Current offering: Spring 2022, Taught by Chelsea Mills
Join us for our live-streamed Game Design Showcase on Tuesday April 5 2022, from 2:30 - 4:20pm
first taught in Fall 2017.
Documentation of prior Game Design Showcase on 29th of November 2021
Documentation of prior Game Design Showcase on 28. July 2021
Documentation of prior Game Design Showcase on 9. April 2021
Want to try out Games from prior classes?
type “IAT312” into the search field on the Tabletop Simulator site on Steam or through this direct link.
Course outline
Brief course intro video (spring 2021)
Course description
In a nutshell: you’ll learn how to design, build, analyze, and iteratively refine a number of non-digital games.
Course goals
This is an introductory course in game design and we will examine the discipline and practices of game design. Games are studied across three analytical frameworks: games as rules (formal system), games as play (experiential system), and games as culture (social system). This course will include analytical and practical exercises in game design including small non-digital game design projects. Game design is a creative endeavour requiring practical experience through design, critique and iteration. We will explore some of the more universal game mechanisms, such as randomness, economic systems, player motivation and psychology, and a few specific topics in more detail. This course will prepare students to undertake the fundamentals of game design including designing, building, analyzing, and iteratively refining a number of non-digital games.
During the 2021 Spring semester, this course will be taught online and will apply a flipped approach to learning. Each week students will work independently and with peers learning about game design through videos, readings, discussions and small individual and team activities. In the live lecture part of this class, we will read and discuss some of the work that analyzes players, games and the game design process to establish common ground and prepare you for practical work in the labs where students will play(test), critique, improve and design games as well as report on the course’s longer game design projects.
No programming or Unity knowledge is required. All games created in this course will be or mimick analog games.
Intended learning outcomes
The course is intended to support you to gain both practical experience with and a critical understanding of the foundations of game design in specific contexts. Specifically, by fulfilling the requirements of the course you will be prepared to accomplish key tasks in 4 main game design areas:
- Game Design Basics:
- Explain and critically reflect on games, and the characteristics and features of different types of games including their components, mechanics & rules, dynamics, and aesthetics/UX/fun, the “Magic Circle”, and what makes for a compelling game
- Analyze and argue what makes for a compelling game (or not) and why people like to play games
- Game Design Frameworks & Psychology
- Compare and contrast different frameworks and underlying assumptions, and determine how and when to use which frameworks
- Explain different player types and psychologies, how they affect their gameplay, assumptions, and preferences, and use this knowledge to improve game designs
- Game Design Process:
- Explain and effectively utilize game design best practices/processes/frameworks/mechanics, and explain how you did this when designing several games in teams. This includes typical game design phases such as ideation, prototyping and play testing as the base for an iterative game design cycle
- Analyze, discuss, and critique games using appropriate terminology, and provide well-structured, constructive, and useful feedback (e.g., after playtesting or game pitches).
- Discuss the difference between game critiques vs. playtesting, and demonstrate why, when, and how to use either of them effectively to improve your game and design process
- Effectively demonstrate and reflect on how to effectively communicate your game across different stages (from early prototype to final game), to different audiences (both internal and external), and using different presentation formats (incl. written instructions/rule sheets, pitches, game design documents (GDDs), and game videos)
- Game Design Teams:
- Reflect on and apply suitable processes and team-based, collaborative practices used in game design including ideation, prototyping, iterative revisions, and playtesting as the base for an iterative design cycle to a game design project.
- Specific processes covered in this class may include structured team brainstorming (affinity diagramming), moodboards, inspiration analysis, Razor & Slogan, Play Matrix, playtesting scripts, structured game critique/analysis, and Agile project management)
- Explain what makes a good game designer, and why and how they often work in teams
- Reflect on your own and others’ assumptions, lenses, beliefs, what people really care about, and preferences about games/playing, and how do they affect game design and teamwork
- Explain and utilize a toolbox of how to foster a collaborative, constructive, and supportive team culture and process, including patterns of thinking and behaviour that support effective teams, as well as specific tools, tips, processes and frameworks (incl. Agile) that might be useful
- Find ways to effectively address challenges that can occur in team-based environments while being respectful and constructive. (This could include collaboratively resolve challenges that commonly occur in team-based projects, such as balancing between leading/following, communication challenges, conflicts that arise, ensuring all team members contribute meaningfully, engaging all team members, ensuring all care for the project and each other, getting people on the same page, and figuring out a shared vision/purpose that all can care about).
- Reflect on and apply suitable processes and team-based, collaborative practices used in game design including ideation, prototyping, iterative revisions, and playtesting as the base for an iterative design cycle to a game design project.
Delivery Method
This course will include a weekly live lecture (110 minutes) and a workshop-tutorial (110 minutes) component. The course for the spring 2021 will be delivered via remote instruction and will use a “flipped” classroom approach. Students are expected to participate in:
- synchronous activities during the scheduled course times. This includes a live, interactive lecture with demonstrations, discussions, and some individual and peer/group work, as well as a live workshop-tutorial where students will practice and apply the concepts of the lecture in designing several games
- asynchronous activities (e.g., independent preparation before the lecture, team work, peer work etc. to prepare each week and to pace yourself carefully in order to stay on top of the activities/assignments and to get the most from the class).
The learning environment will be active, supporting, and will afford opportunities for students to strengthen knowledge, skills, and feel a part of a community.
Teaching/Learning Activities
these include:
- Interactive lecturing and demonstrations
- Flipped-classroom activities: e.g., students are asked to watch online tutorials & do readings at home so they can come to class prepared to do a short quiz, discuss and apply the material, and fill out the weekly JiTT online assignments
- Tutorial sessions
- A team project made up of several team assignments/presentations that culminate in a final group project report/presentation and project video
- Group discussions (in-class and online chat– and discussing forums)
- Short in-class writing and other activities
- Weekly reading and short writing assignments
- Several short student team presentations
- Peer feedback and evaluations
Main textbook
- Fullerton, T. (2019). Game Design Workshop: A Playcentric Approach to Creating Innovative Games, Fourth Edition (4th Edition.). Boca Raton, FL: A K Peters/CRC Press. ISBN: 9781315104300. This is our main textbook, so make sure you have access and get your own copy by the first week of the semester. You should be able to access it online through the SFU library.
- Schell, J. (2019). The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses, Third Edition. A K Peters/CRC Press. doi:10.1201/b22101. You should be able to access this online through the SFU library.
Additional readings will be provided through Canvas.
Software used for game design & playtesting: Tabletop Simulator
As this is an online class in Spring 2021 you won’t need to purchase physical prototyping materials for designing your own games. Instead we will use an online board game simulator, the “Tabletop Simulator” https://www.tabletopsimulator.com/about. Course assignments will be taught and demonstrated with this software, and other software will not be supported by the course. You can also use this software for rapid prototyping and designing your games in your teams, and it also works really well for online and distributed playtesting (and of course gaming just for fun), and sharing your final games online. Thus we strongly recommend that you purchase, download, and install your own copy of it before class starts, see link above of directly from Steam https://store.steampowered.com/app/286160/Tabletop_Simulator/. it runs on both Windows and MacOS and currently costs CDN$ 21.99. The software has a lot of excellent online resources and tutorials available at https://www.tabletopsimulator.com/about. Note that to minimize your extra costs for this class, we are removing the need to purchase physical prototyping and game design materials, and I chose a textbook where our library provides free online access.
Weekly Structure
The course will apply a “flipped” approach to learning. This requires you to prepare each week and to pace yourself carefully in order to stay on top of the activities/assignments and to get the most from the class. Each week it will go something like this:
Preparing Before Lecture
You will begin the week by checking the weekly plan and your tasks on Canvas, and then watching short, online tutorials, lectures, or other videos related to this week’s topics; then you will be invited to do the weekly readings that will cover topics of the week. You will use a reading guide/Jitt questions to help you focus on key aspects of the readings, to answer key questions that will help you to understand the ideas in the readings, and start applying them in the JiTT (“Just in Time Teaching”) online short weekly assignments. We will also ask you about any “muddy points” or questions you might still have after going through the videos, readings, and JiTTs. This will be done before the live lecture and will help us decide what aspects to focus on specifically in the “lecture”. Occasionally you may be asked to do a short quiz to indicate how well you have understood the concepts in the readings and videos.
We will assist you in forming small study groups for those interested to help you digest and reflect on the materials before class, and have people to discuss the topics with (as that can sometimes be a challenge in online teaching). We will also have a course slack channel for online discussions and Q&A.
Engaging in the Live Lecture where we discuss and apply the material
The lectures will be interactive and include small group discussions, demonstrations, student presentations and feedback sessions, and instruction on key ideas. Parts of the lectures may be recorded for review. It is important to realize that the lectures will focus on key ideas and applications and will not be a re-teaching of content found in the readings and videos. You are required to read and prepare for the live lecture.
Participating in the Tutorials (aka Workshops or WKS)
Following the live lecture each week there is a tutorial aimed to provide opportunities for practicing and applying the knowledge and skills of game design. The tutorials will include small group learning, team activities, game playtesting, and peer feedback in particular on the game design projects. Teams may be called upon to do short presentations or pitches of their game ideas and receive feedback from peers and the instructor on their designs. The tutorials will be highly engaging and practical and require your full contribution. They also require active participation in the prior lecture.
Documentation of prior (and ongoing) games that students created
Spring 2022,
Fall 2021
Summer 2021
Spring 2021
Examples and details from the Fall 2017 course offering
For their final game project, students were asked to design a non-digital game that includes “Transformative Fun” aspects, also known as “serious fun” (e.g., Lazzaro): That is, the game should be meaningful/purposeful or add value by somehow transforming the user, e.g., by providing a novel/meaningful user experience, different perspectives/viewpoints, altered states etc.
Pictures from the final showcase on Dec 13, 2017
Sample Project Videos
Shelter
ōBit
StranDead
Left Behind Bars
False Illusion
Rescue
One Week to Refuge
Questionnaire
Some examples from the 2019 offering:
Student debt