by Annie | Other
In the spirit of the back to school season, I’ve decided to create my own Crayola masterpiece. Not with a paintbrush, but rather, with a blow dryer. If you’ve got some crayons, glue, and canvas, try it out for yourself! Step 1: Gather supplies So many crayons, so little time. This time of year, stores are full of back to school sales, so it’s easy to find a large box of crayons for very little cost. Add to that a glue gun, fresh canvas, and blow dryer, and you’re all set to create your own masterpiece. Step 2: Attach the crayons Dump out your crayons and start sorting. Once you’ve decided on the order and placement, glue your crayons to your canvas. Step 3: Ready, set, melt! This is my favorite part. Once all your crayons are securely attached to the canvas, fire up the blow dryer. It takes a few seconds to warm up, but soon you’ll see the wax starting to melt, and then the magic happens. And voila! There you have it – a Crayola masterpiece guaranteed to brighten up any...
by Annie | Game Design
I played a game today. No, it wasn’t Monopoly, Minesweeper, or Street Fighter. A few days ago, I got an Amazon gift card from my parents-in-law. So today, I played the Amazon gift card game. Curious? Here’s the high-level pitch: Play as a shopper trying to buy as many different items for a new apartment as possible while staying within the gift card amount. Rules: – Items must currently be in stock. – Shipping cost for each item cannot exceed item cost. – Bonus points for items that can be shipped together. The Result: I started out by filling up my shopping cart with over 3 times the amount of the gift card. Lots of balancing, compromising, and trading later, I ended up purchasing 8 different items for various rooms of my new apartment. In the process, I rediscovered some things I already had, prioritized my shopping list, and got a better idea of what I was looking for. The Takeaway: Anything in life can be a game. Look around you. Take any task, set a specific goal, add a few stipulations and a potential reward, and voila! You’ve got fun waiting for you around every corner. Don’t believe me? Try it out. Here are some daily tasks to get you started: – Waiting for the bus – Washing dishes – Going grocery shopping – Paying bills – Making the bed Anyone can be a game designer. Fill your life with games, and you can play even the most ordinary moments...
by Annie | Education
During my two years in the classroom, I had lots of talks with my students. We discussed the fourth grade slump, the importance of fractions in daily life, and what happens when you get caught cheating. But one of the most heartbreaking talks I ever had with my students was about the achievement gap. During my first year of teaching, I had a group of very bright, talented, and eager fourth graders. They were street smart, curious, and intent on success in life. One day, during a conversation about standardized testing, one of my students pointed out that some schools seemed better than others. A brief intro to the achievement gap later, most of the class was more determined than ever to break the mold and soar above the rest. But at the back of the classroom, Ashley was in tears. It wasn’t fair, she said. Ashley was one of my best students, years above grade level in reading and very articulate. She went on to tell me about the struggles of her family and about how hard she had and would continue to work, but that it might not be enough. It’s one thing not to be able to provide a quality education to the students who are repeatedly tardy, have an arsenal of homework excuses, and cause daily disruptions in the classroom. But to look a child in the face, a child who desperately wants a good education, and to tell her that the world sometimes just isn’t fair, remains one of the toughest things I’ve ever had to do. If you haven’t already, consider watching the documentary...
by Annie | Game Design
Think games are just a simple pastime? Think again. Around the world, game makers are creating games that continue to push the boundary in education, health, and world issues. Here are some of the things games have...
by Annie | Psychology of Games
People are often surprised when I tell them I came to game design through teaching. “Wow, that’s a huge switch!” they’ll say. But if you examine the core of teaching and game design, they’re really not all that different. Sure, I used games in the classroom. On any given day, you could’ve walked into my classroom and seen my students engaged in a scavenger hunt, team trivia tournament, or math race. And let me tell you, any time I brought up the word game, even the most reluctant student would perk his ears up, eager to try something new. But I’m not just talking about using games to enhance teaching. I’m talking about teaching itself. The very act of teaching is, in itself, a form of game design. A teacher has a specific goal in mind (e.g., having her students pass the state math exam) and creates a structured experience to guide students toward that goal. So what do I do as a game designer? The same exact thing. I have a goal in mind, and I structure an experience to teach players the skills they’ll need to master the mechanics and succeed. And what I’ve discovered thus far is that, aside from a clear goal, the most important element of games is clear and immediate feedback. And that’s what my students responded to most in the classroom. Homework exercises required waiting until the next day to figure out if they got the answers right, but games allowed them to immediately correct any misunderstandings and level up their skills. If you think about it, the variety and intensity of...
by Annie | Game Design
One of the most commonly dreaded terms in the VFS game design program is term 3. Why? Because that’s the term you write your first DDD – detailed design document. Why is the DDD such a dreaded assignment? After all, don’t game designers love coming up with ideas and fleshing them out? Absolutely. However, an effective DDD requires a level of detail many novice game designers aren’t accustomed to thinking about. Things like rate of fire, game time projections, and difficulty ramping. So how do you go about writing one of these so-called DDDs? Well, there’s no right or wrong way to go about it. First and foremost, you must keep in mind the audience you’re writing for. Think about Your Audience Think about the other members of your team: the programmers, artists, level designers, sound designers, etc. These are the people you’re writing the document for. What information do they need to create the game? As you write, imagine each of them, tired and grumpy at 2am trying to fumble through your document to glean the information necessary to meet the next deadline. In other words, your DDD needs to be both detailed and concise. Information like, “A bunch of enemies will appear on screen when you enter the hallway” is of little use to a programmer trying to script specific encounters. Be specific. Your job as a game designer is to anticipate the issues various people on your team will have when they try to create the game. So put yourself in their shoes, and make sure the DDD meets their needs. Keep It Organized Another thing that...
by Annie | Psychology of Games
Wow, look at you reading my blog. And here I didn’t even know you could read. I guess that big head of yours is good for something after all. Or maybe not. As it turns out, trash-talking is almost as important to our enjoyment of social network games as the core gameplay. As counterintuitive as it may sound, research has found that teasing each other is one of the fastest and most effective ways to build and intensify positive feelings for each other. Remember all those times you spent teasing your friends on the playground back in the day? You were just secretly trying to become more popular. What a sad little life you lead. The psychology of teasing was especially pertinent as I played through the Portal games recently. (Yes, I know. I’m a bit late to the party.) The more GLaDOS trash-talked me, the more determined I became and the more I wanted to keep playing. I would try as hard as I could to solve the puzzles, then I’d get a monotone statement like, “Remember before when I was talking about smelly garbage standing around being useless? That was a metaphor. I was actually talking about you. And I’m sorry. You didn’t react at the time so I was worried it sailed right over your head. That’s why I had to call you garbage a second time just now.” Admit it. You love it. So as you’re designing games, especially social games, keep in mind the psychology of teasing and what it could add to your game. Of course, having a great writer like Erik Wolpaw on...
by Annie | Game Design
One of the most valuable pieces of advice I got during my year at VFS was to just do it. As creative individuals, we could spend countless hours brainstorming concept after concept, piling on features and thinking of different themes. But in the end, the follow-through is what counts. In my experience, the sooner you lock down a game concept, the better. You’re better off spending your time iterating on a single idea to make it as great as possible than coming up with lots of different ideas while leaving yourself very little time to make any of them good. Sure, everyone wants to come up with that innovative idea. That smashing new concept that no one’s ever thought of, that’s so genius it’ll blow everyone’s socks off. But if it hasn’t come to you within a few brainstorming sessions, choose one of the less genius ideas instead and make it as awesome as possible. And who knows? Maybe the genius idea will come about in the next round. And by then, if you’ve already followed through with another idea, you’ll have more experience and wisdom to bring to your genius idea. So go forth, create, and follow through. Because to be a great game designer, you’ve just got to do...
by Annie | Travel
To celebrate Independence Day, Joe and I climbed a mountain. No really. We climbed a mountain. Grouse Grind, commonly referred to as Mother Nature’s Stairmaster, is a 2.9km trail up Grouse Mountain. It includes nearly 3,000 steps and an elevation gain of over 850 meters. Not for the faint of heart. And when I say steps, I don’t mean stairs like the ones you’d find in your house. No no. I actually rejoiced at the sight of “normal” stairs along the trail. Most steps were several normal stairs high, created out of rocks and wooden planks anchored into the side of the mountain. Before heading out on the trail, I knew we were in for quite a hike. But after all, we’d hiked a mountain or two before, so I figured we’d be okay. I kid you not, I probably spent half my energy reserves laughing (in fear!) at the sheer size of the mountain when we got to the base. We’re climbing THAT? But I knew there was no turning back at this point, so we headed out on the trail. Within minutes, I was out of breath. I tell you, my breath must be in much better shape than I am, because I spent the next hour and fifteen minutes trying to catch it. Once we finally reached the top (the summit is over 1,100 meters high), the view was breathtaking. We could see all of greater Vancouver and Mount Baker. A bag of trail mix later, we were ready to explore. We spent the next few hours watching lumberjacks, birds of prey, and grizzlies, getting sunburned,...
by Annie | Game Design
What’s it like to be a game designer? Well, I’m pretty new to the field, but I can already tell you that it’s a lot of hard work. But also a ton of fun. I started working this week as an official game designer. You know, out in the real world. My job? To design games that encourage kids to be physically active. Sounds a bit counterintuitive, using video games to get kids up off the couch, but that’s where the creative challenge comes in. Our initial aim is to release an iOS game that is highly addictive and gets kids to move around to get some exercise. Because of the platform, we’re limited to iOS device capabilities, namely the accelerometer and gyroscope. (GPS and compass are possibilities as well, but we’re thinking most 6- to 12-year-olds would probably have iPods rather than iPhones.) Because I’m working with a startup (the entire team is just 7 people), I’m in the unique position of having a lot of say in the creative process even though I’m fresh out of school. As the main designer on the project, my days mainly consist of brainstorming and research (i.e., playing comparable games and reading lots of articles). And already, the many assignments we worked on and the skills we acquired at VFS are coming in quite handy. The deliverables on my list in the coming months include a concept doc, design doc, QA plan, tuning for pacing and difficulty, design of control schemes, and UI design, as well as numerous pitches to the team about different concepts under development. A year ago today...
by Annie | Psychology of Games
We’ve always been taught that the opposite of play is work. Play is fun. Work is not. However, positive psychologists have found that work and play can be one and the same. In fact, people tend to be happiest when they’re working hard. That’s why games are so popular and so many people spend so much time playing them. Games provide achievable goals with rules and obstacles. Games make you work hard, but that means you’re having fun! If you’re interested in learning more, I highly recommend checking out Jane McGonigal’s book Reality is Broken. I’ve just started the book but have already learned a lot about the psychology and real world application of games....
by Annie | Game Design
It’s hard to put into words all the thoughts and emotions that come with graduation, especially one marking the end of such an intense year. I went into the year not knowing what to expect and was blown away every step of the way. I learned more than I ever could’ve imagined and met passionate and creative people who continue to inspire me every day. Moving forward into the real world is a scary step, but with the vast amount of knowledge and skills I’ve acquired at VFS and the extensive support network I now have in my corner, I’m confident I’ll be able to tackle the next big challenge. By now, most of you know that my main interests in game design lie in serious games. That is, those games that reach into the real world and have the potential to effect change in players’ lives. And you also know that I crave opportunities to solve big problems in creative ways. So, I’m excited to announce that my next big venture will be with a startup company here in Vancouver whose aim is to create games to encourage kids to be more physically active. With growing issues of childhood obesity, physical fitness has become a huge societal issue. I’ve seen firsthand how much kids love games. Games transformed my classroom and turned even the most reluctant students into eager learners. Thus, I know that games have the potential to change people’s lives. Like I said, it’s scary stepping out into the real world. I’m now accountable for designing real games, rather than just concepts for various assignments. But...
by Annie | Game Design
Check out Blokhead and some of the other games from our class on the VFS...
by Annie | Game Design
From our first day at VFS, Industry Night was dangled like a carrot before us, that seemingly unreachable goal light years away. Yet after months of hard work, countless brainstorming sessions, and tons of great feedback, we’d produced a game. And a few hours ago, we presented it to the industry. In many ways, Industry Night is the culmination of the VFS game design experience. After working closely with a small team for several months to produce a game, you’re invited to present your game to a group of people from the games industry, who then come and play your games. Our Industry Night included action games, puzzle platformers, adventure games, and shooters. Our games incorporated creativity, solid design, and unique mechanics. And after working day in and day out with these guys over the past several months, I can say that I’m extremely proud of all the games we showed tonight. If you’re interested, you can read more about the games and even try them out for yourself. Be forewarned, though, that some of them can be very addictive....
by Annie | Other
It’s been a year and a half since I first put up my website. I still remember those early days, my first introduction to web design. “What do you mean the textures have to be tileable?” “Why isn’t the font I chose showing up?” With this new site redesign, I can say that I’m still not over those confusions and frustrations, but I’ve learned to be more flexible and open to change. With some help from my husband, web programmer extraordinaire, my new site is ready to show off. Consider this the official ribbon cutting. Bye-bye, duckie. You’ll be missed....
by Annie | Logoland, Typographically Speaking
I’ve long admired people with business cards. Something about having your name and information on a card just makes things more official. So now, with our final game project submitted and Industry Night just around the corner, I finally have a card to call my own. The front comes in a few different colors, and the back has a QR code that will take you to my website. Pretty nifty,...
by Annie | Game Design
Bugs, bugs, bugs, bugs… Our final project is due at the end of this week, which means it’s time for debugging. Looking back through old scripts I wrote in March and April reaffirms how much I’ve learned in the past several weeks. Not only do I have a much better command of C# syntax, but my logic has improved noticeably, meaning I can manage multiple functions and instances simultaneously without too much of a headache. Less guessing, more purposeful planning. As of today, we have 22 bugs on our bug list, 13 of which are ranked high priority. And that’s not including all the ones we haven’t yet found. So here’s to the last few late nights of crunching and debugging. May they go as smoothly and be as pain-free as...
by Annie | Game Design
There are less than 10 days left until our final game is due, which means it’s time for all the little details. With our mechanics and main gameplay elements ready to go, it’s now time to add little flourishes that will make our game experience all that much better and more fun. Here are some of the things on my to-do list for the next week and a half: – implement particle effects (explosions, movement trails, player notifications, etc.) – polish animations – create a new set of background pieces – script some movement for midground pieces (airplanes, clouds, etc.) – ensure that the scoring system works properly for successive plays – debug character movement, environmental assets, and front end menus It’s hard to believe that the deadline is so close. Time to kick things into high...
