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Game Design Curriculum

riotgames.com

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Re: Game Design Curriculum

#91

Post by CyanBird »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #23
ev1 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From 2018 case (just google "riot farting" honestly): https://html2-f.scribdassets.com/6454fy6neo6mwj3w/images/5-7... > Why don't game engineers demand better? Start a company with decent work hours and comp and refuse to work elsewhere. Some do! I would imagine many indie game companies are not like this. There's kind of a split, where you have "strictly-business" companies - many Asian MMORPG publishers that have a…

> You can kind of see how this playerbase would differ from, say, the usual singleplayer or co-op indie or puzzle game. Oh yes. I must say, these days I hate playing multiplayer game modes with leaderboards attached. Relevant to this thread: I used to play Heroes of the Storm (Blizzard's LoL clone) causally with friends. Then one day a colleague dragged me into his team, full of people dozens of levels above me (and…

> I mean, seriously, I want to play games where one can excel in out-thinking the opponent. But HotS progaming feels more like an exercise in memorizing obscure game mechanics and a (constantly changing) Excel sheet full of character stats

Just for the record:

obscure game mechanics and a (constantly changing) Excel sheet full of character stats

Is exactly out-thinking the opponent, and we are not even talking of a game where execution enters into play as Heroes is no Dota2, let alone SC2 or Broodwar

What you want isn't real outthinking, you want to feel rewarded for feeling like you out-thought your opponent, be it true or not

Re: Game Design Curriculum

#92

Post by CyanBird »

jimbob45 wrote: post #39

IMHO the biggest innovation Riot brought to the industry was player outreach. They were the first to heavily (30+ posts per day across multiple devs) interact with their player base. Even better, their patch notes were the first to have paragraphs explaining each change. Even better , they stuck to a bi-weekly patch cycle religiously, unlike Blizzard, who had to be begged to put out a patch every six months. To playe…

I never picked up lol early, but I do vividly recall all the screeching wars between Hon (heroes of newerth) , Dota and lol people

The agreement was that lol won because it was free, tho it looked and played worse than either Dota or Hon, but the free aspect won riot the entire emerging markets sector

Me as a SC2 player through and through I just looked down on them overall, so feel free to correct me if I am wrong

Re: Game Design Curriculum

#93

Post by meheleventyone »

munificent wrote: post #61
meheleventyone wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I take serious issue with the description of games as useless. They don’t do anything in the same way as reading a book doesn’t do anything. Or playing chess doesn’t do anything. You absolutely get something tangible in return. Whether it’s a new perspective, new friends or utter humiliation. The idea we should capture the way games build tangible experiences and apply them to “useful software” is to misunderstand bo…

> I take serious issue with the description of games as useless. I figured some might. Try to charitably understand why I chose to emphasize with that word. Yes, obviously, playing games provides all sorts of meaningful things to the player. As I said, playing games is intrinsically rewarding. But what most games don't do is provide extrinsic utility . Playing a videogame does not pay your mortgage, fix your leaky si…

Oh yes absolutely UX design can learn a lot from games.

VR applications are riddled with games folks both because the tech requirements are the same. And also because the interaction design really benefits from the way games use space and deal with limited control input.

I still fundamentally disagree that games don’t provide people with external utility. It’s a popular assumption because they don’t necessarily do anything obvious or provide you with something tangible to others. There are plenty of emotional journeys you can take, creativity to engage in and skills you can learn. My younger brother for example was really helped in learning to read by playing Monkey Island.

An ephemeral word processor actually sounds like something that could provide cathartic release. It might not be as useless as you think.

Re: Game Design Curriculum

#94

Post by [deleted] »

MaulingMonkey wrote: post #78
munificent wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I take serious issue with the description of games as useless. I figured some might. Try to charitably understand why I chose to emphasize with that word. Yes, obviously, playing games provides all sorts of meaningful things to the player. As I said, playing games is intrinsically rewarding. But what most games don't do is provide extrinsic utility . Playing a videogame does not pay your mortgage, fix your leaky si…

> But what most games don't do is provide extrinsic utility. Playing a videogame does not pay your mortgage, fix your leaky sink, cure your halitosis, or get you an A in class. (Ignoring professional game playing for money, of course.) Games can help you practice interpersonal communication skills, teamwork and coordination, problem solving, and fine motor skills. These may very well help you with your work or leaky…

[deleted]

Re: Game Design Curriculum

#95

Post by roudaki »

ido wrote: post #90
meddlin wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm asking because you seem to speak with experience... Why do we make video games? I've been programming for 10 years, I love games; wanted to make them. But I went into infosec because it felt...justified? Like it's more noble? But that doesn't seem to make sense saying it out loud. But your points on understanding game design because of that human-software-machine connection, that just feels like it makes sense. I…

Why do we paint? Sculpt? Write? Film? Play or compose music? Both art and entertainment are important.

No game is David's Michelangelo in talent or effect.

When people say we need entertainment they are thinking in a sense of dessert like of course you deserve a dessert sometimes. But that is not how we got 67% obesity rates.

And now with companies aggressively stealing attention and average person spending 5 hours a day on entertainment while reading one book a year you do feel little guilty for creating one more app to steal you attention and sell you microtransactions.

but this pressure is a positive thing as now when we make games in free time or talk about games we focus on more artsy indie stuff. it is weird how quickly most of my friends dropping Call of Duty or Halo after decade of obsessing. this pressure will create more artistic games.

Re: Game Design Curriculum

#96

Post by rayalez »

meddlin wrote: post #88
munificent wrote: post #43

Game design (whether computer or even board games) is a valuable topic to learn even if you never make a real game. If you make any kind of thing that people use, learning a little about how to think like a game designer can help you make things that are more rewarding and pleasant to use. One way to think of videogames is that they are useless software . Imagine a word processor that couldn't save or print files. Or…

I'm asking because you seem to speak with experience... Why do we make video games? I've been programming for 10 years, I love games; wanted to make them. But I went into infosec because it felt...justified? Like it's more noble? But that doesn't seem to make sense saying it out loud. But your points on understanding game design because of that human-software-machine connection, that just feels like it makes sense. I…

There might not be a deep philosophical answer. Making games is fun, playing games is fun, that's all there is to it. If you can make money doing something you enjoy - why wouldn't you?

To try to go for a philosophical answer - why do we do anything? Cooking, writing, building shelter, sending spaceships to mars. I think generally, the purpose is to make human brains feel good. Ultimately, we all are going to die and nothing we do will have a lasting impact, but as long as we're here - we spend our time making ourselves and each other feel good. Games are one of the ways to make people feel good.

A more cynical answer - we make games for no good reason. Games feel good in the moment, but feel like a waste of time and energy afterwards, making a net negative impact on people's lives, like junk food or addiction. People play them against their best interests, because it feels good in the moment, and because people aren't rational creatures. People make games because making games is fun and makes them money.

One more answer - making games is art. Art is cool. Making games is an art that can be beautiful, interactive, engaging. It's a combination of multiple art forms (painting, sculpting, storytelling, music, etc). It's also way more fun than most kinds of art, people don't get addicted to paintings or books the way they get addicted to video games. I doubt that people got as much joy out of looking at Mona Lisa as they did out of playing Minecraft.

One more related thought - the real world is overrated. We have the power to make imaginary worlds that are far more engaging and satisfying than the one where we live. Better ones. So we make them.

These are different possible perspectives, pick yours. There can be a bunch more I'm not considering.

Re: Game Design Curriculum

#97

Post by drops »

roudaki wrote: post #95
ido wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do we paint? Sculpt? Write? Film? Play or compose music? Both art and entertainment are important.

No game is David's Michelangelo in talent or effect. When people say we need entertainment they are thinking in a sense of dessert like of course you deserve a dessert sometimes. But that is not how we got 67% obesity rates. And now with companies aggressively stealing attention and average person spending 5 hours a day on entertainment while reading one book a year you do feel little guilty for creating one more app…

> No game is David's Michelangelo in talent or effect.

Yet. How long has sculpting been an art form and how long has it taken for Michelangelo to surface?

How long have video games been an art form?

Re: Game Design Curriculum

#98

Post by asutekku »

Animats wrote: post #9

They put a PowerPoint into a PDF into a scrollable window too small to display a full slide. Ouch. The course itself is interesting, in that it's not a programming course at all. It's about what makes a game fun. Download the PDF and look at page 6, which has the useful info.

Game designers in most companies do not program.

Re: Game Design Curriculum

#99

Post by TeMPOraL »

CyanBird wrote: post #91
TeMPOraL wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can kind of see how this playerbase would differ from, say, the usual singleplayer or co-op indie or puzzle game. Oh yes. I must say, these days I hate playing multiplayer game modes with leaderboards attached. Relevant to this thread: I used to play Heroes of the Storm (Blizzard's LoL clone) causally with friends. Then one day a colleague dragged me into his team, full of people dozens of levels above me (and…

> I mean, seriously, I want to play games where one can excel in out-thinking the opponent. But HotS progaming feels more like an exercise in memorizing obscure game mechanics and a (constantly changing) Excel sheet full of character stats Just for the record: obscure game mechanics and a (constantly changing) Excel sheet full of character stats Is exactly out-thinking the opponent, and we are not even talking of a g…

Fair enough.

I was a quite good SC/SCBW player back in the day though, and I was up to date with obscure game mechanics and unit stats and "current meta" (way before it was ever called that). Yet with all that, the game still felt like it had much bigger possibility space. Something I never felt about MOBA games.

(Come to think of it, maybe I just don't like the "team sports with strangers!" aspect of the currently popular multiplayer games - MOBAs, Battle Royales, whatever the genre it is Overwatch falls into, etc.)

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