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The Mechanics of Magic

The Mechanics of Magic

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

  • 247G Syllabus
    • 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
  • The How and Why of Sketchnotes
  • Graphic Design Resources

Author: Katherine

Values at Play & P2 Peer Grading

March 18, 2022

Tunnels The value in this game was the choice between venturing into the unknown and learning more about the world or returning home to…

Final Reflection Essay

March 17, 2022

Before this class, I had never designed a physical board or card game before, only digital video games. Out of the video games I…

Sketchnote: The Mechanic is the Message

March 17, 2022

Sketchnote_ The Mechanic is the Message

Graphic Design for Game Designers

March 17, 2022

Mapping Systems: Genshin Impact

March 17, 2022

I decided to map the systems present in Genshin Impact, a player vs. environment open-world game that is constantly being updated with new characters…

Sketchnote: MDAO

March 17, 2022

Sketchnote_ MDAO

P3: Tragedy of the Commons

March 6, 2022

P3 by Katherine L, Melody Y, Thomas H, Kavita S Artist’s Statement “The tragedy of the commons is a situation in which individual users,…

Project 3 Reflection Essay

March 6, 2022

For Project 3, we made Tragedy of the Commons, a game roughly based on the phenomenon of the same name. The premise of the…

Mind Map: Working With System Dynamics

March 6, 2022

My team made a game about the phenomenon of the tragedy of the commons. Our game holds the values of resource-management and teaching the…

Sketchnote: Art of game design- Story

March 3, 2022

Sketchnote_ Art of Game Design – Story

Sketchnote: Rise of the Video Game Zinesters

March 3, 2022

Sketchnote_ Rise of the Video Game Zinesters

Sketchnote: Rules & Tutorials

March 3, 2022

P2: Downwelling

February 27, 2022

Introduction Downwellling is a piece of interactive fiction about exploration and hubris. Play the game on itch.io! Inspiration Gameplay: With Those We Love Alive…

Sketchnote: Erin Hoffman // Wind, Not Sand: Mapping Dynamic Emotion Across a Product Landscape

February 20, 2022

Sketchnote_ Erin Hoffman – Wind, Not Sand_ Mapping Dynamic Emotion Across a Product Landscape

Interactive Fiction: Tiny Playable Prototype

February 13, 2022

Tentative title: Downwelling

Critical Play: Gorogoa

February 13, 2022

For the assignment “A Mechanic and a Story to Tell,” I played the game Gorogoa. Gorogoa is a puzzle game played in a 2×2…

P2 Map and Premise

February 11, 2022

Premise The story follows the main character, whose point of view is told in the 2nd person. You are a child who is on…

Mind Map: Formal Elements of Games

January 31, 2022

Critical Play: Pandemic

January 31, 2022

I played Pandemic in-person with Melody, Kavita, and Thomas. We could set our own difficulty, but since this was our first time playing, the…

Critical Play: With Those We Love Alive

January 31, 2022

With Those We Love Alive is an interactive fiction Twine game made by Porpentine. This poetically written text-only game (with music) tells a story about…

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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

  • 247G Syllabus
    • 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
  • The How and Why of Sketchnotes
  • Graphic Design Resources

Archives

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  • March 2022
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  • January 2022
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • September 2020
  • February 2017

Recent Posts

  • Jasmine Steele – P3 Reflection (Clout Chasers)
  • The Mechanic is the Message – Charlotte Feng
  • P4: Refine a Game – Lost Voices – Charlotte Feng
  • P4: Black Friday Baking (Yasmine Mitchell and Grace Zhang)
  • P4 | Accelerate

Recent Comments

  • Christina Wodtke on P2 – Barrier or Bridge?
  • Christina Wodtke on P2 – Split
  • Christina Wodtke on P2: The Last Moment of Sun
  • Christina Wodtke on P2: Zauberkurg Kartoffel Farm
  • Christina Wodtke on P2: The Future We Deserve https://mechanicsofmagic.com/?p=13253&preview=true

Categories

  • mindmap
  • 377G: Serious Games
  • P2: The Future We Deserve
  • P4: Refine a Game
  • CS247G
  • Project One
  • milestone
  • P2: Games In Space
  • Critical Play
  • Lectures
  • Sketchnotes
  • Project Two
  • From the Instructor
  • Project Four REFINE
  • Assignments
  • Project Two: The Future We Deserve
  • ReadWritePlay
  • Project Three: The Game of Unexpected Consequences
  • SGSG

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