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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

Author: ilaria04

Final Class Reflection – Ilaria

June 2, 2025

This was one of my favorite classes I’ve taken at Stanford, not because we got to play games during class (this is a big…

Sketchnote: Onboarding in Plants vs Zombies – Ilaria

May 27, 2025

Critical Play: Games of Chance & Addiction – Ilaria

May 21, 2025

For this week’s Critical Play, I chose to play Luigi’s Picture Poker. This game is hosted online (HTML5) and free to access, and is…

Critical Play: Worldbuilding – Ilaria

May 14, 2025

For this week’s Critical Play, I chose to play Wizard101. The game’s initial target audience was children aged 8-14, but it has found to…

Sketchnote: Addiction by Design – Ilaria

May 14, 2025

Sketchnote: Loops & Arcs – Ilaria

May 11, 2025

I love the game HayDay. The interaction loops it contains are the initial learning curves of learning how to grow crops and make foods…

Critical Play: Puzzles – Ilaria

May 5, 2025

For the Puzzle Critical Play, I chose to play Storyteller. Storyteller is designed by Daniel Benmergui and published by Annapurna Interactive in 2023. It…

Sketchnote: Puzzles in Games, Puzzles as Games – Ilaria

May 5, 2025

(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 0: Team Norms – Group 12 (Ilaria, Melody, Dalynn, Monica)

May 1, 2025

Communicate early and often if you think you will fall short of a deliverable. Acknowledge/react to messages so we all are on the same…

Critical Play: Mysteries & Escape Rooms – Ilaria

April 28, 2025

For this week’s Critical Play, I chose Cube Escape: Paradox. Cube Escape was released in 2018 by Rusty Lake and is designed for players who…

Sketchnote: Designer’s Notebook: The Role of Architecture in Videogames – Ilaria

April 27, 2025

Critical Play: Walking Simulators – Ilaria

April 21, 2025

For my Walking Sim critical play, I decided to play Journey. Journey is a game made by Thatgamecompany in 2012, and its target audience is anyone…

Mindmap: Narrative Architecture – Ilaria

April 21, 2025

Critical Play: Competitive Analysis – Ilaria

April 14, 2025

Our game concept revolves around escaping the island. In a set number of rounds, players search for champion items which fit both the scenario…

Sketchnote: Game Design Patterns for Building Friendships – Ilaria

April 13, 2025

With the optional challenge!

Short Exercise: What do Prototypes Prototype? – Ilaria

April 9, 2025

Does the prototype make people feel closer to one another? This is an important question to answer because the entire purpose of P1 is…

Critical Play: Bluffing, Judging and Getting Vulnerable… – Ilaria

April 7, 2025

For my first critical play, I chose to play a bluffing game called Coup. Coup is a card game which was created by Rikki…

Sketchnote: What Games Are and Aren’t – Ilaria

April 7, 2025

Done with the Sketchnote Challenge! Shortening my words and focusing on visuals made me understand that I don’t need all that much content into…

Short Exercise: MDA & 8 Kinds of Fun – Ilaria

April 6, 2025

A game that I have come to love recently is Scattegories. For those of you that haven’t played before, Scattegories is a pen and…

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

Archives

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Recent Posts

  • Protected: P2 Refined Prototype — amaru
  • Protected: P2 Playtest Prototype — amaru
  • P4: It’s just a burning memory
  • Reflection Seb
  • P4: Giant Steps V2: Welcome To Tall’s

Recent Comments

  • EvvrryyDDY2 on Critical Play: BABBDI
  • Male Monitor – Seminar Group 2 on Through the Looking Glass: Gendered Gazes in Video Games 
  • brysigg on Conclave: A Prayer Simulator — P2
  • brysigg on P2: The Empathy Machine – Angela Mao
  • brysigg on P2: The Empathy Machine

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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