The Game Design Workshop is a two-day hands-on event that lets the attendees practice the design concepts that are presented under the guidance of an elite group of game designers. The workshop began with Marc LeBlanc presenting an overview of the workshop and a high-level look at the concepts behind game design. This workshop has been presented at GDC for the last 6 years.
Introduction and the MDA Framework
In his introduction, Marc highlighted a specific game design approach that is organized around the designer/player relationship. This approach considers the game player to be a consumer of the designer’s product, but unlike other consumables, the designer doesn’t know many details about the player’s actions such as how often the game is played, how long its played, where or with whom it is played. Because many events of the game are uncertain, the game play lacks predictability. This can pose a problem for designers.
When considering the game experience, designers often think of the game as three parts—the rules that govern the game, the game “session” event and the “fun” that is realized. These parts can be formal defined as the Mechanics, Dynamics and Aesthetics (MDA) approaches to the design. These three phases complete the formal framework used to design games and each represents a unique view of the game. These three approaches are defined as:
Mechanics: the rules and concepts that govern the game as a system.
Dynamics: the run-time behavior of the game.
Aesthetics: the emotional response produced by the gaming experience.
Although games are typically designed in reverse with the game aesthetics in mind while developing the mechanics to create the desired response, all three aspects are important.
Aesthetics are defined as the "fun" of a game. There is no grand unified theory of game aesthetics, rather aesthetics are defined used many smaller models. Successful models are abstract making them widely applicable and proven, meaning they are known to work.
Marc defined several different types of "fun" including the following:
Sensation: pleasure from experiencing how the game looks and feels.
Fantasy: the game as a source of make-believe allowing the character to suspend their believe.
Narrative: involving a drama or story that unfolds.
Challenge: an obstacle course that must be overcome. To be fun, it must not be too complex or too simple.
Fellowship: pleasure derived from socially interacting within the game.
Discovery: exploring unchartered territory as a tourist, eventually becoming a master.
Expression: pleasure gained from self-discovery and learning about oneself.
Submission: pleasure from mindless pasttime.
Each game typically has multiple aesthetics. When designing a game, one of the first steps is to create an aesthetic model. To accomplish this, one needs to document a formal definition including a list of criteria for success and modes of failure. This definition can then be used as your “compass” for guiding the rest of the game design.
Dynamics are used to define and explain the game's behavior. They are defined once you have a clear aesthetic model, but just as with aesthetics, there is no grand unified scheme for modeling dynamics, rather a smaller set of commonly used tools. For example, probability is a good model for explaining the likely value of the roll of the dice. A feedback system, such as a thermostat, is another good example of a dynamic model. Other dynamic models come from the realms of math and psychology.
Mechanics are often composed from a library of common game mechanics much like a set of legos that are combine in unique ways. Some game behaviors are a direct consequence of the defined mechanics and others are indirect.
The game design process should also follow a iterative design cycle of test, analyze and revise. This cycle is essentially the scientific method. During this iterative cycle, use the aesthetic model to set goals and measure you progress, the dynamic model to pinpoint your problems and a combination of the two to lead to possible revisions.
Aesthetics Definition Example
Following the introduction, the attendees were split into three rooms and each room was divided into groups of 6. Each group played a simple game involving events played on index cards called Sissyfight 3000. The game consisted of each player placing an action card and a target card face down each turn. When all players had placed their cards, they were all revealed and points were deducted. The action cards consisted of a solo attack card (which reduced the target’s point total by one), a team attack card (which reduced the target’s point total by four if two players played this card with the same target), and the defend card (which prevented an attack from being effective).
After playing through the game, each team was asked to modify the aesthetics of the game and then to use these new aesthetic definitions to alter the game dynamics and mechanics. Our team introduced a team dynamic to the game that centered around political running mates who could defend and support one another. Other teams had aesthetics designed around feudal kings, wolf packs, family dynamics and squirrels.
Following the successful exercise, the entire group discussed what was learned and some feedback included being flexible with the design so that the aesthetics didn’t drive the dynamics and that game dynamics need to support the aesthetics or the game doesn’t make sense.
Elective Exercises
After the aesthetics definition example was concluded, all attendees were divided into three different elective subgroups. Each group focused on specific elements of game design. The available electives were held in two sessions. The first session consisted of Randomness (which covered methods of introducing randomness into a game and the benefits of doing so), Conversation (which covered techniques for creating effective dialog between game characters), and Us vs. It.
I attended the Randomness elective session, led by Art Min, where we were encouraged to select a non-random game such as chess, checkers, tic-tac-toe or rock/paper/scissors and to introduce a random element to the game. Our team selected the 4 by 4 tic-tac-toe game and made it random by placing a chance card on each square. As a player placed an X or an O, they flipped and followed the instructions on the chance card for that square. The chance cards included options such as place an X to the north of this square, switch all occupied squares in the same row, lose a turn, and even trade sides with your opponent. Other teams added random elements to checkers, dots and rock/paper/scissors. Adding randomness to a game introduces a mix of luck and skill that can enliven a game by adding an aspect of uncertainty.
The second set of elective sessions included Ready, Aim, Fire; Putting the Cart Before the Horse; and 3 Musketeers. I attended the Putting the Cart Before the Horse session led by Jonathan Hamel. This session addressed the issue of business constraints on a game design. MDA is a good framework that is worth the effort. It focuses the team on the project goals and helps you deal with feedback. But regardless of how well a project runs, it is common for business constraints to demand changes to the design’s framework. If a change is requested in the game’s aesthetics, then the changes can often be minimal, but changes to the mechanics view will ripple into large changes in the aesthetics model. Although it is common to argue or to talk your way out of these changes, it is best to accept them and to move on. It helps to focus on the client and to realize that they are the ones with the money. To deal with a constraint model, try to understand what is being asked and to predict how to handle it. Constraints can be additive or subtractive.
After this brief discussion of concepts, each team was given a chance to revisit the Sissyfight 3000 game while addressing a specific constraint. Our constraint was to make each round be completed in a minute or less. To accomplish this, we changed the game dynamics by eliminating the team attack event. This speeded each round and made it possible for us to meet the constraint given us.
Conclusion
I was unable to attend the second day of the course, but it continued along the same vein with more pertinent game design techniques. The hands-on nature of the course proofed to be very effective when followed by a lively discussion of the principles learned. Overall, I would recommend this course for future attendees interested in game design. It was enjoyable and informative.
Unite 2010
