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Lecture

Game Design Fundamentals

In course

HUM-380: Video games and gamification

Ce cours propose d'acquérir des compétences en création de jeux vidéo, en invitant les étudiant·e·s à mettre leurs connaissances au service d'un projet collectif de recherche-création centré sur la ludification (gamification) d'un contenu scientifique. ...

Description

This lecture covers key concepts in game design, including the experience of play, game analysis frameworks, types of game actions, and the MDA model. It explores the relationship between mechanics, dynamics, aesthetics, and player experience.

Instructor

Yannick Rochat

Official source

Related concepts (31)

Game design

Game design is the process of creating and shaping the mechanics, systems, and rules of a game. Games can be created for entertainment, education, exercise, or experimental purposes. Increasingly, elements and principles of game design are also applied to other interactions, in the form of gamification.

Game art design

Game art design is a subset of game development involving the process of creating the artistic aspects of video games. Video game art design begins in the pre-production phase of creating a video game. Video game artists are visual artists involved from the conception of the game who make rough sketches of the characters, setting, objects, etc. These starting concept designs can also be created by the game designers before the game is moved into actualization. Sometimes, these concept designs are called "programmer art".

Game balance

Game balance is a branch of game design with the intention of improving gameplay and user experience by balancing difficulty and fairness. Game balance consists of adjusting rewards, challenges, and/or elements of a game to create the intended player experience. Game balance is generally understood as introducing a level of fairness for the players. This includes adjusting difficulty, win-loss conditions, game states, economy balancing, and so on to work in tandem with each other. The concept of game balance depends on the game genre.

Game design document

A game design document (often abbreviated GDD) is a highly descriptive living software design document of the design for a video game. A GDD is created and edited by the development team and it is primarily used in the video game industry to organize efforts within a development team. The document is created by the development team as result of collaboration between their designers, artists and programmers as a guiding vision which is used throughout the game development process.

CD player

A CD player is an electronic device that plays audio compact discs, which are a digital optical disc data storage format. CD players were first sold to consumers in 1982. CDs typically contain recordings of audio material such as music or audiobooks. CD players may be part of home stereo systems, car audio systems, personal computers, or portable CD players such as CD boomboxes. Most CD players produce an output signal via a headphone jack or RCA jacks.

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Introduction to Game Design

Explores the process of designing video games to create meaningful player experiences, covering game genres, iterative design, and creating game concept documents.

Game Design: Theory and Practice

Explores game design theory and practice, online resources, and the synergy between scientific research and the video game industry.

Video Game Analysis: Structures and Mechanics

Explores video game analysis, covering representations, ludic structures, code, and the importance of narratives in game studies.

Video Game Analysis: Visual Aspects

Explores the analysis of video games, focusing on visual aspects, storytelling, and dynamic narratives.

Game Design: Finding True North