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The Mechanics of Magic

The Mechanics of Magic

Game Design Writings by Students at Stanford taking 247G and 377G

  • Library
    • CS247G Community Game Design Resources
    • Game Design Resources
    • Graphic Design for Game Designers
    • Graphic Design Resources
    • Chapter 11 from Game Balance
  • Read Write Play
    • Hollow Knight: RWP 4 2023
    • Mystic Messenger: RWP 6 2023
    • Undertale: RWP 3 2023
    • What Remains of Edith Finch: RWP 5 2023
    • Catan: RWP1 2023
    • 80 Days: RWP 2 2023
  • 247G Syllabus
    • The Formal Elements of Game Design
    • Design for Play | Week One | Lecture A
    • Design for Play | Week One | Lecture B
    • Design for Play | Week Two | Lecture A
    • Design for Play | Week Two | Lecture B
    • Design for Play | Week Three | Lecture A
    • Design for Play | Week Three | Lecture B
    • Design For Play | Week Four | Section A
    • Design For Play | Week Four | Section B
    • Design for Play | Week Five | Class A
    • Design for Play | Week 5 | Class B
    • Design for Play | Week 6 | Class A (no class)
    • Design for Play | Week 6 | Class B
    • Design for Play | Week 7 | Class A
    • Design for Play | Week 7 | Class B
    • Design for Play | Week 8 | Class A
    • Design for Play | Week 8 | Lecture B
  • Serious Play Study Group Overview
    • Study Group Week by Week Breakdown
      • Formal Elements of Games
      • Final Reflection Essay
    • [Optional Material] What is fun?
    • Project 1: Those Who Play, Teach
      • READING Visual Design of Board Games
      • Pitch Your Teaching Game
      • Sketchnote: Playtesting Boardgames
      • Sketchnote: Erin Hoffman // Wind, Not Sand: Mapping Dynamic Emotion Across a Product Landscape
      • SketchNote: MDAO
      • Critical Play: Write up your game of FLUXX
      • [Optional Material] Playtesting
      • OPTIONAL Board Game Usability
    • P2: The Future We Deserve
      • Critical Play: A Mechanic and a Story to Tell
      • Interactive Fiction: Tiny Playable Prototype
      • Introducing Interactive Fiction
      • Map and Premise
      • Critical Play: Story AND Storytelling games
      • Essay or Sketchnote: Rise of the Video Game Zinesters
      • Sketchnote: Art of game design- Story
      • [Optional Material] Emergence and Progression
      • Essay or Sketchnote: Rise of the Video Game Zinesters
      • Project 2 Reflection Essay
      • Share what you Learned: Writing Excuses Podcast
      • Values at Play & P2 Peer Grading
    • P3: The Game of Unexpected Consequences
      • P3 Concept Doc
      • Playable prototype
      • Working With System Dynamics (mindmap the reading, apply it to your game)
      • Mapping Systems
      • Sketchnote/Response for Rules & Tutorials
      • Project 3 Check-in
      • Project 3 Reflection Essay
    • P4: Refine a game
      • Sketchnote/Response for Playtesting with Strangers
      • Read: Mechanic is the Magic
  • On Sketchnotes
  • Printing at Stanford

Month: May 2025

Yu Gong: Prologue – Checkpoint 1: Concept Doc

May 4, 2025

Game Overview Title: Yu Gong: Prologue Concept Summary: Yu Gong sets out to trade beyond the mountain but is stopped by the fearsome Flame…

Moodboard & Playlist

May 4, 2025

Moodboard (via Pinterest)   Playlist Link   Brainstrom: Direction 1: Tone: Satirical, character-driven Core Mechanic: Build or sabotage relationships to gain puzzle pieces Fun…

Individual Team Member Deliverables – Checkpoint 1 Eleanor

May 4, 2025

Emotions to Evoke 1. Courage: The game should evoke the emotional thrill of overcoming fear when confronting powerful adversaries, including gods themselves, despite being…

Individual Team Member Deliverables – Checkpoint 1 Shang

May 4, 2025

Emotions Anger, Despair, Triumph Playlist Yungong Xunyin https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvKF14DBcHY Chain Attack! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRoklPq43Xo A life sent on https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNYXLWYcu-A Directions The main storyline of the game follows…

Individual Team Member Deliverables – Checkpoint 1 DP 2

May 4, 2025

Mood Board Emotion: Resolved Directions 1. Rogue-like Pilgrimage through the Mountain Veins Core Mechanic: Turn-based JRPG battles in mountain corridors with roguelike elements (random…

(Individual) Checkpoint 1: Concept Doc – Ilaria

May 4, 2025

Emotion:  Friendly competition   Moodboard: https://pin.it/1VJkSi6PQ For the moodboard, I decided to go for a playful cartoon-ish style board game. This is to mimic…

Checkpoint 1: Concept Doc — Jack Ryan

May 4, 2025

Playlist All ambient house, could see these songs being good background tracks to have playing while playing the game. Mood Board:   3 directions…

Individual Checkpoint 1: Moodboard and Playlist – Justin

May 4, 2025

Checkpoint 1: Concept Doc

May 4, 2025

Spotify 3 game directions: Incorporate challenge/accomplishment fun. Each room solves a puzzle that gets closer to discovering the truth about Gingy being evil/his evil…

Critical Play: Mysteries & Escape Rooms — Barry

May 4, 2025

For this week’s critical play, I chose Cube Escape: Paradox. This game was created by Rusty Lake, and is available on Windows, Mac OS,…

Protected: Critical Play: Puzzles!

May 4, 2025

There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.

Checkpoint 1 – individual

May 4, 2025

Thinking art deco travel poster theme for each landmark someone visits on the scavenger hunt, which is just a normal map maybe tagged with…

Checkpoint 1: Concept Doc (Individual)

May 4, 2025

Emotions Delight, Purpose, Curiosity Moodboard Spotify Playlist Game Directions

Sketchnote: Puzzles in Games, Puzzles as Games – Tesvara Jiang

May 4, 2025

Protected: Sketchnote: Puzzles

May 3, 2025

There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.

Checkpoint 1: Individual Deliverables – Myan

May 3, 2025

For the second project, my team wants to create a 2D aesthetic platformer(?) game set in a magical forest. From this general idea, here…

Checkpoint 1: Concept Doc [Individual delivarables]

May 3, 2025

For this game the emotion that I would like to evoke is a sense of discovery mixed with some mystery and suspense. I tried…

Protected: Athena’s Individual Checkpoint 1

May 3, 2025

There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.

Checkpoint 1: Individual

May 3, 2025

Emotions Excitement, Thrill, Cool Mood Board Spotify Playlist Direction 1 Types of Fun: Fantasy and Challenge Narrative: You are fish out of water trying…

Sketchnote: Puzzles in Games, Puzzles as Game – Lisa Ing

May 3, 2025

Posts pagination

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Welcome to the Stanford HCI Game Design Blog.

Currently this blog holds two formal classes being taught by Christina Wodtke as well as Independent Study Work. In winter of 2022, cs377g was cancelled because of covid-19 uncertainty, and became a study group. You can follow along by looking at the SGSG syllabus and weekly break down.

CS 247G: Design for Play(SYMSYS 195G)

A project-based course that builds on the introduction to design in CS147 by focusing on advanced methods and tools for research, prototyping, and user interface design. Studio based format with intensive coaching and iteration to prepare students for tackling real world design problems. This course takes place entirely in studios; please plan on attending every studio to take this class. The focus of CS247g is an introduction to theory and practice of the design of games. We will make digital and paper games, do rapid iteration and run user research studies appropriate to game design. This class has multiple short projects, allowing us to cover a variety of genres, from narrative to pure strategy. Prerequisites: 147 or equivalent background.

CS 377G: Designing Serious Games

Over the last few years we have seen the rise of "serious games" to promote understanding of complex social and ecological challenges, and to create passion for solving them. This project-based course provides an introduction to game design principals while applying them to games that teach. Run as a hands-on studio class, students will design and prototype games for social change and civic engagement. We will learn the fundamentals of games design via lecture and extensive reading in order to make effective games to explore issues facing society today. The course culminates in an end-of- quarter open house to showcase our games. Prerequisite: CS147 or equivalent. 247G recommended, but not required.

SGSG: Serious Games Study Group

  • Library
    • CS247G Community Game Design Resources
    • Game Design Resources
    • Graphic Design for Game Designers
    • Graphic Design Resources
    • Chapter 11 from Game Balance
  • Read Write Play
    • Hollow Knight: RWP 4 2023
    • Mystic Messenger: RWP 6 2023
    • Undertale: RWP 3 2023
    • What Remains of Edith Finch: RWP 5 2023
    • Catan: RWP1 2023
    • 80 Days: RWP 2 2023
  • 247G Syllabus
    • The Formal Elements of Game Design
    • Design for Play | Week One | Lecture A
    • Design for Play | Week One | Lecture B
    • Design for Play | Week Two | Lecture A
    • Design for Play | Week Two | Lecture B
    • Design for Play | Week Three | Lecture A
    • Design for Play | Week Three | Lecture B
    • Design For Play | Week Four | Section A
    • Design For Play | Week Four | Section B
    • Design for Play | Week Five | Class A
    • Design for Play | Week 5 | Class B
    • Design for Play | Week 6 | Class A (no class)
    • Design for Play | Week 6 | Class B
    • Design for Play | Week 7 | Class A
    • Design for Play | Week 7 | Class B
    • Design for Play | Week 8 | Class A
    • Design for Play | Week 8 | Lecture B
  • Serious Play Study Group Overview
    • Study Group Week by Week Breakdown
      • Formal Elements of Games
      • Final Reflection Essay
    • [Optional Material] What is fun?
    • Project 1: Those Who Play, Teach
      • READING Visual Design of Board Games
      • Pitch Your Teaching Game
      • Sketchnote: Playtesting Boardgames
      • Sketchnote: Erin Hoffman // Wind, Not Sand: Mapping Dynamic Emotion Across a Product Landscape
      • SketchNote: MDAO
      • Critical Play: Write up your game of FLUXX
      • [Optional Material] Playtesting
      • OPTIONAL Board Game Usability
    • P2: The Future We Deserve
      • Critical Play: A Mechanic and a Story to Tell
      • Interactive Fiction: Tiny Playable Prototype
      • Introducing Interactive Fiction
      • Map and Premise
      • Critical Play: Story AND Storytelling games
      • Essay or Sketchnote: Rise of the Video Game Zinesters
      • Sketchnote: Art of game design- Story
      • [Optional Material] Emergence and Progression
      • Essay or Sketchnote: Rise of the Video Game Zinesters
      • Project 2 Reflection Essay
      • Share what you Learned: Writing Excuses Podcast
      • Values at Play & P2 Peer Grading
    • P3: The Game of Unexpected Consequences
      • P3 Concept Doc
      • Playable prototype
      • Working With System Dynamics (mindmap the reading, apply it to your game)
      • Mapping Systems
      • Sketchnote/Response for Rules & Tutorials
      • Project 3 Check-in
      • Project 3 Reflection Essay
    • P4: Refine a game
      • Sketchnote/Response for Playtesting with Strangers
      • Read: Mechanic is the Magic
  • On Sketchnotes
  • Printing at Stanford

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Recent Posts

  • CS 247G – Critical Play: Competitive Analysis
  • Critical Play: Competitive Analysis — Deep Sea Adventure
  • Critical Play: Competitive Analysis – Owen Sample
  • Secret Hitler – Critical Play: Competitive Analysis – Rohan Gonzalez
  • Critical Play–Competetive Analysis

Recent Comments

  • Sizhe Wu on Introduce Yourself – Carl
  • Christina Wodtke on Short Exercise: Learning to Play closely
  • Christina Wodtke on Short Exercise: Learning to Play Closely – Fruit Ninja
  • Aksel Kolasinski on Hi! I’m Mathias
  • Aksel Kolasinski on Self Introduction – Cameron H

Categories

  • P2: The Empathy Machine
  • Featured
  • Project One
  • milestone
  • P2: The Future We Deserve
  • mindmap
  • P1: Social Games
  • CS247G
  • Assignments
  • P1: those who play, teach
  • Lectures
  • P2: Games In Space
  • Critical Play
  • P3: The Game of Unexpected Consequences
  • Project Two
  • Project Four REFINE
  • P4: Refine a Game
  • Sketchnotes
  • Project Two: The Future We Deserve
  • From the Instructor
  • Project Three: The Game of Unexpected Consequences
  • ReadWritePlay
  • 377G: Serious Games
  • SGSG

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