Making Games (Autumn 2018)

Abstract

This course teaches the design and development of video games from prototyping to effective teamwork across disciplinary boundaries. It also covers the most important technical and theoretical foundations of game development.

Description

Video game development is a design-driven process. This course teaches the technical, theoretical, and practical basis of game development. At the same time this course is an exercise in interdisciplinary teamwork, preparing students for working in diverse teams.

Students will learn how to create video games alone and in groups. They will be able to apply established industry methods in the areas design, production, project management, and programming.

In this course students will first learn to explore the design space of games by making a number of focused prototypes. Students will learn the basics of prototyping in theory and practice, the basics of game design, game programming and interaction design, and essential user experience and evaluation techniques. All students will program and design small prototypes and a larger final project individually and in groups.

The focus of the course is on development methods applied to an actual game production. The production process of the game is based on established industry practices..

Students will additionally learn to identify what makes their game unique, what is its technical and design essence, and how to  best communicate it. They will learn the basics of marketing and the games business.

Formal prerequisites

This is an introductory course and has not mandatory requirements. However, students will benefit from a certain familiarity with game development technologies.

Intended learning outcomes

After the course, the student should be able to:

• Conceptualize, prototype, design, develop and test a digital game individually and in teams.
• Reflect on and act in her role as a team member of a joint game production.
• Reflect on the relation between design and technical implementation in innovation-driven projects.
• Apply different play testing and usability methods.
• Structure an innovation-driven development process using industry-relevant project management methods.
• Practice different concept development, sketching, prototyping, and game design methods.
• Evaluate established technologies, methods and processes for their usefulness in their games project.
• Perform basic programming, art, and/or design activities, applied to computer game development.
• Argue a marketing and business case.

Ordinary exam

Exam type:
D: Written report with oral defence, external (7-trinsskala)
Exam description:
D1G Submission for groups with following oral exam based on the submission The duration of the oral exam is 20 minutes per group. The students have to hand in the following: – The finale game and its trailer – A group report consisting of play test results and the press kit of the game – A 2000 word individual report that is an analysis of their game based on theory presented in weeks 5-8 The game, the group report (plus the trailer) and the individual report have equal weight in the grading. The group report will be graded according to how well the user testing is executed and how well the game is communicated. The individual part is an analysis of the game that should use the research presented in the lectures of phase two to reflect on specific aspect of the game. It will be graded according to its clarity, originality and rigour. The oral exam is a presentation of the final game. Students will be examined on their capacity to argue as a group that the project is original, well designed and of high technical quality. Individual group members will be asked about their role in the production of the final prototype. A group consists of 4-6 people.