Here's some "design development" stuff - meaning photos from our design sessions.
Tables of possible object interactions, and their effects on mood stats:
http://www.lcc.gatech.edu/~nwatson7/dys/interactions_table_left.jpg
http://www.lcc.gatech.edu/~nwatson7/dys/interactions_table_right.jpg
http://www.lcc.gatech.edu/~nwatson7/dys/interactions_table_top.jpg
A diagram of the relationships between a set of objects (how the presence of one object can affect the interactions available with another object):
An early map of the house
Table of the objects we'd wanted to include, and the default starting mood stats
AS you know I had created multiple user interfaces and background animations (which a copy is provided below) as well as testing animations for the objects and the man silhouette (unfortunately though the final material was built on top of this material which left me without a draft to publish here - one of which you might recall as the red silhouette for the walking man, and another is the walking silhouette that cycles through different characters).
Old UI:
old BGs:
header / logo - Tom
Level Designs (Collaboration - Tom, Brian, Mariam)
Growth Production Docs (Tom) -
Download Growth project schedule
Other Random SWFs (Tom) -
Below are the paper mock-ups of our three levels:
Below are the complete three level designs done in Photoshop. The levels were done in segments, so the combined images aren't that clear because I had to scale it down since the files were really large initially.
Level 1:
Level 2:
Level 3:
Level 3 Revised (Level 1 and Level 3 were combined later on during our design phase in order to make Level 1 longer for the final prototype; but the change was not made in our prototype):
I've attached the zip files of the 4 levels with the more detailed images below:
Grand Theft Auto IV as notorious of a game as it is, presents one of the best commentaries on modern American society to date, in a highly interactive and free environment. The game revolves around the values of the modern American Dream, bringing about phrases such as, "The money makes decisions, it's the American way" or "I'll do it as long as it pays." It strives to embody the insanity in which our consumer driven capitalistic in every feature it has to offer, as a means to mock "the American way".
Brenda Laurel in her book the Utopian Entrepreneur makes a valid and very intriguing point, "Values are everywhere, embedded in every aspect of our culture and lurking in the very natures of our media and our technologies" (Laurel 62). The most fantastic stories told are the ones that have the most impact on our values as a culture. In terms of GTA IV, the designers have modeled a similar representation of one of the most symbolized cities in America, New York, and filled it with what they perceive as our "values" everywhere throughout this place known as Liberty City. One of the most iconic figures is the Statue of Happiness on Happiness Island, a mockery of the Statue of Liberty on Liberty Island in New York. The Statue of Happiness holds in it's hand a cup of Starbucks coffee, and a book of corporate law. It speaks for itself as an icon and satire on America. Another key medium in which our values as a culture are portrayed is within the radio station heard anytime the player's avatar is inside a vehicle. In particular the commercials poke some serious fun at our consumerist values, trying to get the player to almost go out and buy fake products advertised in a fake world. The player hears commercials like, "Did he really do it? That's not the question, it's are you going to win or are you going to go home! Watch the Science of Crime a crime show where scientists sit in a lab all day, while we watch with utter boredom. We are taking out the drama of from the crime show and making it forensically boring. The Science of Crime, only on CNT." This is obviously a mockery of CSI or other modern crime shows. The game also has an in game television that allows you to watch shows advertised on billboards, the radio, or even the in-game internet, one of which is called "I'm Rich", a show that mocks E!'s portrayal of Hollywood glamor and the over spending of wealthy Americans. One quote from the show is about a fake yacht a hotel heiress owns, the narrator states, "This is Chloe Parker's 9 trillion dollar yacht that costs 300 million dollars a day just to run." Though one can only laugh at the seriousness the in game characters use to present the culture of this fake world that mimics our own, it's all but frightening that some of these values have truth in their roots.
The tortoise and hare story Laurel tells us, where the Hare wins the race due to his ability to do everything fast, from trading stocks on his handheld, to eating fast, and driving fast, is a grand example of the use of the story in relation to our cultural values. She states, "Okay, what's wrong with that story? It's cynical. It doesn't give good advice about how to live. We probably don't want our children to believe it, even though some of us may be afraid that it's true" (Laurel 65). This relates back to GTA IV's utter influence on culture, it aims not to grow our children in to consumer hungry adults bent on using any means necessary to make a dollar, but to show us how ridiculous our society has become.
There are radio commercials in the game that are almost insane to think as real. For instance, "Babies Overnight," a company that sends you a baby of your choosing overnight in a box on your doorstep, in much the same manner couples who have trouble conceiving for whatever reason depend on 3rd party companies to receive children. The commercial can be played here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P4XQzOrqPMA. After hearing an entire game full of advertisements and fake media such as the one just presented, we as American's are either angered at the deprecation of our culture, or wake up and realize how true this portrayal is of our culture.
Laurel states optimistically, "Change the stories, and you change how people live" (Laurel 65). The most iconic trait of GTA IV is the mere fact it can only represent American culture. Perhaps if we stop emphasizing the importance of wealth in our stories our culture will change. GTA IV in the context of European or other foreign cultures causes it to make absolutely no sense, it is a an American phenomenon. Perhaps the story GTA tells isn't so harsh, but it's quite frightening to think a world where killing for money, helping corrupt politicians, and utilizing any form of violence as means to gain wealth, isn't so different from the one we currently dwell.
Earthbound was an RPG for the Super Nintendo released around 1994. It remains to be one of the few games that has stuck in my mind for years for a multiplicative of reasons, and upon replaying for this assignment I was awestruck by how amazing the game presented itself to me. This game offers to it's audience, a brilliantly and vividly portrayed world for the audience to explore, which Johan Huizinga states as a core aspect of play: "We found that one of the most important characteristics of was it's spatial separation from ordinary life. A closed space is marked out for it" (Huizinga 113). Earthbound uses this element of play to attempt to parody many aspects of American culture within the world it represents. Instead of defeating hardened enemies to collect powerful weapons, we find Ness our protagonist buying supplies at the local supermarket, department store, or super mall complex, in much the same way a suburban mother does her family shopping during the course of a day. This is not only a humorous representation of Americans, but the comical portrayal of a young elementary school boy buying a baseball bat and cheeseburgers to supply himself to fight the greatest evil the world has ever seen seems like a preposterous idea.
However as Huizinga states, "play is not "ordinary" or "real" life. It is rather a stepping out of "real" life into a temporary sphere of activity with a disposition of it's own (Huizinga 103). Earthbound models itself after real life, using American culture in particular as its base, but pushes the bounds of the imagination to present to us the audience a world in which a child with his infinite faith in the universe can save all mankind from an impending doom, while having a sense of humorous irony. We giggle as Ness' capitalistic pig of a neighbor, in their luxurious house, mocks Ness' family and their home, while we see visually how Ness' house is smaller than the one next door. We enter his house to realize what it means to be home as Ness' mother states, "You look tired Ness, I'll fix you a steak and then you go straight up to bed, a mother knows these things." Though these are only a few examples of the vivid world induced through mimicry, as Roger Caillois stated, "All play presupposes the temporary acceptance, if not of an illusion, then at least of a closed, conventional, and, in certain respects, imaginary universe" (Caillois 135). The universe of Earthbound as fake as it may be mimics the real world to the point, I felt an emotional attachment to it.
Earthbound shines brightest at the end as the player faces the final boss. The traditional rules they have followed up to this point become uncertain and the player's own intuition must be utilized to find the solution to the goal. Normal attacks prove fruitless, and as the boss in a roar of confusion constantly wails on your party, all seems hopeless. In this hopelessness the player realizes they must pray to succeed and ask for the prayers of the world to ensure their safe return home. As the player does this the boss is vanquished and one realizes the true power play has to offer.
Learning about the New Games Movement was one of the highlights for me this semester. I have always had "Hippie Tendencies", and was intrigued to see a gaming philosophy that incorporated "Hippie Values". DeKoven, who made a huge impact on the New Games Movement, presented the ideas of collaborative play and the importance of the players' knowledge of the rules of the game, as well as coming together collectively to decide whether rules should be adjusted. "...By establishing guidelines, we assure each other of a common intention and mutual respect for the willingness to play, for the need for safety and trust" (DeKoven 19). Communication before, during and after play was something that DeKoven valued in general.
DeKoven introduced a game called "Zip, zorch, boing, perfigliano"(DeKoven 80), where players sit in a circle and try to pass along these phrases to the players sitting next to them without making any mistakes. The rules sound simple enough, but it's actually a lot harder than it seems. We played a variation of this game earlier in the semester, and saw how difficult the game can be. More importantly, it was a game that we all could play, and play together. The rules of the game did not, particularly, require skills of the players involved that are subject to a specific type of person. The nature of the game relies on communication, voice/speech, and little collective coordination, but that's it. Anyone can join in, or drop out, when they are ready, without much disruption to those who still would like to play.
Another game that I found interesting, and somewhat profound, is the game called "Incidental Music--Five Piano Pieces" a game where you stack blocks onto piano strings, and build a tower as high as you can. When you have reach a point where the tower can no longer hold itself, the game begins. As the blocks fall, "music" is made, hence the name of the game, Incidental Music. This is a cool idea as "the games formulation is the inverted game mechanic: it is at the moment that you 'lose' the game the music itself is created" (Pearce 19). I love the idea of player wanting to "lose" in order to win at a game. It's a completely reversed use of game mechanics to create something interested and unexpected.
A third game that sort of breaks traditional game mechanics, and could be classified as a sort of New Games Movement game, is "Rock, Paper, Scissors Tag". The game requires that the group of players split into teams and collectively decide which move their team will make against the others. So most of the traditional "Rock-Paper-Scissors" strategy is distorted because it's a little more difficult to guess what move a TEAM of people will make in RPS, than one other opponent. When the teams make a move, the "losing" team must run or be tagged by the other team, and once tagged becomes part of the other team. This is interested because typically when you are part of a team, you stick with them, but in the case of this game you could become a part of the "opponent's" team at a moment's notice.
I would like to explore more of these kinds of games in future game design projects. Fair Play, collective ruling, and dynamic/organic rules of play could be interested in the digital gaming space.