The creative project I have created is a game design document for a space adventure game that I have thought of designing for due to personal interest for the genre. Upon reflection I have understood more about the basics development of video games in general from books that I have found in the library and from my game design units. I understood some of the aspects of what seems to be essential in the game industry and from understanding about these limits of mine I have acknowledge what I need to work on if I want to be apart of the game industry. I also realise what I could do that might make me recognise more in depth over how I can achieve my goal in the most efficient way possible, which is through reflection. Some of the aspects that I would like to acknowledge are what roles I could be affiliated with when working on a project of a video game and on what level must my skillset should considered to be on the level where I can be content to have some creative control on a game design project. These aspects are what I believe should be important to me as I would want to know of how well I could design a video game that is playable and enjoyed by others. It can be possible to create within my skillset and to also know more about whether it could benefit me in some way of spending my valuable time on and a somewhat sense of accomplishment I would feel upon completion.
In my game design document I have included various sections explicating numerous concepts for the development of the game and images of what kind of influence I have gained from playing these games. What these sections in my game design document explain about are game concept, gameplay elements, target audience/market appeal, background story, characters, world design and level breakdown/walkthrough over how the design of the game will be played. I have learned of these categories of what the video game needs to be designed around, from one of my game design units and in one of the modules of game design principles I have learned of the specifications of each of the five core mechanics that is present in video games, which are goals, challenges, rules, boundaries and feedback (Brooke, 2019).
In my document I have explained the importance of each of these sections and are to be envisioned for the development of the game while also having an understanding of the specifics of the design aspects. Furthermore I will be making estimates of how long the process of development would take since “the process of creating and releasing a game involves numerous steps and can take anywhere from three months to three years”(Chandler & Chandler 2011).
What this design document made me consider focusing on is how exactly can I make this development plan for this game concept in reality and the ideas I came up with in which I could considering in doing. “The production process encompasses every stage of developing a marketable game, from initial idea to eventful distribution”(Berbank-Green, Cusworth & Thompson). I thought off pitch these game concepts through a game development team who are interested in designing for this sort of game or I could go independent and form my own team with several roles fro the development of this game. The benefits for going independent is that I could have creative freedom, I would be happy to work on my own pace and I would not have any outside interference. Although there is a side that is not beneficial for example I would not have a fixed income, I would be having a lot of competition, it would be difficult to get any recognition from people, even if the game is good or original and it would be difficult to develop a game without requiring a fair amount of budget. After all if I want to continue designing for games then I need to be realistic and make a living off being a game designer.
Upon writing up the game design document I then realise how grateful I know that the past readings I have read turned out to be useful. An example of this is when I thought of adding a first person shooter in some point of the game levels to experience a new perspective to the game as played by VR. In this moment the player would be playing this part of the game in a Virtual Reality headset or ‘VR’ for short, which is a technology that creates a digital immersive experience that blocks out the real world (Downey, 2016). I would not have known of this if it were not for the readings I have read for class.
So in conclusion I need to think more about how I could apply myself more into the design aspect of video games since I believe I still have much to learn over the fundamentals of game design. By improving more ways of designing a game concept, I would choose to design more video game documents over various other genres and I would do this whenever I could get the chance. I like to believe that I have made improvements over the course of this semester as know I know a little bit of what I want to aim at. Since the most important thing for me right now is to have the experience of designing a video game and I should start on an individual project as soon as possible.
References
Berbank-Green, B. Cusworth, N. & Thompson, J. (2007). Game Design Course. Quarto Publishing.
Brook, L. (2019). Week 3 Game Design Methods. Retrieved from https://blackboard.ecu.edu.au/webapps/blackboard/ content/listContent
Chandler, H. M. & Chandler, R. (2011). Fundamentals of Game Development. Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Downey, S. (2016, October 25). The Gigantic List of Augmented Reality Use Cases. Retrieved from http://uploadvr.com/
