Group Project S2+S3

Group Project

~ Sprint 2 & Sprint 3 ~

So in the last two weeks of the group project we have done quiet a lot to the game and its really coming together, some might say it resembles a game.

We've now started to work in one weekly sprints to break down the work load over the month before the big presentation with all the tutors. I feel this system is working well for us as we can see improvements and bug's as we progress through the sprint instead of adding almost 4 weeks worth of work in one go then finding something is wrong in the last minute. 

Our group managers have organized a play test sessions today for the general public at the Uni and I'm very much looking forward to getting a lot of feedback from people that haven't played the game, provided its constructive feedback of course.

Due to feedback from tutors and other students that have already play tested we've made a lot of adjustments. Here just a small list of what has been changed, added, re worked and needed testing so far :-

• Two Play Versions 

                       ( X & Z phase controls)
                       ( Space on & off phase controls)

• Levels 1-10 implemented
• Phase Power Bar Resets Upon Re-spawn
• New Character Model
• New Walking/Jumping Animations
• Cloud Animation
• Shooting Stars Animation
• Tutorial Animations & Adjustments

Overall very productive so far over the last two weeks and I think our whole group feels the game is ready for public testing so we can start building upon what we have already and improve were needed. Please just remember this is a VERY early build to the game and we still have many more months to complete the project.

I leave you with the level art done within these two sprints for levels 5-10.

                                                                                  

< Level 5                           Level 6 >

                                                               Level 7

< Level 8                           Level 9 >                                      

Level 10

you can play test our game and leave feedback at www.waterfrontgames.com

Space of Possibility and Pacing in Casual Game Design

 Marcos Venturelli

As causal game design is a large discussion, only aspects relevant to pacing are emphasized in this paper. This paper aims to help understand what makes casual games so special and help understand what makes up a so-called "casual" game, and also build upon a vocabulary towards them.

Casual games have been labelled as “games that generally involve less complicated game controls and overall complexity in terms of gameplay or investment required to get through the game”. but for the purpose of this work "casual games" will be considered "Games that offer the possibility of pick up and play and experiences that can be enjoyed in small bursts and interrupted by players without penalty or perceived penalty". This is because not all "casual games" are less complex in terms of mechanics involved and can become increasingly difficult over time.

Pacing - The rhythm of the game, the relative speed at which the different moving parts of the system are put in motion. by indirectly crafting the player experience - through mechanics, aesthetics and dynamics - to create relaxation, tension and repetition, the designer "paces" the game.

Restricting the Space of Possibility - Designing a game is designing a space of possibility. It is the creation of a structure that will play out in complex and unpredictable ways. It is the collection of all possible actions and outcomes inside the design space of the game - all actions and outcomes artificially made possible by the system.

Player Experience - When playing a game, the player is trying to figure out patterns within it, to make it easier, we do with naturally as humans in all aspect of life to help us understand and overcome. According to Koster [2005], “the natural instinct of a game player is to make the game more predictable because then they are more likely to win”. Taking the definition of “fun” as being “pleasure with surprises”[Schell 2008], when there are no more surprises, there is no more fun. If all the patterns have been figured out, the game becomes uninteresting.

Concepts of  Pacing

Movement Impetus - Movement Impetus, is the will or desire of a player to move forward through a level. Most importantly, it determines how willing the player is to make “advancement decisions”, thus representing his interest in keep playing.

Tension - Tension is the perceived danger that a player might become the weakest side on the conflict. Aesthetic resources such as graphics and sound can be used to increase or decrease Tension.

Threat - Threat is generated on the level of game mechanics, existing as the power struggle tips in favor of the system or the player's opponent(s).

Tempo - Tempo is the “intensity” of play. It is the time between each significant decision made by the player.

 A game that is too simple will get boring fast – players will quickly figure out the patterns and move on to other game or activity. This is what happens to most casual games available in PC flash game portals. However, making it complex will require more time for the player to master its patterns, consequently slowing down Tempo, which reduces Player Impetus. Maintaining this approach will lead to an inevitable Catch-22 while trying to find a “right balance” or a “sweet spot” between small and large spaces of possibility.

Perceivable Pattern of Continuous Learning - A player must be seduced to agree with his or hers entrance on the game experience, but it is also necessary to continuously seduce him or her to stay there. A game can be presented in a way that  new patterns can be quickly absorbed and mastered, and allowing the players to realize that there will be new patterns to be learned in the near future. There should be a time to learn and time to play.

Dramatic Game Dynamics

Tools for Creating Dramatic Game Dynamics

~ Notes on Marc LeBlanc ~

 The power of games as a story vehicle is not a new idea. Many acient games (such as Senet) tell a story of passage through the underworld to the land of the dead. In some cases of these games they are perceived to be divination which tells you your story or possible outcome via the game. This was covered in the Royal game of Ur studies as a possible starting point of the game and maybe continued tradition throughout its life cycle.

Creating drama within a game is compounded by our limited control over the game we create. This is because we don’t know or cant see how our game will play out in precise detail each time it is played. We can only implement mechanics and dynamics within a game to which create drama. You could also say some aesthetics create drama and/or enhance its dominance within a game such as Challenge in FPS games or Expression & Discovery in the Final Fantasy series.

In order to discover ways in which to make our game more dramatic we must understand how drama usually works and how we see drama in stories, computer games, movies, cards games etc. We use the dramatic arc for this which visualizes the rising and falling of a well-told story. 

The drama starts with conflict which creates tension that will accumulate as the story builds to a climax and then dissipates as the conflict is resolved. This diagram is only used to explain how drama within a narrative works, we cant actually measure tension but it is important to get a idea of how it increases over time till the climax and then resolves shortly after at a much quicker pace than the tension was built.

We can break down the dramatic tension into to uncertainty and inevitability to better understand how we can create tension, climax then resolve throughout the narrative.

Uncertainty

Feedback System as Sources of Uncertainty -

The game state is all the information you would need to put in a save file for the game. This includes scores, positions, location, items, health, bullets left etc., anything needed to be known to continue the game in the same state as it was when saved.

The scoring function is the sensor of the cybernetic feedback system. This could be the score of kill/deaths in a FPS game, or the distance between player 1 & 2 on a racing game. Its a means of measuring who is winning and by how much.

The game mechanical bias is the actuator of the cybernetic feedback system. This rule determines which player gets an advantage over the other. For example giving the losing race car a small speed boost to help catch up or giving the lead scorer a bonus as reward.    

The controller is the comparator of the cybernetic feedback system. This rule chooses which player receives the game mechanical bias and bases its decision on the scoring function.

We can use this system to create dramatic tension by driving the scoring function closer to zero or a tie as this creates uncertainty and tension on the way to the climax. The ultimate goal of this system is to keep the game as even as possible to create the drama and tension throughout the game and used as a safe guard against one player totally dominating the game.

We can also use this system in a positive way to aid the climax of the game. Due to the mechanical bias used throughout play it can stagnate who is winning or losing and we can ensure the climax is reached by giving the mechanical bias to the leader to dispel the uncertainty of the end result. We see this in many forms such as RTS games where you get more resources if you win the battle over it or you get to pick up all the speed boosts in Mario kart if your in first as no one is in front taking them before you. This process dispels the dramatic uncertainty and creates a sense of closure, preparing you for the win and the losers to lose.

Pseudo-Feedback 

 Quite frequently, these sorts of mechanism create game dynamics that appear as if the game were being driven by a negative feedback system when one player takes the lead but quite frequently the other player(s) will catch up. This is just a perception of a cybernetic feedback system as there isn’t one.

 

Escalation - This mechanic is when the score changes faster and faster over the course of play, so that there are more points at stake at the end of the game than at the beginning. This is best explained using game shows were questions answered by teams are worth less at the start than they are at the end. The lead team by half time may of answered more questions and have more points but in the second half the behind team answer only a few question correctly but draw scores or go ahead.

Hidden Energy - A example of this would be a power boost you can use at your command which is hidden from your enemy, much like nitro boost in racing games or a absorb shield in fantasy shooting games. The lead player may be ahead but that could be down to he/she has already used his hidden power and the currently losers have not. This gives the illusion of the leader winning until the other players use theirs the outcome is uncertain. 

Fog of War - This represents a way of creating dramatic uncertainty by limiting the information available to the players. At the beginning of the game, players cannot predict the outcome of the contest because they aren't given enough information. As the game progresses, more and more information becomes available and the outcome of the game seems more and more certain.

Cashing Out - This is a game mechanic where the score of the game is reset to zero. Best described in games such as bomberman where you have to win a set amount of games to be declared the winner. Each time a new game is started all players start on a even playing field and have just as much chance of winning as each other. The only thing taken over from each game is the score to the last winner of a game like a tally.

Inevitability

 Uncertainty alone is not sufficient enough to create dramatic tension, we also need dramatic inevitability, the sense that the contest is moving forward towards a conclusion (resolve). We can use mechanics to measure the progress of a game as well as give a sense of how far away the end might be, The players will feel propelled towards the conclusion of the contest. Using timers or clock to measure time or count down time is a example of this. Other mechanics that convey inevitability are a ever increasing crowded game board, a dwelling deck of cards, decreasing health bars or diminishing resources.

All of these give a sense of progression through the game, warning us that the end is approaching. We look at these as a type of ticking clock and the time it is counting down is the resource that’s non-renewable. These mechanics are a non-reversible processes which bring the game to its conclusion while at the same time prohibiting backward movement. Its important that for a ticking clock mechanic such as these to be perceived as one, its must be apparent and understand as one by the player(s).

 

 Resolving Dramatic Tension

The climax of the game should occur at the moment of realization, when uncertainty is dispelled and the outcome of the contest is known. Given this, the climax should happen as late as possible to let tension build to make a more dramatic climax occur. We need to ensure that the climax is meet and all players know this otherwise it can be see to be left unresolved at the end of the game. A clear winner or condition needs to be meet.

 My Thoughts

Great read, very in-depth and informative. I found it fairly easy to relate a lot of games and movies to this essay, especially the ticking clock and resources mechanic to give a sense of inevitability and progression. This reading made me think about the quote "it's not about the destination, it's about the journey" and I think its partly true in the sense you need to build up the tension along the journey to feel satisfied with the end result and using tools like this to create a more dramatic dynamic/aesthetic to the game you can balance and shape it depending on what play style you are going for.

Group Project - S1 - Pt2

Group Project - Sprint One .Pt2 

So over this weekend I'll be getting on with some group project work that I've been assigned by my group managers (Bradley Smith & Joe Easter). Haven't honestly done much over this week for it so I've got quiet a bit to catch up on for the MVP (Minimal Viable Product) presentation on Wednesday.

One of the tasks I've kind of been avoiding a bit has been the animation of the character, there’s two reasons for this. One, I've never animated anything before and have no idea where to start other than doing it in flash. Two, I dislike my character. Nevertheless I'll give it a go.

After reading up on animating and watching a few tutorial video's I started to break my character down into sections in photoshop to link them up via the skeleton tool in flash later on. This task was tedious as the character wasn't really built to be broken up like this so I had to do a lot of aesthetic mending as I did it. What I'm walking away from this with is understanding that to animated characters in flash your better off either doing the character in flash itself or doing the character in PS and making the sections as you go (hands, arms, body, waist, legs etc.). This will ease the process later on. I'm also thinking doing a character in Illustrator would be another easier way as it works like flash in terms of vector art but has a lot more tools than flash does.

Once I’d imported the PS file into flash I started to assemble my character and linking them via the skeleton tool. After a few hours of simply messing around with the character and learning how to use the key-frames I was able to make a semi passable walking character for the MVP. The full length of the walking cycle is 24fps so that’s 1 second long but looped.

Note : Unfinished, this was totally a test of animating

 You can find the animation here : CLICK ME! Or here : CLICK ME!

Truth be told, it wasn't completely smooth sailing. I encountered a lot of issues when importing the character via PS because there were small painted pixels in the sections that were making the image selection area a lot larger than the body part so I was forced to go back to PS to clean the art up. Found a good way of cleaning the art up quick as well with the cut selection tool so should prove to be useful in future.

The skeleton tool took quite a few hours to get the hang of as well but think I’ve learnt enough to feel comfortable in doing small animations like this and maybe with a easier and a in proportion character, make it a bit more realistic. Despite spending a good 6-8 hours on this animation I’m hoping we will redo the character design at a later date which means this is all in vain but at least it will show I've tried my hand at animation for the sprint and MVP.

Refine, Refine, Refine

If you haven't read the first part of my blog regarding the group project you can find it HERE. In the post I gave you a preview of the finished art style we will be using in the project, but alas I've found a few flaws in its design when implementing it into flash and a lot of the platform angels were off which will course issues later on in the game as the levels becoming more complex in design. So I've done quiet a bit of tweaking to the platforms and added a few more details into the background to really enforce this mysterious dark environment feeling.

Another thing that made me go back on my work was the adding of new techniques and learning how some tools work in photoshop that I wasn't previously aware of. Horrible feeling having to go back on work you previously thought to be complete but as the sprints almost over I've decided to do the changes now rather than have to do it in another sprint which may course issues.

In addition to the changes I've also done the 4th and final level of the sprint & started to compile a assets folder containing all the images I've used and designed for the game. This will enable anyone to make a level within the game graphically but of course you will still need the coding and knowledge of how we constructed the game.

< level 1                                              Level 2>

< Level 3                                            Level 4 >

While I was refining the levels a bit I kept in-visioning shooting stars random appearing across the sky and the birds flying off into the distance. Would be awesome to do something like that but will have to discuss this with the managers but even if they agree to do it I doubt we would do extra stuff like that till really late into the project as its just extra work that we may or may not be able to do.

Royal Game of Ur

Royal Game of Ur

The Royal Game of Ur was excavated from the Royal Cemetery of Ur by Sir Leonard Woolley between 1926 -1930. The tombs at Ur date from around 2,600BC which are located in southern Iraq.

The board is best described as sections with a larger body of squares (4x3) and a smaller body of squares (2x3) joined by a narrow neck with 2 squares in it (2x1).

This board type is recognized as the 3rd millennium BC version, the original version that all the later are based upon. Over time the game has changed shape but kept its fundamental race mechanic and rule set. 

This version is the second millennium BC version. but by straightening out the smaller body of squares (2x3) into a straight line it changed the game into a more aggressive and faster game. but still keeping the basic rules and mechanics as the original.

For this blog post I'll be using the original first millennium BC board as means to explain the rules and how they work with one another. I wanted to introduce you to the board first so you would see how it worked visually as I talked about it because sometimes trying to in-vision the game itself around the rules is very difficult, especially when the rules are complex and there may be multiple pieces involved during play.

The game is played by 2 persons, each controlling there own pieces around the board. The original game had white and black pieces (7 of each), each player would control a colour. For the sake of simplify this a little I'll refer to these as "units"

To determine how many squares you move we use four 4-sided dice or "d4". Each d4 has two marked corners and you will roll all four at the same time. The result of the rolls are how many of the marked corners are faced up added together.

We enter our units into the board from the lower right square of the larger body from this point of view or from the bottom left from the opposite point of view (see picture below) as the first square. Each player starts on opposite sides of the board. Once you have made your way into the board you have to share the middle lane and neck of the board with your opponent.

Now we have a means to move and the units we move around the board we need to understand how the pieces interact with the board and the board with them. I'll begin with the Rosette squares. There are 5 rosette squares on the board placed 2 in the larger body, 1 along the neck and 2 on the smaller body. When you land on these squares you are granted an extra turn as reward.  They have always been called rosette squares despite all the changes through the years and I thought I would keep that tradition with my board here. 

You are also aloud more than one unit on the board at a time. So in essence you are able to have as many units on the board as you like but they cannot inhabit the same square as each other. When you have rolled and you can choice which unit you wish to move. This includes moving a new unit onto the board.

The next mechanic we are introduced to is the capturing of your opponents pieces. If for instance your opponent has a unit 3 squares ahead of yours and you rolled a 3 you would land on the same square as them. In the event of this happening you would capture their unit which would mean that this unit will be returned to the player and would have to start from the beginning again. This can only happen in the middle lane of squares.

The last mechanic which is common among these types of games is the need to get the exact number to move the units off the board via the exit / finish. So if you are on the last rosette you will need to roll a 1 to exit or maybe if your on the first square entering the smaller body of squares you would need to roll a 4 to exit. the last square is not the exit but 1 over that square taking you off the board.

The end goal of the game is to get all of your 7 units through the board first.

A Brief History of Ur

• Excavated from the Royal Cemetery of Ur by Sir Leonard Woolley between 1926 -1930 
• The rules (written on tablet) were excavated in 1880 but unrecognized as this till 1956
• The clay tablet is the oldest known set of game rules in the world (dated 177bc)
• Has also been referred to as "the Game of 20 Squares" in various forms (you can guess why)
• The Second millennium version was played with only 5 units (original was 7)
• The Second millennium version was referred to as "Pack of Dogs" 
• Throwing stick were also found at the excavation at Ur. Thought to be used as a type of dice

Tactics & Game Play

Given the fact this game was made sometime around 2600bc the mechanics within the game are very in-depth and bring about a lot of tactical play by means of the dice rolls and which unit you move depending on your roll, how many squares there are, sharing the middle lane, taking of opponent pieces, having more than one piece each on the board at any given time and the rosette squares.

For example if you rolled and you could move a unit in front of your opponents unit you had to way up the odds / chance of them rolling the number needed to land on your unit (See Dice Diagram) or maybe this is the plan as you have a unit behind that would be 2 squares behind theirs if they got so lucky therefor putting one of your units in harms way to get rid of one of theirs.

By far the safest way to play is to not put your units ahead of your opponents but that wont win you the game. Your forced by the need to achieve the win to be more aggressive and tactical in your approach towards the game. The best tactic I can think of is to get each unit through the board as fast as possible before you bring another one one. 

Its easy to see why this game has been labeled as so many different types as it includes so many different dynamics. 

Different Types

Theres many different iterations to the game which is understandable since the game is so old. There are a few iterations I enjoy and understand why they would be into the game. Here just some of the changes that have been made to different types of the game.

• Having to go around the last smaller body of squares (not doing directly down on the last in the middle lane sqaure)
• Making rosette squares safe zones (units on rosette squares cannot be captured)
• Changing the shape of the board itself but keeping the same rules
• Different amount of units
• Different amount of dice rolls
• Not needing the exact number to exit
• Needing to roll a certain number to enter a new unit

Paperbased RTS

RTS Boardgame

~ Tues 06 Nov session ~

So after having discussed the MDA paper (found here) we began to talk about how we can start with a base structure of a game and add certain aesthetics to it by implementing mechanics and dynamics to it. The game we were given to implement these changed to was a very basic RTS game where each player selected whether they would move, move & turn, turn or fire by using a card mechanic where as we would all show our selected cards at the same time and then depending on what cards you had selected there would be a set order in which they get to go :-

Move -> Move & Turn -> Turn -> Fire

There was no limitation to the range of your fire but you could only fire in the direction you were facing.

There were no obstacles on the board and the board itself was made up of hexagons so there was 6 different paths in which you could move. We decided to play a 6 player game with each player starting at a different point on the board.

 

After some play testing we found that it was near to impossible to kill another player as firing was the last play to be made so your enemies could simple move out of your line of sight and as there were no move & fire or turn & fire cards it came apparent that there was no strategic thought behind playing the game other that "don't stand in their line of sight". 

The only possible way of someone dying with the game in this state was by them not paying attention at all to the other players positioning and mistakenly moving into someone light of sight as they were firing which quiet honestly was nearly impossible to do unless you weren't actually playing the game.

The Changes

Now we have a understanding of how the game plays in its current state and figured out what is the core mechanics behind the structure of the game we can start to implement changes to the rules and dynamics of it to induce an aesthetic of our choice.

In all RTS games you have a element of tactical thinking (strategical play if you will), either that be against a real players or against the game itself. Your choices in the game are reactions to their choices and theirs to yours. This was the critical dynamic and aesthetic missing from the game in its current state and we begun to discuss how we could implement it into the game while still keeping it in its relatively basic form so we could clearly see the impact on the game state.

We began by adding obstacles into set positions on the board and play tested how it works. We found its became even more impossible to kill someone, not exactly what we thought we would achieve but at least we figured out which way we shouldn’t go. We then started to discuss different guns in the game and how we would put them in. How would we balance the guns and would they counter each other in certain situations.

 How we decided to implement the guns was by placing them in set positions on the board so the players have a type of goal or objective if they so choice to do so but adding the fact all 6 players might be going for these guns there was a element of risk involved but for reward.

The guns we implemented were Shotgun, Sniper Rifle, Rocket Launcher, Machine Gun and Pistol. The Pistol was your starting weapon and clearly the weakest of all the weapons which we did to give the users a sense of getting stronger by getting better guns (Power Up). We first thought about placing certain guns in position that would re spawn every so often but we found this may implement a element of camping where the most powerful weapons spawn. 

As a result of this we decided on making a random element to it where you would draw a gun card from the pile that would be face down so there was no way of knowing what gun you would get. The different gun types are :-

We play tested this structure and found a few things that were working well and actually added a lot more to the game than we first intended on. By adding the guns to the game we gave the players a goal and a power up, by placing the different gun positions we implemented strategical play by forcing you to pay attention to where you enemies were and what kind of guns they had and finally by giving the guns a random chance we implemented a sense of discovery as you would only know what you got when you got it.

Unfortunately we only had a very small amount of time to play test this build but what I had seen from it was very interesting and showed how adding only one or two dynamics to the game can implement multiple aesthetics to it. Our original goal was to get more tactic play involved but we ended up with a lot more. There was drama in who got what weapon, discovery in the unknown chance of the weapons, power ups with different types of guns and challenge by implementing more tactical play with different gun ability’s.

We really wanted to add a fellowship aesthetic to the game by playing in teams of two but we didn’t have time to play test this version but I believe it would of enhanced the strategical play of the game and resulted in a lot of different and interesting possibles for the game.

My Thoughts

Really good exercise yet again but had some issues when it came down to play testing the game. It wasn't down to how much time we had overall to actually make the changes or play the game but more about how working in such a large group and having all these designers thinking of idea's while we play tested meant we would stop for 5minutes during play just to discuss more possible changes or even implementing them while play testing which to me was highly frustrating. 

We wasn’t really able to see the effects of the original changes we had decided on once we had either stopped for debates or put more stuff in while we was playing and to me it took away from being able to really understand how that dynamic or mechanic we added were inducing a certain aesthetic.

I'm thinking of it like making a smoothy with a blender. You want a banana smoothly so you add banana's, but then your friend comes along and wants a little apple in it so you add an apple. After a short debate and a little taster you decided on adding two more apples because one more just isn’t enough. You go to drink it and it doesn’t taste anything like what you originally planned and you can barely taste the banana in it.

I’m not saying these idea's were bad, in fact most of the idea's were great but I’m more focused on how these idea's are great and what do they bring to the overall game play in terms of MDA. Getting down to the core of each idea and understanding how they work with other idea's. I don’t believe these lessons are about how many idea's you can splurge out in a given time frame, I believe these lessons are to understand the difference between what works or what might work within your game structure and why it does or doesn’t after play testing.

MDA

MDA

A Formal Approach to Game Design and Game Research 

by Robin Hunicke, Marc LeBlanc, Robert Zubek 

The MDA paper was developed and taught as part of the Game Design and Tuning Workshop at the Game Developers Conference, San Jose 2001 - 2004. The paper presents a formal approach to understanding games in which it attempts to close the gap between game design & development, game criticism & technical game research. The desired outcome of the papers publishing is to help all aspects of game design and research breakdown games into abstract sections to pin point and enhance iterative processes of developers, scholars and researchers.

MDA stands for Mechanics, Dynamics and Aesthetics. Lets break it down :-

Mechanics - Describes the particular components of the game, at the level of data representation and algorithms. Jumping, Walking, Flying and Fighting are all examples for mechanics, they are the backbone and underlying structure of a game. Think of these as the rules, the boundaries you are limited to and the tools given to you to perform the task.

Dynamics - Describes the run-time behavior of the mechanics acting on player inputs and each others’ outputs over time. Dynamics are used to create aesthetic experience within the game. Examples of this are time pressure or high scores to create a challenge for the user(s), team or co-op based games promote fellowship as a aesthetic, unlocking new items or levels as you proceed through the game creates discovery.

Aesthetics - Describes the desirable emotional responses evoked in the player, when they interact with the game system. What makes the game "fun"? How do we know a specific type of fun when we see it. Aesthetics are the components that create their respective player experiences, such as :-

• Sensation - Game as sense-pleasure                        
• Fantasy - Game as make-believe
  
• Narrative - Game as drama                                        
• Challenge - Game as obstacle course
• Fellowship - Game as social framework                  
• Discovery - Game as uncharted territory
• Expression - Game as self-discovery                      
• Submission - Game as pastime

Example : Final Fantasy VIII - Fantasy, Narrative, Expression, Discovery, Challenge, Submission.

As designers we see the MDA framework within games differently to the user(s). Neither perspective is right or wrong but it is fundamental as designers that we see it from both points of view. Doing so will help us observe how even the smallest of changes in one element of a game can affect the others,

Using These Tools

Using what has been discussed above we can start to break down games into their MDA components and begin to fine tune our games. There is no magical formula in each genre of game that will make it a success but breaking it down as we have will give us the ability to define which mechanics, dynamics and aesthetics work within the game, how much of each component should we emphasize on and where or when should it be used.

Each time you tune something within the game, wither it be just a simple bit of story text or maybe a colour change, you will need to evaluate how this affect the other elements of the play. Does it take away from the narrative?, How does it take away from it? Where does it take it from? Does it change anything else? Does it work?. All these questions can be answered by using the tools in this paper, by understanding how they are connected and why they are in the game.

Final Thoughts

A surprisingly interesting read once you rap your head around the idea of MDA. Took me a couple read thoughts to fully grasp the concept Robin Hunicke, Marc LeBlanc & Robert Zubek were proposing and got me thinking about the group project a lot and what aesthetics we currently have in it and how I can improve upon them using the dynamics and mechanics we already have in place. Great paper for starting to understand how you refine your game instead of just throwing every mechanic you can find in it and TRY to make it work.

I was directed to a video that covers this paper by Jack Murry, I found it very informative and well worth a watch if this is something your interested in.

 Penny Arcade - MDA video