Game Studies: Journal

 

Game Studies Journal 0350795

Module name: GCD61504/ Game Studies
Lecturer: Sir Charles Sharma Naidu
Current semester: Semester 3
Class timetable: Every Wednesday from 8:00 morning to 12:00 noon.
Mode: Hybrid mode
Location: Classroom E6.11

Group Journal Link: https://sites.google.com/view/trouble-makers/home

Module Booklet: 

Week 1 (31August 2022)

[National Day]

This week is Malaysia national day, the class will begin on week 2 onwards. 

Week 2 (07September 2022)

Hello

At our fist class, Dr. Charles explains about the module information and assignments to us. In this semester, we need to do exercises, project 1, project 2, and a final assessment. Exercises would be given on each week and we need to submit on our e-portfolio. Project 1, 2 and final assessment is group assignment. The final prototype of our group assignment is to develop our own playable game. After introducing all the assessment, Dr. Charles requires us to make an introduction of ourselves. I think the most interesting part was that Sir. Charles asked us to introduce ourselves by presenting our personal game history. By introducing our personal game history we can not only learn about other's background, but also allow classmates with the same interests to get to know each other more quickly. For the group assignment of this module we need to divide into groups of 6 to complete it. After getting know with each other, everyone was busy in finding group members and filling up the google spreadsheet. In this class, I found 3 partners that are taking the same major as me which were Qiao Hui, Ying Hui, and Chee Hong. Our group name is Trouble Makers so that we can always remind ourself not to be a troublemaker. 

Week3 (14September 2022)

New members!!! Idealize (Farcry5 -> Tabletop simulator)

In this week, we have several new classmates that are in the online session last week. Most of them are international student and just reached Malaysia few days ago. They haven't found a group to join so we are glad to have 2 new members (Daren and Ataka) in our group. Meanwhile our group members are all in the class, we started our first discussion during the tutorial session. At first, we decided to use the map customise features in Far Cry 5 which were suggested by Sir. Charles to develop a FPG games. We plan to     create a terrain full of traps and obstacles in far cry 5 and develop a competitive gameplay along with the existing weapons within the platform. After having a conversation with Sir. Charles, he conclude that our ideas would be difficult to implement.First of all, the far cry 5 platform only provides players with custom maps in the existing gameplay, so if we use far cry as the platform for game development, we will not be able to break through in the existing gameplay. Second, the far cry platform provides limited features, and its more complex procedures require a lot of programming work unless we are very talented in programming, otherwise it will be difficult to us without coding. After considering the feasibility of our idea, we decided to change the platform, which meant that everything went back to the very beginning. Dr. Charles encourage us to use Tabletop simulator in Steam platform which have tons of features for us to create our own games. After having another discussion after school, we finally adopted Ying Hui's idea called Who's the fastest to Taylor's. Who's the fastest to Taylor's basically a tabletop game that players need to race to collect transportation and be the fastest one to reach Taylor's. After brainstorming the idea, Ying Hui designed the game rules and the game cards.

Group members:

Created Database:

Week4 (21September 2022)

Prototyping, 3D PRINT

In this week we made our physical game prototyping in class. We used papers and pens to draw out the play card to test the card size and design. We found that using papers and hand drawings are fragile and confusing, so we decided to design the game card on digital platforms and stick the printed design on a poker card. For the pawns part Darren and Ataka suggested using 3D printer to print the transportation model as our game's pawns. They find the 3D model of the transportation and printed out using a 3D printer. Darren and Ataka are in charge of the transportation pawns and card designing whereas the others designed the action card and map board. After assigning the task, Qiao Hui, Chee Hong and I are designing the game action card, and Ying Hui is designing the card board. Each of us complete our task at home and then we meet again on 27th September to finalise our work.

First prototyping:

2nd Prototyping with 3D printer:

Designing the game cards:

  

Finalising our work:

Week5 (05October 2022)

Playtest 1, FEEDBACK from Sir

We made our first playtest in this week. We bring our physical game board to class and test to play within members. When we did our first playtest we found that some game cards were designed with too many cards and slowed down the progress of the whole game. For example, the traffic jam card and the snipper card were designed to be too many, causing a mismatch between flying and land vehicles. In order to balance the game length and fairness, we decided to reduce the number of snipper cards and traffic jam cards, and changed the game rules. After the first change, the game flow became smoother, and we were able to split the winners and losers in two cycles. 

Next, we also tried out our games with Sir. Charles during our practical time and get some feedbacks from him.

Feedbacks from Sir. Charles: 

• Purpose of the game: Why do we need to Taylor's? What are we racing for?

• Will want play again? (maybe...)

• How do we gonna utilise it in tabletop simulator? any animation or effect for different vehicles? like flying effects for helicopter and hot air balloon 

• How can we distinguish between different vehicles except for special abilities? For example, designing the route for each vehicle

• explanation on the game cards must be visible

After playing our game for the first time I was very happy that the game we designed went well. However, the whole game process is easy to get bored and lack of motivation. I think the game experience was pretty good, but I still hope we can improve the fun level of this game.

Week6 (12October 2022)

Playtest 2, New Map!

This week onwards our class are going to be independent, Although there is no physical class but we need to make appointment with Sir. Charles to follow up our assignments and get feedback from him. Some of us do meet up in the class as usual to make our second playtest after getting feedback from Sir last week. In order to improve the competitiveness and fairness of the game we have added a new store and administrator function to the game. Administrators are elected among players and their task is to hunt down other players to become the ultimate winner. In addition, we have made some changes in the map. For example, the one-way route was changed to allow players to choose the direction of advance at the beginning or around the corner to avoid the administrator. We also set some scores in the map, as long as the player stays on the grid with scores to get the corresponding points, its points can let them stay in the store to buy the action card needed. These enhance the fun of the game and also give the players the meaning of race, players have to avoid being chased by the administrator and also have to race with other vehicles to be the fastest to Taylor's. 

Week7 (20October 2022)

[Independent Learning Week]

Optimize bugs in the second playtest. New cards for administrator in the store

Week8 (26October 2022)

-Reporting progress-

We had an online meeting with sir via discord.

Week9 (02November 2022)

Playtest 3, Changes are made based on Dr. Charles feedbacks

We ran our third playtest this week, which was after adding the administrator and shop features and extended our playtest to other faculty students for more suggestion. We also have a physical meeting with sir to get his feedbacks. Everything was going well with the game process and we are starting to design our final prototype this week.

 

Week10 (02November 2022)

-More feedbacks from others-

This week Ying Hui was managed to make a playtest with her friends in their dorm. Most of her friend were from different faculty so that we have the opportunity to get feedbacks from different background players. After playing our game, our group members made up a feedback survey form via google form and send it back to our players to have feedbacks from them. 

Google Form

Week11 (09November 2022)

-Analysing feedbacks- 

We analysed all the data collected from other faculty players and modify the distribution of some cards. We have mainly changed the number of cards sold in the store, the scoring system, and the price of cards sold in the store.

Week12 (16November 2022)

Final design 

Complete game equipment, coloured game boards, 3d print game pieces, create AR carousel with unity.

Week13 (23November 2022)

Game board and play cards printing

Qiao Hui and Darren were in charge of the printing progress.

Week14 (30November 2022)

Video shooting and completion of Trouble Makers website 

We were in campus this week to film for our final prototype video and everyone were working on their e-portfolio to complete our group website.