sizing/scope, and in format. This, I found, was really essential in becoming more comfortable with everything we learned. We can talk in theory about game design for as long as we’d like, but at the end of the day it’s about the application of those concepts that really helps you internalize all of the lessons you’ve learned. This class was a great help in that regard, as having four different games that each required fairly quick iteration and turnaround forced me to face my perfectionism and focus instead on getting better each time.
In project 1, we all got a chance to work on an analog game, something that I was excited to revisit after doing the same in 247G. Even though I had worked on one before, I learned a lot more about different types of games and techniques to build prototypes than I had known before the project. For example my group worked on a board game, which we created by laser cutting wooden boards and creating custom tiles, tokens, and cards. This was a big step up in terms of involvement and skills needed from my last analog game, and working on those skills in this setting helped me understand the importance of polish in an analog product for player experience and enjoyment. In my opinion, this was a great first project, and my teammate and I enjoyed it so much we decided to continue it for P4.
Project 2 was an interesting and novel challenge. I had never created a game entirely alone before. While this offers a lot of creative freedom and flexibility to design exactly what you want, I found that this level of control was a gateway to choice paralysis. After second-guessing my design repeatedly and worrying about all of the details I was left with little time to implement the game itself, something that proved to be a valuable lesson in chasing perfection versus jumping in and iterating as you go. Despite my setbacks, I had a lot of fun on this project and, as I’ve talked about in my P2 reflection, felt really connected to and invested in the game.
With project 3 came new obstacles and challenges in the form of time management and scoping. I feel this was the project that impressed upon me the most the need for a small, manageable scope in a game. While we had a lot of ideas and goals for our game and it evolved and grew in size, at the end of the day there is only so much that can be done in a certain period of time, and it was really eye-opening to understand this lesson so personally. On the other hand, it was also a great chance to expand my skills in a new platform like Twine and try out new features in Unity I’d never worked on before, even if we decided not to pursue that platform for our final product.
Finally, in project 4 I got to come back to our first game and practice designing with more intention. With all of the tools and concepts from the entire quarter in hand, we were able to really focus in on the feedback we had received from earlier playtesters, identify the gaps in our attempts at fun, and address them directly with specific changes. I came out of this project feeling the most relaxed and confident of any of them, perhaps a sign that I really had learned from all of my previous mistakes from the games I had made along the way. Watching the final playtest for this game was also the most rewarding, and I had a great time playing other people’s games during the final showcase and learning from their wisdom as well.
All of these games were opportunities for growth, and from them I feel confident in taking the lessons I learned with me into future projects. I understand now the importance of thoughtful design with regards to the player experience and have real-life data to connect to our discussions of dynamics and aesthetics. Overall, I also think I’ve gained a stronger appreciation for the amount of human effort and consideration that goes into every good game (and even some of the bad ones!), which is something that I can see will serve me well for the rest of my life.
