Final Product Evaluation

Final Product

The kind if gaming experience I was aiming for in terms of the reactions I wanted for it to generate, would be the feeling of not knowing where you are going, in a way a blind person would, as was the inspiration from the “Out of Sight” animation.

As for whether my final product succeeded in this regard, I feel it did to an extent.

For why it didn’t work, it was mostly due to the lack of environmental assets for the player themselves would see and limited level design, cramming 3 different environments into one level and also that the level itself is too small and so the experience would go by too fast.

However, what was right were the colours to help set a lonely tone and the fact that my character was a floating light with a pulse that represented the sound reflection range which caused the invisible ground to appear when they ‘touched’ as bats and some blind people get around by sound and touch. The platforming aspect of the game works as well to some degree but for this I would rather have the character move more slowly as rushing blind would be a quick way to disaster.

Some changes to the final product that I would make if I had more time would be; to make the character more humanoid as opposed to being a ball, adding more environmental assets to remove the feeling of empty space helping vary the environment and parallax, make it so when the pulse isn’t touching a platform the platform would disappear and including about 2 or 3 more levels to space the environments out.

Project Evaluation

Evaluation

As far as I've worked on this project, I feel like I've done a good job trying to get my ideas to work but instead had to make combinations and compromises to meet the deadline.

I've made occasional updates to my blog of my ideas, mostly in bulk as personally, I am unsure of what I should be showing off on it.

All of my ideas had levels of ambition that wouldn't have been possible to fully make with the project time but because of that, I've been able to take elements from some of them into my final product such as the idea of pulses (1^st idea) but they are used to activate beacons (initial Construct 2 idea) to make the invisible platforms appear.

What I feel most proud of during the project would be my research on games as an art form, as I was able to generate more ideas after breaking them down a bit and maybe taking the mechanics or artistic style. My 3^rd and 5^th ideas are examples of this. My inspirations weren't limited to just games as I even got inspiration from an animation called Out of Sight, which was the product of my pulse idea.

Improvements I need to make include being able to generate multiple ideas and try not to stay attached to one, making goals that are realistically achievable within the project time limit, work on annotations between the research and ideas, updating the blog more regularly and improve on the quality of assets.

What makes a game a game?

What makes a game a game?

There is a fine line between what makes a game and what makes an experience with game elements.

A game, is defined by these key features:

• There must be some form of competition.
• Rules.
• Aspects of player actions that influence the game – chance.
• A goal or objective.

Competition:

There has to be a level of difficulty in getting to the goal, this in turn requires conditions that result in the player losing other than winning and thus the competition stimulates the player to improve and succeed.

Rules:

The rules must define the game and lay out what can be done by the player and what cannot such as; what limits they are bound by and what can they physically do.

Actions that influence the game – chance:

The gaming experience should change depending on how the game is played and the player’s decisions can allow for alternate events.

Goal:

Goals need to be integrated as part of the game and also be defined by the rules.

There must be a level of strategy to meet the victory conditions or requirements to win the game.

Even though these are the key features that define a game, they can be experiences more than mechanics, for example: Shadow of the Colossus which gives you the goal of slaying twelve colossi; with the player choosing which order they want to eliminate them, but even with these, the main attraction would be the art direction taken to create the vast landscape and the feelings that you get while riding along.

Another set of ideas for my atmospheric game

Ideas generated from initial research.

Experimenting with Linocuts

Here we had a go with creating a monster in Illustrator to which we printed out and then applying it into lino. We then proceeded to cut out the shape of the shape of the creature, paint over it using a roller and finally printing it onto a piece of paper.

Ideas for an Atmospheric Game

Here are a few ideas of mine for an atmospheric kind of game where you cannot see the character or the level but the only indication you have is a pulse where the character is touching.
An easier variation is where the only things you can see are the character an the pulse but not the stage.
Inspirations for this idea were from looking at Limbo, The Unfinished Swan, The Company of Myself and staring at a white sheet of paper...

Experimentation with Multiple Exposures

Research: Games as an Art Form

Okami

Inspired by the Ukiyo-e style of Japanese watercolour and wood carving but done in the colourful Sumi-e style to help convey the task of restoring nature in the game world to help provoke a fully emotional experience.

Flower

Flower is intended to provoke positive emotions with the only mechanic being hitting a flower to trigger an event.

Dear Esther

With a focus on exploration, Dear Esther combines poetic storytelling and visually impressive island invoking a sense of fear and curiosity.

Bastion

Bastion is an action role-playing game using an isometric camera and a colourful, hand-painted art style.

Fatal Frame

Fatal Frame is a survival horror series of games that has the player exploring haunted locations, mostly abandoned ruins and fending off ghosts with the use of an antique camera known as the Camera Obscura.

Jet Set Radio

With a colourful cel-shaded style Jet Set Radio has you spray painting graffiti at certain locations around the city, making it a fun filled world.