Game Studies

Week 1: Monopoly and Risk & Conquer Game

This week, Mr. Charles introduce us to a game called Monopoly and Risk. Mr.Charles explained to us about the game, how the game works, and how/why some elements are needed in the game (like the paper money, etc).

We were told to do an activity. We were divided into two groups and we have to make a game using some elements from Monopoly and Risk. Each group has to brainstorm on the ideas. My teammate has the idea of using the chairs and the money for the game.

For the game, we finally decided on using the dice, the money, the chairs. In Monopoly and Risk, the money has different values and each value has different colors. For our team's game, we only care about the colors. The money has 6 different colors.  Each team has to pick 3 colors. So, the money is to mark the chair that each team had conquered. Basically, the game is all about conquering the chairs in the classroom. The team that could conquer more chairs will win the game. Each round of the game lasts for then minutes.

First, we have to do rock, scissors, paper. Whoever won the rock, scissors, paper, he/she will get a chance to roll the dice. The value on the dice that is shown will represent how many chairs we can conquer. (For example: If the dice showed 5, then that means your team can conquer 5 chairs). After rolling the dice, he/she can mark their chairs using Monopoly money.

In the middle of playing the game, we realize that we should make a rule that we can actually steal other team's chairs.


Week 2: Paladins Game Review

This week we go to Taylor's cyber cafe in Syopz. We play a game there called Paladins. We play as a team. So there's two teams.

Before we play the game we have to create a steam account and then sign up. The game is free to play game but once we get into game, we can know that the game actually offers some sale. Like for example to unlock new characters we have to spend money. It also took a lot of time to load the game, i don't know if it's the game or it's just the PC.

After signing up, we added each other as friends first. Finally, we can play the game. The game is free to play game but once we get into game, we can know that the game actually offers some sale. Like for example to unlock new characters we have to spend money.

We choose to play the game as teams. We choose 'custom game' to play together.

Before starting the match, we can choose which hero character we want to play. Each character have their own ability. There are four primary abilities, Flank, Damage, Frontline, Support. It is recommended that each team included all four primary abilities character. But I think it actually depends on how you want to play. 

After choosing the characters. We can finally start the game match. The first time playing the match it feels a little bit chaotic to play, but surprisingly I can finally catch up with the game after playing it for hours. At least I can know the mechanics of the game. 

I understood that this game is actually a team-oriented game. The game is a first-person shooter point of view. Also, the game seems kind of a kid-friendly game as well. There's no violence and it seems kind of simple to understand. The style of the game is a cartoonish fantasy style where the animations and character style is pretty colorful. The environment in the game match well with the style and characters. The place of the match is pretty big as well. 

For me, the match game has a smooth experience as well and when I play I feel like it is a fast pace movement which is fun for this type of game. I also realise that the game has a unique sound for each character. The sound that they use is also suitable and believable. For example, there's this character that is small, then the sound is kind of high pitched where its more suitable than dark low pitch voice. 

When I play, I didn't really pay attention to the health of the character, maybe I just had to get used to playing the games to finally focus on the health level. First time playing it, I keep focusing on getting to shoot the other enemy without even focusing on the function, health level, and ability of the characters. After a few times playing it, I finally can pay attention to the details of the game. 

Some characters are hard to play for me. I'm not saying that those characters are weak, but I think it all depends on how you want to play in the team, if you want to play them and using their ability properly, then your character can be really useful for the team. 

In this game, the character is just a character, no background story. For me, a background story or a story that includes past background could bring a lot of life to the characters. Like the Tekken game, it feels like the character has an interpersonal relationship between each other. Therefore, it makes the game have more of a unique experience.

I haven't really experienced any bug in the game. But maybe if I play the game over and over again I can finally know the bugs in the game. Overall the game is fun and addictive. It will be more fun if you play it with your friends.


Week 3: Tekken 7 Game Review

Week 4: Identity V Review

This week we played identity V. It is a mobile game. All I knew is that the game was made by NetEase, mobile multiplayer, so I it is more mobile multiplayer. As survivors you must go between five marked typewriters to fully decode and then a final door will open. Of course theres a challenge in it, in the meantime you'll have to avoid the hunter, who is much faster than you.

You can interact with the environment to push over pallets to block the hunter's path, and jump over ledges the hunter cannot. You can also hide in lockers, but how useful this is depends on who's playing as the hunter.

As the hunter have to find and attack the survivors, until finally they can send them out of the game.

Once you've slapped them twice they'll hit the floor, and you can pick them and take them over to a rocket chair, where, after a short wait, they'll be blasted out of the game. 

The style of the game looks mysterious and horror. It also came with a horror looking character as well. The story  for the game that is introduced is kind of like a detective story. 

Surprisingly it is a good multiplayer experience, one you can either play with friends as you team up as survivors, or by yourself as a hunter - or, you know, in random teams. 

You can customise your hunter and survivors too, with various character skins, costumes, accessories, and more. You'll unlock these as you go, and earn currency for more. Of course, you can also invest real money in order to get customisation options done faster.

Fun whether you're a survivor or a hunter, and your knowledge of the game's mechanics, stage layouts, and abilities will help you hunt or survive.

Week 5: Chicken Cha Cha Review

In Chicken Cha Cha Cha, the goal is to "cha cha" your chicken past every other player's chicken, stealing each of their tail feathers as you go by them. The first player to collect all of the tail feathers wins.

To play you place all of the egg tiles face up in a circle. It is a good idea to shuffle the tiles and make sure no two of the same images are next to each other. You then shuffle and place the hexagonal tiles in the center of the circle, spreading them out slightly. Once the game is ready, each player takes a chicken, places its corresponding tail feather into its backside and places it on one of the egg tiles. After all players place their chickens evenly spaced out across the circle gameplay may begin.

On each turn you will check the next egg tile in front of your chicken (going clockwise) and then try to guess where its matching hexagonal tile is. If the player selects correctly, then his or her chicken advances and he or she may check the next picture and try to guess correctly again. That player may then continue advancing around the board until he or she guesses incorrectly. When a player flips a hexagonal tile they must then place it back, face down, in the place it originally was thus maintaining the pattern of hexagonal tiles in the center of the circle. A player hop over another players' chicken he or she takes all the tail feathers out of the chicken he just hopped. If a player collects all of the available feathers in the game then the game ends and that player is the winner

The components are top notch. The chickens are these huge chickens that are made of wood. They come in different colors and are some of the best components I've ever seen. The tiles are all very thick and colorful. The art is very cute and attractive to children. The components are top notch and wonderful. The game is very attractive on the table. I think this is a fun game that is easy for non-gamers to pick up.

Week 5: Game Prototype

This week, we were asked to create a prototype of a game that we created. Me and my groupmate, Joseph, we have made a game, but the process that we are doing is not right. We made a game without looking at any references, we are supposed to look for references. So with that in mind, we went to look for games is relate to the games that we made. Before, we were inspired by a few games but never write down notes about what the game is about. 

We played a game called Battle of Polytopia. The goal of this game is to destroy the other factions. This game is about waging war between factions. The rules of the game are pretty simple, we have to build an army big enough to destroy the other kingdoms. 

We thought about what sort of elements can we add to our game. The game had different terrains and different levels, we wanted to make something simple from a rough prototype and see what sort of updates we can put in our game. We see that the game needs resources, troops or units. 

We figured that we wanted to look for a feature of a game that could make the game even longer. We want to create the game more interesting. So we wanted to find a feature that allows for that feature to happen. So we think again, until i got inspiration from Monopoly, as i mentioned about Monopoly where the goal was to buy other players building so that they could get bankrupt.

We want to make our game more competitive. So we thought of a feature that can give competitiveness or something that the players have to work to win. So for our game, we built a map. With the information gathered, we decided that we would build a game that's turn-based, with the goal to steal what others have. We had a lot of ideas and features that can be added to the game, but with new features comes with new rules that have to be set. The longer we thought about it, the more complicated it became, so because of that, we started small and simple. The game became a simple game of snatch, we made it simple then try to see if it works or not.

The Goal of the Game :

• First to acquire all of the treasure wins the game. The total treasure is 4.
• Everyone has 1 treasure. 

The rules of the game :

• Each player will start with corners within the map.
• Each player will be granted couriers that they can use to move the treasure.
• Each player will start with a King and a Courier.
• Kings act as a leader that controls the troops.
• Couriers act as a unit that can acquire and move the treasure.
• Soldiers and Kings are only allowed to move one box at a time. 
• Couriers can move 2 boxes at a time.
• The game is turned based.
• Soldiers and Kings aren't allowed to move the treasure.
• Couriers are only allowed to carry one treasure at a time. 

As we consulted, Mr. Charles said that we need to change the idea of the game, there needs to be a sort of studies in our game so it could have logic in it. With the feedback that we got, we worked on a new idea.

For our new idea, we thought about making a board game that would promote teamwork. After giving it some thought in the end we decided to turn it into a survival game. We tried make a survival game where survivors are stuck on an island and they have to survive based on building and managing resources. With that in mind, we went ahead and look for board games that were based on that, one of the games that we found was Stronghold Games Survive: Escape from Atlantis.

For the map, we choose hexagonal so the players can move freely. In terms of resources number and count. We were heavily inspired by open-world survival games like The Forest or State of Decay. These games require teamwork if you play multiplayer mode.

After that, we think about our game rules. These are the set of rules that we gave for the game.

Survival Game:

• A hexagonal based map
• Experimenting hexagonal shapes for map movement, the reason being that it offers more sides and offers more freedom than the standard 4 side shape or a box.
• The idea of the game is to survive with a certain amount of turn.
• It starts with 2 Tribe and 2 Survivors.
• Each ending turn they will get a resources card, a dice will determine how much they get.
• The players will start with 10 stamina.
• Each player will get a random set of resources.
• Players can carry a maximum of 10 stacks of resources for each resource
• Players play for a total of 30 turns

Resources include:

•  Stones
•  Wood
•  Fabric
•  Rope
•  Fruits
•  Flint and Stone

Utilities Include:

• Shelter
• Traps
• Axe
• Fireplace

Losing Condition:

Survivors lose by:

• Running out of stamina
• Caught by Tribe members

Tribe members lose by :

• Running out of stamina
• Survivors survive until the dedicated turn is reached.

Winning Condition:

Survivors win by :

• Surviving until the dedicated turn.

Tribe wins by:

• Capturing survivors.

Once again, one of the ideas that we thought of was turned down because the game was already thought of, So we got advice from the lecturer and then decided to make a battle royale game.

We started by doing some research on different digital battle royale game. Before making the design, we think about how exactly are we going to bring battle royale to our game. We started by discussing how the game is going to play out, by thinking about how the game will be. We started by looking at games like PUBG and Fortnite. We focused on how the game mechanics is made. It was simple. 

Game Design Research

PUBG (PLAYERS UNKNOWN BATTLEGROUND)

PUBG is a game where up to one hundred players parachute onto an island and scavenge for weapons and equipment to kill others while avoiding getting killed themselves. The available safe area of the game's map decreases in size over time, directing surviving players into tighter areas to force encounters. The last player or team standing wins the round. The plane's flight path across the map varies with each round, requiring players to quickly determine the best time to eject and parachute to the ground. Players start with no gear beyond customized clothing selections which do not affect gameplay. Once they land, players can search buildings, ghost townsand other sites to find weapons, vehicles, armor, and other equipment. These items are procedurally distributed throughout the map at the start of a match, with certain high-risk zones typically having better equipment. Killed players can be looted to acquire their gear as well. Players can opt to play either from the first person or third person perspective, each having their own advantages and disadvantages in combat and situational awareness; though server-specific settings can be used to force all players into one perspective to eliminate some advantages.

2. Fortnite

Fortnite is a online free for all battleroyale game where 100 players are put in an island to defeat each other until the last man standing wins. The game focuses on crafting cover to gain a better advantage on winning duels against players. Fortnite: Save the World is designed as player-versus-environment game, with four players cooperating towards a common objective on various missions. The game is set after a fluke storm appears across Earth, causing 98% of the population to disappear, and the survivors to be attacked by zombie-like "husks". The players take the role of commanders of home base shelters, collecting resources, saving survivors, and defending equipment that help to either collect data on the storm or to push back the storm. From missions, players are awarded a number of in-game items, which include hero characters, weapon and trap schematics, and survivors, all of which can be leveled up through gained experience to improve their attributes. Fortnite Battle Royale is a player-versus-player battle royale game for up to 100 players, allowing one to play alone, in a duo, or in a squad (usually consisting of three or four players). Weaponless players airdrop from a "Battle Bus" that crosses the game's map. When they land, they must scavenge for weapons, items, resources, and even vehicles while trying to stay alive and attack other players, eliminating them. Over the course of a round, the safe area of the map shrinks down in size due to an incoming storm; players outside that safe area take damage and can be eliminated if they fail to quickly evacuate. This forces remaining players into tighter spaces and encourages player encounters. The last player, duo, or squad remaining is the winner.

After looking at those games, we tried to figure out how can we put that mechanic in a game where players can sort of land whenever they want. So we decided that we were going to put in dice in the game and whoever rolls the highest will get the first turn and get to choose where to spawn in. After deciding on how the game is going to start and how will they get their turns and how will they move. We thought to ourselves how combat is going to work out. Since this is a table top game then continuous movement in real time is going to be impossible, in that case we made the game turn based and in terms of movement we let dices determine the movement of players. After that we tried to figure out how are players going to find weapons, we thought about putting out weapon spot for them to find, but then it would be complicated and players would know where to find weapons every time. So it seems that it would be a problem, we went ahead and ask PUBG and Fortnite players how did they acquire weapons and how did they acquire good weapons from the game. Most of them answered it was based on luck, so that gave us an idea on how players will acquire the weapons, which we would then used luck. We decided to use the dice as a feature. Since it would be luck based, we decided that if players were to roll the dice 2 times and got an amount that’s more than 6 then they would get to draw a weapon card, how rare and how good the weapon is will be random.

FINAL PROJECT - VISUAL DESIGN

The next step for us is to determine how the combat will work, that was pretty simple. However, there were still mistakes that we made while testing it the first time, the first time we tested it was really unbalanced. We made a grid arena consisting of 100 boxes or 10x10 boxes and thought that it was too small.

So we decided we decided to do 200 boxes or 20x10 boxes and use a bigger space instead.

Having 200 boxes allowed for more space and more freedom. It allowed for more strategic movement and much more longer gameplay. For the combat we had to think of little rules to apply, for example if a player were to roll 6 then are they allowed to attack mid movement and or are they only allowed to attack after a full movement was made. Either way, we tested both of it. We find that the rule where players are able to attack mid movement was a very unfair, at the same time we realized that there was no strategic element towards it. Eventually, we went with the second rule which is before attacking they must finish the move depending on the number that they rolled.

So up until this point we covered attack mechanics, spawns/starting points, movement and map design. The next step is to determine the game elements, that means we have to figure out what sort of weapons are we putting in, what sort of numbers are we putting in, what can we do to simplify the math (health reduction and such). Since its a battle royale game, that means there will be combat, when there’s combat there is a health system or something that you lose. In a battle royale game, that thing is health. Being the person that plays a lot of games, we had a clear idea of what we wanted to add in the game. We added a health system, an inventory system, and a 2 different sets of cards. Those cards include a weapons card and a utility card. When we thought of the inventory system, we decided that players can only have 5 maximum card in their inventory regardless it being utility or weapons card. For the weapons we mentioned that there will be different rarities for each weapons, we added weapons with their general names, weapons that we added include handgun, shotgun, assault rifle, sniper rifle. These are the weapons that we decided to add to the game They were basic and simple enough. We applied weapons with different rarities so colors will determine different rarities will give different stats.

For the weapons we had a bit of an issue whether we should like an ammo system for the weapons and after a long discussion of how its going to affect the mood of the players we decided   no ammo, instead we made it so that players can only use for a certain amount of time. For example, if people were to have a sniper rifle, then they only get to use it 3 times. To prevent people losing count of how many times they’ve already lost their health or how many times they’ve used their weapons. We decided to use a token to determine quantity, after a few moments of discussing. We decided to use pins to determine quantity. The hair pins will determine how much health a player has left and also to determine how many times a gun has been used. We then continued to put in Utility Cards which consisted of Medkit, Body Armor, and a Grenade. Chiquita did the design of the game board, she came up with a pixel artstyle of the design and used bright colors for the design. She designed a game board that was reminising of a digital arcade game. This was the final game board.

Game Board

User Flow

This is the user flow that we set up for our game.

Finally, with all of the game mechanics and the design done. We established the rules  for the game of Ready, Set, Kill.

Game Mechanics and Rules

Goal :

- Be the last man standing

Rules :

- Determine your turns by rolling the dice with the largest number to the smallest.

- Players will draw a weapon card after rolling 2 dice with a number thats larger than 6

- Weapon cards include : Pistol, Shotgun, A.Rifle, Sniper

- Players will draw a utility card after rolling a card thats lower than 6

- Utility cards include : Body Armor, Grenade, Medkit.

- Players are NOT ALLOWED to attack mid movement.

- Players are not allowed to attack diagonally or move diagonally

- If players roll a total of 6, players will get both utility and weapon card.

 Inventory System :

- Each Player can only hold 5 max cards (Includes Weapons and Utility Card)

- Players can replace cards of inventory is full.

- Replaced cards will be returned to the stack.

User Testing 

Throughout the creation of the game we manage to do some user testing before the finalized game and after the finalized. The first time we did it was with one of our classmates from other specialization. We did our first user testing with ripped off papers and modeled troops for the game.

User Testing

Their reactions was that some parts of the rules were unfair and was a little bit over powered, and then the game lacked features. We used ripped off papers, and modeled troops.

Our second user testing came after the finalized game, the second user testing came from hospitality students, although there was only 3 we still had some data that was clearly not enough. Nevertheless there are still data to be shown.

Question 1

Question 2

Question 3