Skip to content
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

Category: 377G: Serious Games

P2: Map, Premise, Project Plan – Noe Chicas

October 21, 2026

Premise: In this story, Leon wants to keep spending time with his best friend pip, but can’t, because pip is gone and Leon hasn’t…

P2: Playtest Prototype (Emma Wong)

October 21, 2026

Who: I playtested over Zoom with my college friend, Kirin. As someone also familiar with Batman and who enjoys creative writing and visual novels,…

P2: Playtest Prototype – Saharat “Game” Laksanasut (สหรัฐ ลักษณะสุต)

October 21, 2026

My game, What We Carry Forward, started as an interactive fiction project about Ang Sila, my hometown in Thailand. The player took the role…

P2: Map, Premise, Project Plan – Jeffery

October 21, 2026

Hello! If you are a prospective playtester don’t read don’t get spoiled !!!! . . . . . . Premise: You are a formless…

P2: Playtest Prototype – Noe Chicas-Aranda

October 21, 2026

What I Changed Going In The setting and the story changed. The game used to take place in a computer lag room. Now it’s…

Map, Premise, Project Plan – Rachel Zhao

October 20, 2026

Premise Player Role This interactive narrative takes place in the universe of The Little Prince, where a wild fox living on the edge of…

P2: Map, Premise, Project Plan_Paprika

October 20, 2026

Premise In this story, a young volunteer teacher arrives in a remote mountain village for one week and wants to help Mei, a shunned…

P2: Map, Premise, Project Plan (Emma Wong)

October 20, 2026

PREMISE: Renowned yet reclusive horror author, Bryce Wyne, just wants to hide away in his lonely manor, writing in peace. However, this peace is…

Sketchnote: Rise of the Video Game Zinesters – snoopy

October 20, 2026

Attached are my two sketchnotes for the reading.    

Read & Play: Game Design as Narrative Architecture – snoopy

October 20, 2026

Notes for Game Design as Narrative Architecture Ludologists: wanted to study/shift focus onto mechanics of gameplay Narratologists: interested in studying games alongside other storytelling…

P2: Tiny Playable Prototype – snoopy

October 19, 2026

For this P2 prototype, not only is it my first time making a game (“officially”) solo, it is my first time making a digital…

Silicon Crossroads: Playtest Observations

October 19, 2026

Silicon Crossroads is an interactive fiction game about a student making technology choices: using AI for assignments, phone use late at night, and cheating…

P2: Tiny Playable Prototype (Emma Wong)

October 19, 2026

I did my first, very rough playtest with Judy (thank you)! OBSERVATIONS/FEEDBACK:  During playthrough: I didn’t explain too much about cards when first presenting…

P2: Tiny Playable Prototype – Sabrina

October 19, 2026

My current concept is a game where you play as a player who is trying to fix their relationship with their grandmother as their…

P2: Tiny Playable Prototype – Rachel Zhao

October 19, 2026

The Fox: A Story of Taming is a choice-driven narrative based on The Little Prince. Played entirely from the Fox’s perspective, players navigate the…

P2: Tiny Playable Prototype – Noe Chicas

October 19, 2026

During our in-class playtest, I noticed a few things about my interactive fiction (IF) prototype! First, the medium I’m using to present this story…

P2: Tiny Playable Prototype – Saharat “Game” Laksanasut (สหรัฐ ลักษณะสุต)

October 19, 2026

“What We Carry Forward” What We Carry Forward is an educational interactive fiction game that I will be working on for the P2 project….

P2: Tiny Playable Prototype_Paprika

October 19, 2026

How Do I Remember You? — First Playtest Reflection Feedback received Limitations of this playtest 1. I tested the introduction rather than the core…

P2: Tiny Playable Prototype: Jessica

October 19, 2026

My current draft of the game prioritized the parenting scenarios and left the consequences of the choices and the game map for future development….

Read & Play: Game Design as Narrative Architecture (Emma Wong)

October 19, 2026

SKETCHNOTE: Game Design as Narrative Architecture by Henry Jenkins   I played Animalia by Ian Michael Waddell on Twine. In this game, you play…

Posts pagination

Previous 1 2 3 … 30 Next

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

  • October 2026
  • September 2026
  • August 2026
  • July 2026
  • June 2026
  • May 2026
  • April 2026
  • March 2026
  • December 2025
  • November 2025
  • October 2025
  • September 2025
  • June 2025
  • May 2025
  • April 2025
  • February 2025
  • December 2024
  • November 2024
  • October 2024
  • September 2024
  • June 2024
  • May 2024
  • April 2024
  • December 2023
  • November 2023
  • October 2023
  • September 2023
  • August 2023
  • June 2023
  • May 2023
  • April 2023
  • March 2023
  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • September 2020
  • February 2017

Recent Posts

  • Read & Play: Working With System Dynamics: Jessica
  • P2: Expect the Unexpected (Jessica)
  • Read&Play: The Rhetoric of Video Games – Judy He
  • P2: Refined Prototype
  • P2: Playtest Prototype

Recent Comments

  • @SEO_LINKKK in Telegram | הימורי ספין בפוקר ובמכונות: מדריך טכני לשחקן הישראלי – Quin Creative on Critical Play: Luigi’s Picture Poker
  • Jeffery Cai on P2: Playtest Prototype – Noe Chicas-Aranda
  • dkkoba on Critical Play: Blood on the Clocktower (Bluffing, Judging, and Getting Vulnerable) – Sabrina
  • Jeffery Cai on P1: Cave Talk
  • syenko on P1: Cave Talk

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

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.org

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.org
Copyright The Mechanics of Magic. All rights reserved. | Theme by SuperbThemes