Lecture 13: Games

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(No Transcript)
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Computation as an Expressive Medium

• Lecture 13? Games!
• Jason Alderman

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Project 6 Make a game!!

• Whats the assignment?
• Where do I begin?
• Ludology videogame theory!
• Where to go for inspiration
• Some examples
• Q A! (if you have questions)
• Discuss the readings!

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Your mission

• While computer-based interactive games (a.k.a.
  video games) have been a pop-cultural force since
  the arcade scene of the late 1970s and early
  1980s, in recent years video games have been
  recognized as a major emerging art form, poised
  to have as much cultural impact on the 21st
  century as cinema did on the 20th. The game
  industry is making Hollywood-sized amounts of
  money, with designers of the most popular games
  achieving a geeky sort of celebrity. Museums and
  galleries are offering exhibitions of art
  games, computer-scientists are beginning to
  treat games as technical objects worthy of
  serious attention, and in humanities departments
  around the world, games studies is a hot new
  topic. What kind of game would you create?
  Create a simple game.

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Your mission

• While computer-based interactive games (a.k.a.
  video games) have been a pop-cultural force since
  the arcade scene of the late 1970s and early
  1980s, in recent years video games have been
  recognized as a major emerging art form, poised
  to have as much cultural impact on the 21st
  century as cinema did on the 20th. The game
  industry is making Hollywood-sized amounts of
  money, with designers of the most popular games
  achieving a geeky sort of celebrity. Museums and
  galleries are offering exhibitions of art
  games, computer-scientists are beginning to
  treat games as technical objects worthy of
  serious attention, and in humanities departments
  around the world, games studies is a hot new
  topic. What kind of game would you create?
  Create a simple game.

(games have been around for a long time)
(games are getting (more) popular)
(games are being considered as an artform)
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Your mission

• While computer-based interactive games (a.k.a.
  video games) have been a pop-cultural force since
  the arcade scene of the late 1970s and early
  1980s, in recent years video games have been
  recognized as a major emerging art form, poised
  to have as much cultural impact on the 21st
  century as cinema did on the 20th. The game
  industry is making Hollywood-sized amounts of
  money, with designers of the most popular games
  achieving a geeky sort of celebrity. Museums and
  galleries are offering exhibitions of art
  games, computer-scientists are beginning to
  treat games as technical objects worthy of
  serious attention, and in humanities departments
  around the world, games studies is a hot new
  topic. What kind of game would you create?
  Create a simple game.

(games have been around for a long time)
Games are what make us human.
(games are getting (more) popular)
(games are being considered as an artform)
Broadly paraphrased fromhttp//www.lcc.gatech.ed
u/murray/digra05/
(games are being considered as an artform)
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Your mission

• Create a simple game.

No need to make any epic 20-hours-of-narrative
kind of works, just a simple casual game.
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Thinking about games
Guess how many verbs go with BIG FREAKIN GUN,
eh, punk?

• Chris Crawford says that games are made up of
  verbs
• Raph Koster agrees and does a good job breaking
  down games further
• Take a look at games out there

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Survey of the state of the art

• (Consulting one of our good friends)

(Honestly, Professor Mateas did this last year,
too!)
If you can read this, your vision is really good!
This is for the people who print slides
http//www.homestarrunner.com/sbemail94.swf
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Some starting points

• retro (with a twist)
• (underused) verbs
• and (unlikely) simulations
• (novel) means of interaction

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Any questions?

• Examples from last year
• A few good sites to check out
• http//www.theoryoffun.com/
• Raph Kosters analysis of games
• http//escapistmagazine.com/
• http//erasmatazz.com/library/Game20Design/Index.
  html
• Chris Crawford on game design
• http//grandtextauto.org/
• Learn what Mateas Friends think is nifty about
  games!
• http//del.icio.us/tag/gamedev/
• google for ludology

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Were done!

• Lets discuss the veritable plethora of readings!