"How To Race Squirrels" at Develop Conference in Brighton, 21st July 2011

How To Race Squirrels:Designing and Producing Commissioned GamesRob DavisDirector, PlayniacDevelop Conference, 21 July 2011

Briefs and User tes;ng Balancing Proposals Concept development and Game assets Wrap up wri5en spec Wireframes • Use-‐cases Paper tes;ng • Sta;c wireframes • Interac;ve wireframes

Briefs A perfect brief does three things well: 1.  States the project’s scale, scope and goals 2.  Deﬁnes the creative zone in which the game design will happen 3.  Inspires a good solution Some projects start with research… ©2008 Olympic Delivery Authority

Proposals •  Good quality writing is critical; graphics are important too •  This is where you get to explain your idea – go for it! •  Do you fully understand what you are offering? •  Are you conﬁdent you can deliver on time and on budget? •  Can you convey what your game will be like to play? ©2008 Olympic Delivery Authority

Concept Development •  Happens before and / or after proposal stage •  Absorb the brief / proposal •  Assemble expertise from our team, external consultants, specialists and / or the client •  Brainstorm to develop, expand and then reﬁne ideas •  Key stage to gather everyone’s input and feed into speciﬁcation stages

Written Spec •  If you’ve already written a proposal and that is being used as is, skip this stage •  Simply 1 paragraph to 2 pages max describing the game •  Good starting point to save time and risk before creating more detailed spec

Alien Farm use-case

Alien Farm screen ﬂow

Screen grab showing attractor ﬁeld

Use-cases •  Becomes large document that is difﬁcult to maintain… And no one wants to (re-)read! •  Useful for more procedural software; less useful for most games •  Does specify game functionality very precisely, but leaves little room to maneuver in implementation •  Doesn’t give a sense of what the game is like to play or how the game GUI might work •  So we needed a better technique…

Wireframe for mission select

Finished artwork for mission select

Wireframe for island view

Finished artwork for island view

Wireframe for user dashboard

Finished artwork for user dashboard

Static Wireframe •  Gives immediate visual sense of game screens and functionality •  Allows some GUI design to be done early and in an abstract manner •  Can be assimilated easily by technical and non- technical readers •  Useful for design and dev teams •  Difﬁcult to get a sense of screen ﬂow and user interaction, so…

Wireframe for shop

Finished artwork for shop

Wireframe for home screen

Finished artwork for home screen

Wireframe for race screen

Finished artwork for race screen – mini game

Finished artwork for race screen

User testing with Interactive wireframe

Interactive Wireframes •  All the beneﬁts of a static wireframe •  Clear sense of screen ﬂow and some sense of game dynamics •  Extremely easy to assimilate •  Extremely useful for design and dev teams •  Easy to maintain once set up •  Can be used for live testing with target audience

Sample artwork for deck of 50 game cards

Sample artwork for race track sheets

Aside: MDA model of gamedesign •  Mechanics •  Dynamics •  Aesthetics •  Marc LeBlanc’s game design workshop at GDC (www.8kindsoffun.com) •  Paper by Hunkicke, Zubek and LeBlank (www.cs.northwestern.edu/~hunicke/MDA.pdf)

Paper Testing •  Does not convey game mechanics •  Establish game dynamics early •  Conveys substantial part of game aesthetics •  Easy format to reﬁne and tweak game play •  Reﬁne game balance early •  Fun way to test game with no code

Early charactersketch

Early colour-blocked artwork

artwork

Game assets •  Share early and share often •  Test with users •  Meet with client and/or use online collaboration tools like Basecamp to manage the conversation •  Be ready to reﬁne and tweak; be ready to throw away and rework •  “Champion the user” - keep the ﬁnished game and the audience in mind

Video capture with game alpha

Detailed analysis of user data

User Testing •  Be clear with team and client exactly what is being tested •  Test at several stages, from look and feel to alpha / beta •  Invaluable feedback direct from target audience •  Chance for dev team, design team and client to “see the game through new eyes” •  Very honest – be ready for heart-warming compliments and gut-wrenching criticism •  A lot of analysis to be done with results

BalancingAt mission control we can tweak and tune settings in the game…

…affecting our players who are far away, perhaps 8 or more hours ofgame-play in the future. Image courtesy of NASA

Image courtesy of NASA

Equations formood and energy

Energy / stats / xp / money cycles

Testing team

Google Analytics: Minutes to XP level

Google Analytics: Money at XP level

Google Analytics:Team names

Balancing •  Start with a system-wide strategy and the right formulae •  Start with paper test findings •  Refine using the user test results •  Refine using testing company results •  Refine using using Google Analytics or any other data capture techniques •  Iterate until it’s right

Wrap up •  This approach is the framework used for many of our productions •  Every project is unique •  Sometimes one or more stages don’t apply, sometimes they get re-ordered •  Sometimes the whole approach goes out the window…

Rob DavisDirector Internships: Want to get Playniac involved? Drop me a line. rob(at)playniac(dot)com Speaking at GDC Europe in Aug: "Wheres the fun? How to test www.playniac.com your game before you build a @playniac thing" www.facebook.com/RacingSquirrels@RacingSquirrels

"How To Race Squirrels" at Develop Conference in Brighton, 21st July 2011

by Playniac on Jul 29, 2011

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"How To Race Squirrels" at Develop Conference in Brighton, 21st July 2011 — Presentation Transcript