International Game Developers Association

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IST 446: Game Design and Development

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Contents 1 Teachers 1.1 Instructors 1.2 Teaching Assitants 2 Course Background Information 2.1 Location 2.2 Classification 2.3 Student background needed 2.4 Course prerequisites 2.5 Time periods 3 Course Structure 3.1 Course description 3.2 Course learning objectives 3.3 Week by week topics 4 Course Materials & Facilities Used 4.1 Books 4.2 Other materials 4.3 Software (engines, tools) 4.4 Syllabus 4.5 Slides 4.6 Assessment materials 4.7 Digital media used in class 4.8 Case studies 4.9 Tutorial files 5 Analysis of learning methods 5.1 What worked 5.2 What didn't work

Teachers

Instructors

• Magy Seif El-Nasr

Teaching Assitants

• Ibrahim Yucel

Course Background Information

Location

• College of Information Sciences and Technology, Pennsylvania State University

Classification

See: Areas for classifing for your course.

Primary classification:

• Conceptual Game Design
• Practical Game Design

Secondary classification:

• Game Programming

Student background needed

Graduate and Undergraduate Computer Science and/or IST Students, we also have few instructional design and digital arts students

Course prerequisites

(describe the course's prerequisites in terms of skills that students need to know)

Senior standing

Time periods

Semester long meets once a week for 3 hours

Course Structure

Course description

The course is project driven. Students will form teams and collaborate with one another to develop a game. During the course, students will learn basic principles of game design. In the process, they will be exposed to several techniques for building graphical 3D worlds, animating characters in real-time, moving the camera and lights in real-time, and building intelligent characters (using state-transition architectures). Furthermore, they will be introduced to several tools that will aid in realizing their own projects and ideas, such as graphic engines (e.g. Wildtangent), and game engines (e.g. Unreal Tournament).

Course learning objectives

Students who take the class should learn

• Principles of game design
• Principles of design balance, feedback, motivation, immersion
• Prototyping and game development cycle
• Depending on the tool chosen: applying knowledge of 3-D graphics, level design, and behavior scripting.

Week by week topics

Week 1: Lecutre: Game Genre

        Lab: Game Design Workshop using SissiFight Game created by Eric ZImmerman
        Homework: Choose 3 games for Journal 

Week 2: Lecture: Games as Systems and Game Economic Systems

       Lab: Brainstorming session for game concept
       Homework: journal entry on games as systems and economic systems in games

Week 3: Lecture: Player Motivation

       Lab: Presentation of Concept/Critique
       Homework: Journal entry on motivation

Week 4: Lecture: Feedback and Fullfillment, and Rules and Rewards

       Lab: working on game concept
       Homework: Journal entry on feeback and fulfillment, reward systems

Week 5: Lecture: Environment Design

       Lab: Level Design using Unreal Edit (UT 2003)
       Homework: Journal entry on environment design 

Week 6: Demo: Paper Prototype - Critiques

       no homework

Week 7: Lecture: Educating the Player

       Lab: Unreal Scripting and cut scenes with UT 2003 
       Homework: Journal entry on educating the player

Week 8: Lab: Second Life

       no homework

Week 9: Lecture: Punishment and Game Balance

       Demo: prototype 1 - critique  
       Homework: Journal entry on punishment and game balance

Week 10: Lecture: Stories and Characters (using Freeman's book on Emotioneering)

       Lab: working on game 
       Homework: Journal entry on stories and characters

Week 11: Lab: polishing game

       no homework

Week 12: no class Week 13: Lab: polishing game

        Demo: Prototype 2 - Critique

Week 14: Lab: polishing game

        no homework

Week 15: Final Demo

        Final Journal Due

Course Materials & Facilities Used

Here you can link to and/or describe books and other materials you used for this course. Feel free to create new pages for each item here if a page for it does not yet exist.

Books

Kevin Oxland. Gameplay and design, Addison Wesley, 2004.

Andrew Rollings and Ernest Adams. Andrew Rollings and Ernest Adams On Game Design, New Riders Games, 2003.

Other materials

Papers, magazines, videos (add links to online materials)

see: Course Webpage

Software (engines, tools)

• Unreal Tournament 2003/4
• WarCraft III
• Torque Engine and Torque Builder
• GameMaker
• RPGMaker

Syllabus

Course Webpage

Slides

accessible from: Course Webpage

Assessment materials

e.g. tests, quizzes, assignment requirements, project requirements 40% Journal (where students choose 3 games and add an entry after each class addressing class topic in the journal entry) - Graded in terms of arugments and completeness

60% Project (students submit: Paper Prototype, 3 Prototypes, which are all critiqued) - final grade is based on accomodation of feedback and critique given and final product critique.

Digital media used in class

e.g. Video, Multimedia sources, Audio

Mostly videos from Game Spot

Case studies

None used

Tutorial files

Some tutorials from UT 2003/2004 websites and 3D Buzz website

Analysis of learning methods

What worked

Still under assessment... Class is ongoing

What didn't work

Still under assessment... Class is ongoing