Merry Christmas! Go gamers!

PIXELS - the movie

The independent short movie:



Will be a complete movie in 2015:











Go gamers!

More about gaming interface

Much is said about interface in games today. After a long winter, producers and game designers discovered that a merely beautiful game does not work as product nor as a good experience to different kinds of players.

Try to imagine this situation: a beautiful futuristic game fulfilled of great cut scenes and technological characters. Everything in the scenario is perfect, but every action is a mystery for the player inside this fictional universe. It’s difficult to understand where you need to go, when the objective is accomplished, and it’s impossible to determine what kind of object you can take from the ambient.



Schell (2008, p.222) says in his book The Art of Game Design that the goal of a good gaming interface “isn’t ‘to look nice’ or ‘to be fluid’, although those are nice qualities; the goal of an interface is to make players feel in control of their experience.

Complementing Schell’s ideas, Perron and Wolf (2009, p.66) postulate that one of the “fundamental conditions that govern our interactions with video game virtual environments is that our actions are mapped onto the game system by various technological means, since we cannot physically manipulate the virtual entities directly”. By this last quotation we can understand the importance of a good interface and how it can create an immersive experience to the audience.



An interface establishes an answer system between the game and the player. Before we think about fantastic graphics, it is more important to design the interface to create a deeper experience. For more information and to discover more about this theme, I strongly recommend the following readings.

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References:

PERRON, Bernard; WOLF, Mark. The Video Game Theory Reader 2. New York: Routledge, 2009.

SCHELL, Jesse. The art of game design. Burlington: Elsevier, 2008.

Freemium gameplay loop

We already have spoken of this subject here and here, but it's always good to reinforce some ideas.

"A freemium game is one that you can play, for free, for an unlimited time, but that also offers advantages to players that spend some cash on premium items. These items could be magic spells, higher character stats, more health points, secret characters, or special weapons. They could even be purely aesthetic items, like hats, that just customize your in-game avatar and offer no benefit beyond that".



"Unlike a shareware game, a freemium game doesn't require you to buy anything, ever; you can play it normally without spending a penny, but to really get everything out of the game you'll have to pay. Freemium game designers need to define a clear line between the free and paid. This line needs to be thin; the free items must be great enough to let the player have fun and slowly turn into an addict, while the paid items must be desirable without offering too great an advantage to those players who spend their cash".

Source: Tuts+ (Game Development)

Daddy Long Legs

Daddy Long Legs is a nonsense type of running game created by Set Snail publisher, where you control a bizarre creature with long legs. The hardcore challenge is to control the monster’s steps by tapping on the screen.



If you fail, the monster falls. The idea is to reach further distances each time. Despite the nonsense theme, it’s very fun and has somewhat of a Flappy Bird’s aura in the challenge.

Check a video below with the main idea of Daddy Long Legs:



This kind of game shows us that a strange theme with a bizarre character could be interesting in a first moment, but the “soul” of the experience lives in the gameplay. And about this subject it’s important to remember that gameplay is only one element in the composition of modern games and it means interesting choices (Rollings; Morris, 2004, p.59)

A simple gameplay looks essential in a casual game. Experiences like Daddy Long Legs tend to be forgotten quickly on mobile phones, so it’s important to establish what kind of complexity one game like this one deserves. This kind of thinking is also part of the business model of the game.

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Reference

ROLLINGS, Andrew; MORRIS, Davis. Game Architecture and Design. USA: New Riders, 2004.

Anxiety as a component of game design

Alien Isolation is a big hit this semester. Specialized magazines and websites heavily criticized the game but, regardless of the criticism, I enjoyed the game. I think it’s the first good game of the Alien franchise.



The game tells the story of Amanda Ripley investigating the possible reasons for the disappearance of her mother: the main character from the first Alien movie, Ellen Ripley. Check the trailer below for the plot:



It’s a first person adventure with very interesting cut scenes that create an atmosphere of tension and fear. There’s one true fact about the game: things take longer to happen in the narrative, but that's part of the fear experience.

Maral Tajerian, in an article for the site Gamasutra* entitled Fight or Flight: The Neuroscience of Survival Horror, says that anxiety is a point to highlight in terror/horror games. This author also says that “next to fear, anxiety is perhaps the most prominent feeling experienced in video games. Unlike fear, which is a response to an imminent threat, anxiety is a response to a future potential threat”.

Anxiety is an important game design component in this example. The whole game is based in it, and all fear/horror/terror reactions are derived from it. Alien Isolation is a game to enjoy slowly, a game to be played in the mood of the first movie. An immersive and memorable experience.

*Source: Gamasutra (click here to read the article)

The gaming ecosystem