Level Up 读书笔记

2018-01-04

读书笔记

第五章之前有很多精彩实用的内容，但从第五章起很多都是像百科一样在罗列一些比较基本的东西了。

Game Designers have more Fun

Team

Development Team
Programmer Artist Designer Producer Tester Composer Sound Designer Writer

Publising Positions
Product Manager, Creative Manager, Art Director, Technical Director, Business Development Staff, Lawyer, QA Manager…

Ideas

Many game ideas often sound stupid … never dismiss a game idea, even if it does sound stupid.

List of things to do to get inspired:

Read something you normally wouldn’t read.

Take a walk, drive or shower.

Attend a lecture.

Play a game, preferably a bad one. Sometimes it takes several iterations on an idea before it works successfully.

Regardless of the above, follow your passion.

… all good game characters are wish fulfillment. They give the player a chance to be something they aren’t in the real world.
Games should make players feel something that they aren’ t in the real world: powerful, smart, sneaky, successful, rich, bad, or heroic.

The Theory of Un-Fun states: start with a “fun” idea. As you develop the game, if you find something in the game that is not fun (or un-fun), then remove it.
When you have removed all of the un-fun, then all that should be left is the fun.

Story

Production Triangle: Choose Two [Time, Quality, Money]

The Triangle of Weirdness: Choose One [Chatacters, Activities, World]

Title

The literal title makes it easy to figure out where the title came from. It can be the name of your main character…It can be the main location of your game…Or you can name your game after a gameplay activity or component…

The action/cool title is a title that captures the spirit of the game without mentioning any of the game characters or locations. I think games like Darksiders, Brutal Legend, and Gears of War all have cool titles.

The punny title is a title that makes you appreciate the cleverness of the title. Just Cause, Half Life, and System Shock are all good examples of punny titles…

The “purple cow” title is one that makes your customer stop in their tracks and stare…LittleBigPlanet, Far Cry, and Resident Evil. The advantage to a purple cow title is…It’s going to be a long time before anyone thinks of using the word Halo in their game title…

…shorter titles are better than longer ones…keep them to two or three syllables like Star Wars, Don-kee Kong, Pac-Man or Hey-lo.

Paperwork

Making games is like making chili

the first rule of responsible game design: love thy player

Game Design Document (GGD)

The goal of great game design documentation is communication:
communication to the player, to your team members, and to your publishing partners.

####### One-Sheet

1.Game title
2.Intended game systems
3.Target age of players
4.Intended Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) rating
5.A summary of the game ’ s story, focusing on gameplay
6.Distinct modes of gameplay
7.Unique selling points
8.Competitive products.

####### Ten-Pager

Production Team | Marketing/Executives
Provide clear diagrams of gameplay | Show exciting conceptual images
Use short, punchy sentences | Text in bullet points form
Use specific terminology to get your intention clearly across | Use vivid, descriptive examples
Compare gameplay to appropriate games, even vintage titles | Use successful, modern games as comparative titles

The Rule of Threes

THREE IS A MAGIC NUMBER

Ten-Pager Outline
PAGE 1: TITLE PAGE

• Game title
• Intended game systems
• Target age of players
• Intended ESRB rating
• Projected ship date.
Game Logos

PAGE 2: GAME OUTLINE

• Game story summary
• Game flow Briefly describe the flow of the game’s action in the context of the locations the player will find themselves in… who they are playing, the camera angle, and genre of gameplay as well as painting a picture of game locations and the player’s goals.

PAGE 3: CHARACTER
PAGE 4: GAMEPLAY
PAGE 5: GAME WORLD
PAGE 6: GAME EXPERIENCE

• What does the player first see when they start the game?
• What emotions/moods are meant to be invoked by your game?
• How is music and sound used to convey your game’s feel?
• How does the player navigate the shell of the game? Include a simple flow chart diagram of how the player would navigate this interface. (You’d be surprised how many games have lousy interfaces because the team never thought about it!)

PAGE 7: GAMEPLAY MECHANICS

A mechanic is something that the player interacts with to create or aid with gameplay…moving platforms, opening doors, rope swings, slippery ice.
A hazard is a mechanic that can harm or kill the player but doesn’t possess intelligence.
A power-up is an item collected by the player to help them with gameplay.
Collectibles are items that are collected by the player that don’t have an immediate impact on gameplay.

PAGE 8: ENEMIES

If a hazard uses AI, then it qualifies as an enemy character. What enemies do we find in the game world? What makes them unique? How does the player overcome them?
Boss characters are larger, more fearsome enemies usually found at the end of levels or chapters.

PAGE 9: CUTSCENES
PAGE 10: BONUS MATERIALS

####### The Game Design Document

…eventually YOU will need to read your own GDD.
…my team mates understood concepts quickly when I drew pictures for them.

• Storyboards.
• Diagrams.
• Animatics.
• The beat chart.
• The team Wiki.

EVERYTHING IS LIQUID

At a certain point, writing things down becomes counterproductive and it all becomes about finishing the game. But you need a starting point and a GDD gives you that launching pad from which to soar.
…the MOST IMPORTANT PART OF A GAME DESIGNER’S JOB IS COMMUNICATION.

####### Gameplay Progression

…how the gameplay unfolds to the player over the course of the game. How this happens is called progression.

The Beat Chart

• Clumping : too many new enemies or mechanics being introduced at once. Spread these out over the course of the game.
• Sameyness : too many identical combinations of enemies and mechanics. You want to mix things up to keep interaction fresh.
• Alternate your time of day and color schemes. If you have too many of the same lighting or color schemes in a row, things are going to feel and look repetitive.
• Alternate your music tracks. The player is going to get bored listening to the same music over and over again.
• Problems in game economy
• Mechanics and enemies should be introduced in conjunction with the items and abilities required to defeat them.
• When will the player have “everything” in the game?…75% through the game so the last quarter lets the player use all of their cool stuff.
• As a rule of thumb, I try to introduce two or three new mechanics, enemies, and rewards per level.

Dont Be a Schmuck

• A good idea can come from anywhere.
• Make a decision and stick with it.
• Update often.
• Tackle the tough ones first.
• Trust your instincts.
• Respect the abilities of your peers and be mindful of their limitations…talk to your team mates about what they’d like to work on.
• Save often and always.
• Stay organized.
• Be prepared.

Character

Three Cs:

Character
Camera
Control
If you change any of the Three Cs during production, you risk massive problems with your gameplay.

FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION

silhouette

Personality**: Humorous character, Heroic character, Badass character

The power of customization
…let the player customize their character furthers their feeling of ownership.

metrics

shadow

second character playable or companion

Camera

Controls

HUD and Icon

HUDs …be carefull of the “bracketing effect”…
Loading screen concept art, trivia questions, game map, character bio…