Mini Design Document Guidelines
Game design is an art and science. The mini design document midterm assignment is your opportunity to experiment and explore. Consider game designs that are reasonably simply to implement but vigorously pursue fun. Consider game designs that might evolve into a game proejct you choose to initiative. Consider game designs that might help you win a game contest, like these.
Our discussions, lectures and reading should help you contextualize fun and play as they relate to your intended audience.
The Basics:
- All mini game design documents must be digitally produced. That means typed, and where images are produced, they must be integrated with typed text and labeled clearly. Sketching is fine and encouraged, but clarity is your main goal. Each game design should wholly digital, so please scan sketches or produce drawings using Photoshop or similar products. The result should be a professional looking document, that is easy to read and understand.
- No mini game design documents can exceed 10 pages. All documents must be at least 5 pages. Although game design documents have hit hundreds of pages, for the scope of this course, a 11 page document ceases to be mini.
- All games must be original work by the student. In accordance with Miami University rules on plagiarism any student copying existing designs or creating work that is knowingly derived from other designs will endure all requisite plagiarism procedures. Likewise, any art produces should be your original work (no third party consulting for this assignment). Have fun. Design your own game.
Grading:
- Each mini design documents will be reviewed by the instructor and two other students chosen at random. Much like game contests and the free market, your game designs will be reviewed by a variety of judges. Each reviewer will complete a mini game review sheet. The review sheets will be made available to the original game designer as feedback on their design.
Reviewing
- Reviews: each game design document must be submitted with a 1 page (double spaced - 12 point Times font) review of the game completed by one other student in the class. The reviewer can't be involved in the writing of the document. The review must be fair, discussing the positives and negatives of each design. Failure to enclose a review will mean an automatic 5% reduction in your grade for the midterm project. Reviewers will recieve participations points for their reviews, as long as the review demonstrates critical thinking, analysis or thoughtfulness.
Evaluation:
- A: The game design is original, interesting and clearly offers potential for fun. It is clearly articulated through text and/or image. There is little ambiguity as to what would be produced.
An A is exciting to the senses, intellect, and imagination or begs to be made.
- B: The game design is somewhat original but borrows too substantially from existing game designs. The design is somewhat derivative or could be more clearly articulated. The design may be mediocre, but clearly defined, or the articulation may be mediocre, and the design is original. Since we only understand what you communicate, it much rarer that a mediocre articulation will receive a B.
A "B" is a mildly engaging concept that may need a simple twist to make it wonderful A work.
- C: The game design is generally mediocre. The design lacks any substantial originality or the originality is lost in basic communication issues. Game designs with substantial typos, unclear diagrams, and poorly read images are likely to receive a C regardless of the quality of their ideas. As it goes, a nice car in very bad shape ceases to be a nice car.
Somewhat qualitatively, boring designs may receive a C.
- D: Immediate, apparent “errors” in game design or communication are rampant. The design blatantly misses stated objectives or is fundamentally clunky in implied implementation.
A D is not only boring, or unclear, it may not make sense.
- F: The design does not reflect college level work, the work is absent, or the design is a copy of commonly known game designs. If you are not familiar with common game designs, review the reading and check the cannon of game designs.
A game design including Puckman, a cute yellow character that chases pellets, collects power pellets, and eats ghosts would receive an F. Even if “Puckman” has a bow in her hair. The game has very clearly been done.
last revised: 1/31/11
