Final Class Reflection

Games have always been a huge part of my life. As a kid, I played endless hours of Super Mario, and nowadays I love spending time immersed in narrative-based JRPGs like Final Fantasy, Fire Emblem, and Octopath Traveler. I also love simulation games like Civilization VI or Factorio that provide constant intellectual challenges, and masterpieces like The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom.

One day, I came across a YouTube video explaining how Nintendo designed BotW‘s open world. It completely blew my mind. For the first time, I started thinking about game design not just as code or graphics, but as the deliberate craft of building an experience for someone else. I became deeply curious: how do you actually make something fun on purpose? That curiosity is exactly why I decided to take 247G. I wanted to look under the hood and learn the principles behind the games I’ve loved my whole life.

The MDA framework was the first concept that truly stuck with me. Before this class, I hadn’t thought deeply about the anatomy of “fun,” but learning that it can be categorized completely reorganized how I view games. From that point on, I found myself actively analyzing mechanics while playing. I realized the fun of Factorio and Civivilization VI is rooted in challenge, while what makes BotW magical is a blend of sensation, fantasy, and discovery. While it sounds simple, but being able to name those components was a massive breakthrough. Because this was my first design course, the visual design concepts—especially Gestalt principles—were also entirely new. I had never consciously realized that you can intentionally guide a player’s eyes across a screen, or that mastering this visual hierarchy is essential to shaping their emotional experience.

Putting these concepts into practice, however, brought real challenges. The true test came during P2 when my group decided to build a digital game. None of us had experience with traditional game engines. I had actually tried learning Unity on my own a couple of years ago, but gave up due to its complexity and a lack of time. I was genuinely worried we had bitten off more than we could chew. Thankfully, our team’s TA Lucas suggested that since we were making a click-and-play mystery game, we should look into Ren’Py. Discovering that its scripting language worked a lot like Python saved us. I took on a large share of the programming, and while learning a new framework on a tight deadline was stressful, working with a familiar language structure made it manageable. By the end of the project, I was able to understand the underlying logic of how digital game engines function- which was something I’ve wanted to learn for years.

This project also gave me a chance to apply our visual design lessons to a messy, real-world problem. Our game required players to navigate a village map to collect clues, but early playtests revealed a major issue: there was so much text that players were drowning in information and missing crucial plot points. Remembering Gestalt principles, I stepped in to restructure the interface. I used bolding and color highlighting to create clear visual anchors for key clues, and I implemented an inventory system to offload the cognitive burden so players wouldn’t have to memorize every detail. Watching our next playtesters effortlessly navigate the story because of a class concept was incredibly satisfying.

[Fig 1. Bolding + Coloring important text helped players a ton in making them recognize important information]

[Fig 2. I also made an inventory system!]

In the future, I want to try out more powerful engines like Godot or Unity. This class transformed me from someone who just consumes games into someone who understands how to build them. My ultimate dream is to create a turn-based JRPG of my own—the very kind that I love to immerse in. Thanks to 247G, I feel like I have the foundational tools and the vocabulary to start turning that dream into a reality.