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GameProject / GameDesignProposals

Game Design Proposals

Due Thursday, 4/3 at noon.
Note: this deadline is important since you need to post your proposal early enough that other people can write it and critique it.

Basically, you will come up for an idea for a game to build for the project in this class. These proposals will be critiques by everyone, and then teams will pick from the proposals. The game you propose might be built by your group, it might be built by another group, or it might not get built at all.

Think about the proposal this way: you are trying to sell your idea to your project team. You need to let them know what the idea is, convince them that it would be a good game (if it gets built), and give some idea that it will be possible to build it.

This assignment is to be done with an assigned partner (below). Note: you and your partner will not be on the same project team. This means that for every project that is built, there is a designer who is not part of the team who can check to make sure that the team stays true enough to the original design.

Note: if you look at last year's instructions, there was an extra "Idea Email" phase that we're not doing this year.

1.  About the Game

You can basically propose any game you want. There are some Rules that you need to follow. But the key constraint is that it needs to be a game that can be built in the context of this project. For this reason, I strongly encourage you to review both the Rules, but also to look over the project in general (GameProject.GameProject) to get a sense of what the process is.

In your proposal, you will need to consider both the "design" aspects of the game (what is the game, what will make it fun), and (to some degree) the implementation aspects of the game (not the details, which will be left to the team, but a basic idea that shows why you think its feasible to build the game in the limited time and resources of the class project).

2.  About the Proposal

The initial game design document must cover the following points:

Name

Your Game must have a descriptive name

Brief Description

A paragraph or two (tops) giving the basic idea

Detailed Description

A longer description, describing the gameplay, the look and feel of the game, ...

Scalability Plan

A discussion of how the design can be "scaled" - what is the simplest possible version, what features could be added if there was enough time

Game Principles Discussion

A discussion of what game design principles should be employed in order to make sure the game is fun

Design Challenges

(closely related to the Game Principles discussion) What challenges face the team building the game in terms of making sure the game is fun? Especially in light of the scalability issue (that the team won't have much time for implementation)

Technical Overview

A brief discussion of how you imagine this game being built. What challenges will the team overcome? Do you have ideas as to how the implementation should be done. We don't need details here, just the basic ideas that explain why it should be practical to build it.

Technical Challenges

A brief discussion of what challenges will face the team that tries to build the game. This cuts both ways: the game must be sufficiently challenging, but not too challenging. Having contingencies to "hedge" against not being able to address the challenges is good (see "Scalability" above).

You don't need to have too much detail - just enough to convince people. Also, in terms of grading, you need to show that you've thought through the issues.

3.  Turning in the proposal

The proposal must be posted as a page on the class Wiki (it can be in either partner's page group). Please create a link to the proposal on the StudentPages.GameProposals page.

If your proposal is not turned in on time, you will be penalized. Your classmates (who will need to write critiques of it) may also get pissed off at you.

4.  Assigned Partners

• Byrne & Brzycki
• Driscol & Park
• Felder & Geil
• Hanson & Steinich
• Kruse & Leaf
• Lynde & Moore
• Strommen & Yoh (yes, the TA is participating)