Game Studies / Journal
31.9.2022 - 14.10.2022(Week 1 - Week 3)
Chang Jia Yee / 0350402 / Bachelor of Design in Creative Media
Game Studies
Journal
INSTURCTION
JOURNAL
Week 1
I still have some expectations and excitement for the first time in class, although I am not a gamer, and I don't particularly know what a professional game is, and then I need to complete this semester project and so on. Some are excited and scared, excited because this sem sounds very interesting, it's about games, and scared because I don't have a special understanding of this field.
Week 2
At the beginning, we had an idea, one was a game similar to snakes and
ladders, and we wanted to add a theme to this game. After discussion, we
chose "toxic" as our theme. Toxic, as we define it, means that some
societies look at others with biased or their own extreme ideas, and say
derogatory things about others. Then we want to add a series of
multiple-choice questions at the checkpoint for players to choose from, and
the answers they choose will lead them to different endings.
Week 3
In the third week, I finished the production and recording of my personal
exercise 1. When I am asked to list the games I have played, my mind is
blank at the moment, because I remember that all the games I have played are
"naive", and I rarely play them. They are all those mobile phone games and
some simple computer games played in primary and middle schools.
Exercise 1 Google Slides
Week 4
We assigned the next work up to week 14 to ensure that we have a reference for self-progress supervision.
Fig . Work schedule
Fig . Sketches of storyline
Our concept is that the protagonist sits on the rooftop, and suddenly
a black hole appears on the land, and the protagonist is sucked in.
The protagonist wakes up and finds himself in another world.
Week 5-8
Starting this week, we began to discuss the theme of our story in depth,
and tried every means to extend our storyline to make it tenser. We also
tried to make it have the reversal of the story and some whimsical parts
(after getting Dr Charles' feedback) so that the whole storyline was not
monotonous and more hierarchical.
Fig . Mind Map
Storyline Design
Fig . First version of storyline
We started with a story about a girl's suicide, and then the player as a friend revealed the cause and mystery of the girl's suicide, and decided whether the girl was saved or not through the player's choice.
Fig . Second version of storyline
The second version of the story is probably that the player's identity is the male owner, and then he travels back to the past through the authorities. In order to find out the reason why he separated from his girlfriend at that time, he reveals the truth behind his girlfriend's departure, and finally decides whether he can save their love relationship through the player's choice.
Fig . Third version of storyline
Fig . Fourth version storyline (final)
This story is about a girl who was bullied and killed herself. In order to help her get revenge, her brother started a secret operation to find the people who hurt his sister and "repay" them in a special way. And the identity of the player is one of the goals of the girl's brother. Players need to find evidence to discover the girl's brother's conspiracy and find the key evidence that they can escape this "karma" and escape from the clutches.
To sum up, we have changed four stories in four editions. I hope the fourth edition will be our final edition, and there will be no more changes. After all, we don't have much time left to do this project.
Week 9
This week, we are divided into two groups. Sim and Hazeem are responsible for starting to practice the game with RPG maker, while the remaining four girls are responsible for completing the story and writing the narration and dialog in the story. M-girls talked about this project for about 20 hours, and then we started to work together to complete our dialog.
Dialog design
Week 10
This week, two male players finished the RPG maker part, and then after they finished some of the main scenes, we also discussed together, strengthened some parts, and then completed some details to make the whole scene and story more real.
Fig . Work in RPG maker
Week 11
Our girls' group began to draw our clues designs, and we were responsible for two or three of them. Here is our finished product.
Fig . Clues drawing
Week 12-14
In the past few weeks, we have finished the game in RPG, then discussed the changes collectively, and then continued to make changes, repeating these two processes. This is the end of the whole game design, and because this part is mainly done by two boys, it's just here to sometimes participate in discussions and give some opinions. I'm one of the lighter tasks in the team here.
Title screen design
I made two versions as the choice of our title sceen. I imagine that our theme is a suspenseful story and atmosphere, so I used some cobwebs and some hand patterns to enhance this suspense. The main color system also uses crimson to reflect the sense of warning and danger.
Fig . Title screen design 1
Fig . Title screen design 2
MIRO board
FEEDBACK
Week 5
The story can be more impactful and have some reversals, etc., which makes
people feel whimsical and unconstrained.
Week 8
Week 14
The storyline and reversal of the game are unexpected and interesting. In the living room, I will always interact with the ornaments on the far right. Maybe I can put some clues on that ornament. Because there are some clues that are different for the second and third time, there can be a tip for players in the living room to let them know that there are some clues to interact with two or three times.
REFLECTION
I am not a person who often plays games, so I began to try to explore the
field of games in this module. Originally, I didn't even know the website of
Steam, but I also knew about this website through this module, and I went to
explore it.
In the whole process of doing project, I found that it is not easy to design a game. It takes a lot of effort from the creation of the whole game story line to the logical and smooth plot of the whole story. When we design a simple beginner game designer, we all need to change four versions of the story, and every time we change the story, it is a big plot change. Although the last version is not perfect, and there are even some small defects and bugs, I am satisfied with my performance by my own standards and my current knowledge, and I have learned a lot of new knowledge.
To be honest, this subject makes me love and hate it. Because I feel that when my teammates and I are discussing, I am very happy and not under too much pressure. It seems that we are sharing our own stories while discussing, so the overall atmosphere is great. But whenever the design of a story reaches a bottleneck, it is the most painful time, because after a long discussion, our physical strength and mental strength are overwhelmed. However, the fluency and logic of the story are still flawed, and it feels like being overwhelmed by a stone. To sum up, the whole module is still very grateful to my teammates, who have worked hard to fulfill their responsibilities and tasks, actively participated in discussions, and fulfilled their accusations as team members.
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