GDD710 Development Practice Module - Week 3 - Research
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This week is all about "Rapid Ideation" and "Prototyping". In my experience, Rapid Ideation is just a fancier term for Brainstorming with extra perks depending on the subject and context. An introductory video gave a better view to Rapid Ideation and its wide variety of time-based events that exploits the process as an innovative motivator.
"It's about creating something within specifc time constraints, often based on a theme, in a low-stake scenario" - (Giovanni Rubino, 2021)
Figure 1: Illustration of Rapid Ideation (thinkFWD, 2021)
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Charrette
Giovanni also mentions a mixed collobaration of Rapid ideation types that are applied in multiple areas of technology. One being the concept of "Charrette". This type is more-commonly used in design and architectural areas, based on a small horse cart filled with drawings and ideas that architects would be propose and show off to their clients. This term is mordernly utilized to refer to an intensified time period of work to prepare projects for scheduled deadlines (Involve, 2021). Below is an illustration of Charrette.
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Figure 2: Illustration of Charrette (Départ de la course, 1927)
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Hackathons
Independent events like Hackathons take place that mainly focus on prototyping users for newer and upcoming tehcnologies. This act of ideation encouraged filmmakers such as KinoKabaret to create short movies witin a limited timeframe. Hackathons are usually organised and held by a technical company, forming groups of programmers to contribute towards a challenging project over a short period of time. These types of Rapid Ideation leans to sacrifice esssential human behaviouir liike sleeping and eating to achieve the ending task. These events mainly last between 24 hours to a weekend (Aaron Lawrence, 2016). It acts as a great self-learner for participants that want to improve a certain area in programming. Below is an illustration of Hackathons.
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Figure 3: Illustration of Hackathon (Jackie Smith, 2019)
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Game Jams
Over the past few years, there has been an expanding rate of events using Rapid Ideation within game development. Also referred to as "Game Jams". A Game Jam is where individuals come together and develop a game. whether it be digital or analogue, this technique of Rapid Ideation allows partipants to rapidly prototype designs for a proposed game and enhance new ideas to assist growth within the global gaming industry (Global Game Jam, 2021). A common theme and connstraints are shared to encourage creative thinking under pressure. This results into small projects but casual and innovative creations. Some of these creations have been developed upon to build a commercial reputation. Below is an illustration of my University participating in a Game Jam.
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Figure 4: Illustration of Game Jam (Solent University, 2019)
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Types of Game Jams
Global Game Jam - The most notable Game Jam to date. Originally established in 2008 to help and improve the educationa side of gaming, sparking into the most competitive Game Jam to date. Its duration takes place each year in late January over a period of 48 hours, exploiting any involved websites contributed by open participants on a worldwide scale allowing global community support. The theme is released through an open panel on a friday evening before the jam commences.The jam does offer alot of leeway for participants who may join late due to other commitments and not feel overwhelmed when taking part after commencement.
Ludem Dare - This Game Jam takes place twice a year, mainly to encourage independant game developers. There has been an increase in team-based projects. That inspired to split the jam into two catagories. One known as the "Jam" which lasts up to 72 hours that can be comprosed of individuals, as well as teams. The other catagory called the "Compo" is solo developement only and has a duration of 48 hours (Ludem Dare 48, n.d). There is a differentiation between the two catagories as the Compo is more challenging and can become competitively chatoic. The theme is usually decided upon the hype of the Jam. This enables some consideration to be made whenit comes to researching a particular theme to be creatively centred on.
Pirate Jam - A literal anf metaphorical sense, the Pirate Game Jam was established by the creator of Alice: Madness Returns, American Mcgee. He oversees development teams board a boat and set sail from Thailand who spend a total of 15 days on the Andaman Sea. Their goal consists of 10 days designing and developing a game for 5 hours, followed by pirate-like games such as fishing, diving and apparently pillaging of other vessels for valuable essentials like rum (MCV Staff, 2016). Once the two weeks are up, they will be awarded points for their developed product, as well as their valiant efforts performed in the pirate based activities.
Slow Game Jam - A different approach to Game Jams, the Slow Jam is a way in "getting away from instant gratification", allowing a natural flow of development and maturity to take over. The majority of creative results are walking simulator games. That does not mean the only genre potential when taking part in this event. The duration of the Slow Jam lasts between 2 weeks and a month in a low stress environment to develop less-involved and simplistic mechanics. it is a lot more accessible in terms of particpating enough time to the event on your own terms as the duration is designed to be flexible around yourself. Slow Jams tend to offer alot of experimentation when to brainstorming ideas and ensuring their potential to function correctly (Mitchell Loewen, 2021). The same goes when it comes to playtesting your game.
ProcJam - The Game Jam where you "Make things that makes things" aims to open up a newly evolutionised method of design thinking. Mainly focusing on procedurally generated or card games that surround storytelling. ProcJam is made to make a healthy and relaxed experience when developing games or generative software tools that produces the unlikeliest of objects such as clothes or cars. Like the Slow Jam, ProcJam allows you to start early or finihs late as they are only displayed as a guideline to inform other members when they take part (Cut Garnet Games, 2017). For those less fortunate due to other commitments that affect starting, they can be given a late submission code to upload their game under unfortunate circumstances. As a member you are also commissioned with a licensed tileset ot character sprites for those who do not consider themselves skillful in the art department.
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Personal Experience with Game Jams
I have had my own fair share withn Game Jams over the past few years. Mainly being part of a games society at Solent University called Solent Video Games Academy where I was in charge of promotions giving weekly announcments and organising the events. I was limited with what I could contribute with due to commuting to University which was within a walking distance to the campus. I was mainly based on Discord where our announcements were made. When Covid impacted on our learning, The Game Jams were scrapped due to having no back up approach in a virtual online experience since we heavily relied on face to face communication and teamwork. Bearing in mind, we were under significant pressure finalising our Final Major Projects with 3 months of the academic year left. Below are some examples of my involvement and posters I designed and promoted during the first semseter of my third year.
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Figure 5: Solent Hollow Jam Poster (Kyle Cornwell, 2019)
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Figure 6: Guy Fawkes Jam Poster (Kyle Cornwell, 2019)
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It wasn't until the end of University that I reallty involved myself with participating in an actual Game Jam. It was coming up to christmas 2020 and I wanted to get in touch with some graduates from my old course who may have been interested to participate in a Game Jam I organised on Itch called the 12 Devs of Xmas Game Jam. This felt different as I could properly involve myself and get stuck in and the game I made was an 2D endless runner called A Pixel Carol which was a successful little project. I planned the time for this Jam well as it was to commit 4 days worth of work within 10 days due to other people's schedules. My other experience was earlier this year in April called the Eggstravaganza Game Jam where I developed a 2D wave survival game called You're Late!
This was a change for me as I haven't really experienced with Wave systems before and I enjoyed the change. The one thing I was down-hearted with was the art and sound as I concentrated alot of my time towards the mechanics to ensure they would run smoothly. I intend to go back on this game eventually and give it the polishing it deserves. Looking back at my current knowledge and skills in Game Jams, I would like to familiar myself with a bigger event perhaps, more for the experience than the competition as I would like to test myself in confidence and self-esteem with what I could commit to such a bigger event.
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Prototyping
"Defined as a working interactive software, that gives an idea of the the final product." - (Giovanni Rubino, 2021)
Figure 7: Illustration of Prototyping (Starloop Studios, 2020)
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Prototyping itself is a method that can be manifested throughout a development life cycle. it's main purpose is at the foundational stage of projects where the ideas are all conceptual and theory-based. It is also known as the low-defintion of a product that is utilized to validate further design choices. It would be classed as a bad investment if clients allocated thier time and efforts in a product that requires unlimited modifications which may need to be dropped. This is where a Minimum-Viable Product comes into business play. An MVP is a product with enough functonal features, aimed to attract early customers to secure and confirm an idea's potential for further development and carry out the next iteration (ProductPlan, 2021). A wide variety of material to construct a prototype is from commerical use as it is more about the functionality than the appearence, given the encouragement of feedback is strong to ensure further decisions on how the finalised product will be predicted. Below is a list of various approaches used when prototyping.
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Different Approaches to Prototyping
Wireframing - This digital approach in prototyping allows users to see the functionality and ease of access side of design. Wireframe's goals are to demonstrate an early representation of the current product, to establish its basic structure before any visuals and content are imported. This ensures a mutual agreement with client and developer approval to continue further iterations provided the product is on the right path of development to meet required criteria (Brandon Korth, 2018). In game development, wireframing is more a visualization of a Game Design Document (GDD) to define a mechanics functionality and behaviour. Many consider a wireframe format to be an efficient and economical way method for any alterations that require attention. It is best recommended to make different versions of wireframes to differ between low-fidelity and high-fidelity as this can cause confusion when attempting to identify the level of production or functionaity. better to start concise than precise.
Storyboarding - Also known as a task interpeter, storyboarding allows you to present the type of interfaces and the type of flow you want in your product. it is a creative and straigh-forward comprehend how your system stucture accomplishes its tasks. There is no complex thinking involved as the goal for using this approach is all about mapping out a journey for users experience, potraying their stories through a collection of images in a seqeuntial order. Storyboarding contains 3 main components in any type of purpose: scenario, visuals and corresponding captions. The scenario is the basis of the idea, summarised in a short text description for a non-visual client/team clarification (Luke Leighfield, 2021). Visuals are the centre of the idea through sketches and illustrations depicting the relevance to the story like the environmental aspects towards a user. Captions are the descriptive side of the idea, defining the users action, emotion and purpose. The visuals are primary, where scenario and captions are kept brief.
Paper Prototyping - The pen and paper process where you construct ideas to see whether or not it has digital potential. It is part of the low-fidelity prototyping, but an effective method to debate whether a concept can be developed upon. It is a very cheap and creative approach which can save any development tasks in further iterations that can be put to something more desirable. All it takes is some craftsmanship and brainstorming to knuckle down and generate a promising proposal. If a proposal does not meet the expectations at a paper prototype level, you might as well scrap the idea as it leans towards a non-buildable product (Patrick Thornton, 2019). This approach also opens communication and involvment between team members who are not familiar with design and programming. The more team members, the better the product. Many consider paper prototyping to be the core method in user design. User design is more about user involvement in the design process and gaining feedback rather than asking for user requirements.
Vertical Slice - This is more of a complex and digital approach to prototyping and more than a prototype in itself. Specifically in game development, a vertical slice is a fully-functioning chunk of a game that demonstrates a developers ideal player experience. This consists of all main mechanics and features implemented and running correctly, filled with design and art to represent a polished level of quality. This iteration of a game sets aside from earlier stages such as an MVP or functional prototype. it is also classed to clients as a POC since their purpose to be kept in the loop on development is to sign off on iterations. As long as the vertical slice meets the user/players criteria and the client is satisfied, further development can continue. The term "slice" refers to the level/segment of the game, Whereas the finalised build may include various levels/segments. In Software Engineering, vertical slices work on a similar level when developing tools and programs which are alot more involved with HCI (Xsolla, 2021). It brings a wealth of benefit towards projects and is considered to be a strong time manager when recieving user feedback.
MDA - Mechanics, Dynamics and Aesthetics is the medium approach between game development and game design. An important concept to acknowledge is that developers make the games and players consume the games. The player has a 3 phase method when playing a game, rules to understand, a system to interact with and a need to have fun. This works both ways with a developer with MDA. The mechanics define the missing elements of the game, involving rules and interactables full of logic and data. Dynamics is the visual side of mechanics that players recognise. it also defines the outcomes when players interact with buttons between the input and output of a game (Marco, n.d). Aesthetics report the emotional responses induced by the player when having interactivity with a game. It initially starts with the player journeying through the experience with viewing the aesthetic side of the game. There is always interacitivty with dynamics but not the mechanics due to the developer working on the game. This method in prototyping ensures a stronger prediciton when fueling new ideas.
Theme, World and Story - This would also be classed as Narrative Protoyping. Using the elements of theme, world and story opens up a range of avenues for ideas to flourish when there is no clear starting point. It starts of with a loosely defined theme, that forms in a constructed world where a story is defined from within. This is where the narrative design is produced from these elements. |t enables designers to generate a plot straight from nothing and build from a concept that has the capability to become a buildable product. Narrative is what also brings a development team together as each member can relate regardless of prior experience and knowledge (Raina Glass, 2020). It works the same as a worldbuilder in the design department for a game. Generating the theme is the foundational mechanic start and narrative flow that sparks a particular prototype. Once general features of a plot are added such as characters, world and thematic setting, a narrative prototype has been given a considerable purpose for future growth.
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Personal Experience with Prototyping
My experience when it comes to Prototyping is a mixed collobaration of projects. Alot of my studies invovled developing a range of games from tech demos, micro-games, casual games to first-person horror games that can be found on my Portfolio. Alot of the projects never properly reached the term "Prototype", let alone a "Vertical Slice" due to the requirements needed to meet those standards. There was always un-finished and buggy builds that were called just about a POC. This was mainly down to experimenting the variuous projects and testing our knowledge in what we could work on within a given timeframe, as well as being an educational experience to prepare for what developers would expect in the industry. I tended to lean more towards the design elements in projects, especially using storyboards and wireframes as I find visual representations alot more hands-on and adaptable to devlop from.
I have had my fair share of making paper prototypes such as a game mysef and other graduates came up with during our first year called "Star Wars Battleboards" which was based on the 2005 Star Wars Battlefront 2 (Lucas Arts, 2005). Another prototype we made in our second year was Friday the 13th, but as a board game. This inspired us to work on our own game outside of studies which to this day is currently undergoing development and should see a potential release near the end of 2021. I myself find multiple approaches of prototyping to be a rush in games development as it really pushes my creativeness to the limit and learn newer lengths in how I can improve how I interpret an idea with a reasonable scope and flow that can meet project capabilities. I aim to adopt newer skills when carrying out these approaches of prototyping when it comes to the first Rapid Ideation or what I will keep referring to, a Game Jam.
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References:
Involve, 2021. DESIGN CHARRETTES. [Online] Available at: https://www.involve.org.uk/resources/methods/design-charrettes [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Aaron Lawrence, 2016. What is a Hackathon? A Newbie's Guide to Collaborative Coding. [Online] Available at: https://www.rasmussen.edu/degrees/technology/blog/what-is-a-hackathon/ [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Global Game Jam. n.d. What is a game jam. [Online] Available at: https://globalgamejam.org/what-game-jam [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Ludem Dare 48, n.d. What is Ludum Dare? [Online] Available at: https://ldjam.com/ [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
MCV Staff, 2016. American McGee's Pirate Jam is a two-week game jam set at sea. [Online} Available at: https://www.mcvuk.com/development-news/american-mcgees-pirate-jam-is-a-two-week-game-jam-set-at-sea/ [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Mitchell Loewen, 2021. Why We Need More Slow Game Jams. [Online] Available at: https://www.cloudfallstudios.com/blog/2021/2/9/why-we-need-more-slow-game-jams [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Cut Garnet Games, 2017. PROCJAM - The Procedural Generation Jam. [Online] Available at: https://itch.io/jam/procjam2017 [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Coven Interactive, 2020. 12 Devs of Xmas Game Jam 2020. [Online] Available at: https://itch.io/jam/12-devs-of-xmas-game-jam-2020 [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Coven Interactive, 2021. Eggstravaganza Game Jam 2021. [Online] Available at: https://itch.io/jam/eggstravaganza-game-jam-2021 [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
ProductPlan, 2021. Minimum Viable Product (MVP). [Online] Available at: https://www.productplan.com/glossary/minimum-viable-product/ [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Brandon Korth, 2018. Game Development 101: An Introduction to Wireframes. [Online] Available at: https://www.filamentgames.com/blog/game-development-101-introduction-wireframes/ [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Luke Leighfield, 2021. Video Game Storyboarding: Step-by-Step Guide for 2021. [Online] Available at: https://boords.com/how-to-storyboard/video-game-storyboarding-step-by-step-guide-for-2021 [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Patrick Thornton, 2019. How to do paper prototyping, the UX tool you may be missing. [Online] Available at: https://uxdesign.cc/how-to-do-paper-prototyping-719173215a7e [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Xsolla, 2021. FUNDING 101: THE IMPACT OF THE VERTICAL SLICE. [Online] Available at: https://xsolla.com/blog/funding-101-the-impact-of-the-vertical-slice [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Marco, n.d. Mechanics Dynamics Aesthetics (MDA): The Game Design Theory Behind Games. [Online] Available at: https://gamedevelopertips.com/mechanics-dynamics-aesthetics-game-design-theory-behind-games/ [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Raina Glass, 2020. Narrative in prototypes. [Online] Available at: https://uxdesign.cc/narrative-in-prototypes-4272a99ab344 [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
Star Wars Battlefront 2, 2005. Lucas Arts. [Online] Available at: https://store.steampowered.com/app/6060/Star_Wars_Battlefront_2_Classic_2005/ [Last Accessed 20/07/2021]
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