Game Studies

Yong Sun Lu (0376945)

Bachelors of Design (Hons) In Creative Media

Game Studies

Progress

Week 1

On the first class, the teacher wants us to form a group, luckily i was in the same class as my friend and so we formed a group with one other guy. After we formed a group, we did a class activity which is playing a tabletop game and in my case it was the game called Wazzaword which i think is a rip off to the a similar game called Buzzword, it was fun although we didn't understand some of the game mechanics and there were no explanation from the game instructions either.

Week 2

Onto the second week, we played another board game but i completely forgot what it was but the more important stuff is that this is the time where we discuss on what kind of tabletop game we want to make. My friend asked the other guy what kind of game he wants to make and he said "Lets make a Deck Battler" and then he asked me if i want to make it but i think i blanked out so i didn't remember if he asked me or not but according to what he said, i told him "Sure" so i guess we're making a deck battler now.

Week 3

This week we were supposed to be going to a game cafe or something but due to some unforeseen circumstances we were unable to go (it was a rainstorm outside) so we postponed it (it never happen). Me and another teammate went on to buy a card game to use as reference called Cardfight! Vanguard which is a pretty popular card game in Japan. After we bought the cards, we played them for a match and two to get some ideas and features that we can implement to the card game we are making.

Week 4

This week is basically where we actually make the idea for the game we will make. This game will (maybe) defy all things that are considered "Normal" in card games in which everything is broken and players can do even the wildest combos and loopholes in order to win. When we asked the lecturer about we learned that the lecturer in fact does not like playing a Deck Battler which is surprising. We proposed the idea, make the name for the game which we called it "Fabio's Orphanage" (i don't know why).

Deck Development (All Digital Assets are Here)

The rest of the module week is used to develop some basic needs for our game that includes the stats, art design and overall needs to make a card as well as gimmicks but tried to make it honest for the newcomers that will try our game. I was asked by one of my teammate to stay up and help him make some card designs. We presented the cards that we've made and the lecturer told us to do some playtest to have some understanding of how it would work.

Actual Playtest and Finalization

This game was a nightmare to make (partly because of me), balancing the cards, re-designing it and creating the board takes longer than i expected and most of the time were spent on balancing the cards because people can't read the description despite the simplest detail and not to mention our group only has 3 people whereas other groups have more than 4 which enhance the difficulty of making this game. The players that played the demo/beta version of this game gave out very useful feedbacks and helped us to make the cards even more balance and more importantly playable. After some further balancing and finalizing the designs we finally can have an actual gameplay and the players that played before says that this game is far better than previous versions. Last thing to do is to design a board and make it into an actual physical, sturdy and premium board which cost more than i thought (i guess its because its kind of bigger than an A3 paper) but after that, i submitted everything to the lecturer including a manual book that we made to introduce the game to new players that might try our game.

Physical Board (BETA)

Physical Board (FINAL)

I have to say that i am a bit disappointed because our game will not be returned until i graduate from this university, but there is nothing i can do.

Reflection

Findings

Who knew making a game and studying about it would be so much fun, but making a game itself is very stressful and although i think i was given too little credit from a certain someone but i get that he did most of the work for this project

Observations

This module, more specifically the project took way longer that i anticipated but it isn't as hard as it looks like its just that the project that we chose to make that took a long time to finish.

Reflection

I think i should consider more on my capabilities to make something, i just went along with anything that my friend suggested and i regretted it (not really). This module was fun and i learned a lot as to why games are made the way they were made and i also learned that i am not really cut out on making the actual characters for a game because i know nothing about balance stats and abilities.  

The group's Progress presentation:

Group 1, Weekly Progress by YONG SUN LU