Week 4

MDA Paper; http://www.cs.northwestern.edu/~hunicke/MDA.pdf

1. game mechanics and balance are the focus of this round of physical prototyping. Hence the mechanics of your *entire* game should be prototyped as detailed as possible.

mechanics: behaviors and control mechanisms afforded to the player within a game context. Together with the game's content (levels, assets and so on) the mechanics support overall gameplay dynamics. 

some changes:
bigger grid, more emphasis on platforming
character does auto-illuminate upon approaching
upon reaching unknown, cutscene memory of last encounter plays
upon revealing unknown, agency leans to character, he tries to do something by default and you can choose to intervene in a time frame

2. use the MDA methodology to guide your design (I sent out the article in my last email). Think about what is the main aesthetics you want to have and how do you design your mechanics and therefore dynamics to achieve that. For those of you who has a relatively complete demo, this is very important. Change some of your rules to see how the resulting dynamics and aesthetics change accordingly. Please clearly lay out your MDA in your presentation, and present the results of how you changed the rules (yes, you have to play it using different rules rather than simply hypothesizing the affects.) Find at least two external people to play your prototype and document this process (e.g., photos).

Mechanics describes the particular components of the game, at the level of data representation and algorithms.  
Dynamics describes the run-time behavior of the mechanics acting on player inputs and each others 
outputs over time. 
Aesthetics describes the desirable emotional responses evoked in the player, when she interacts with the game 
system.  

Aesthetics: (Choose the ones that relate to game)

1. Sensation
  Game as sense-pleasure 
2. Fantasy
  Game as make-believe
3. Narrative 
   Game as drama
4. Challenge
  Game as obstacle course
5. Fellowship
  Game as social framework
6. Discovery
  Game as uncharted territory 
7. Expression
  Game as self-discovery 
8. Submission
  Game as pastime

3. find 3-5 similar games and study their game mechanics. What works and what doesn't?

4. flesh our a weekly digital production plan (e.g., Gantt chart) for the rest of the term