Growing Games

berfrois: Shadow of the Colossus isn’t the first video game...

Tue, 19 Feb 2013 07:59:33 -0800

Shadow of the Colossus isn’t the first video game that begins with a maiden laid out on a stone altar, waiting for you to resurrect her. If you played Zelda II: The Adventure of Link on the NES, it should have been a familiar scene.

This is, of course, just the modern echo of a great many myths and fairy tales. Sleeping Beauty and Snow White, sleeping the slumber of death, both waited to be saved by a young prince. What’s strikingly different about Shadow of the Colossus is the eventual conclusion. For Wander and Mono, there is no salvation, no redemptive defeat of some wicked queen. Instead, there’s gradual corruption and a fall from grace, leading to the edge of a catastrophe, barely averted by the same forces of order that you, the player, have just spent fifteen hours trying to defy.

Read as a fairy tale, Shadow of the Colossus is a surreal revisionist clusterfuck, a wholesale rejection of the picturesque idealism that makes up that Disney fantasy. This is because mass-market fairy tales are pure Romantic ejaculate, unencumbered by historical consciousness or self-awareness. Shadow of the Colossus, on the other hand, is a hero story that’s been contextualized according to the lessons of history. It is not a naïve story of Romanticism’s triumph, but a savvy retelling of its rise and eventual collapse.

“The Death of Romance in the Shadow of the Colossus”, Jesse Miksic

Beautifully said.

Great article on the history of the "shmup" and the (slightly) changing features that define the genre.

Tue, 12 Feb 2013 13:26:48 -0800

Great article on the history of the "shmup" and the (slightly) changing features that define the genre.

Double Fine’s newest game: The Cave set to release...

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 19:35:07 -0800

Double Fine’s newest game: The Cave set to release tomorrow. Are you guys as excited to play it as I am?!

Writing Child Characters

Sun, 20 Jan 2013 13:41:55 -0800

swordofthedarkslayer:

thewritershelpers:

A couple of weeks ago I made a post on writing teenagers, I don’t believe we’ve made a post on child characters recently. So here we go!

Child characters are different to adult characters for several reasons which are stated below. However these differences should make no difference to how you develop your character. A child character has likes and dislikes and both positive and negative traits.

Innocence

Depending on the age of your child character and the life they have led, they will be more innocent to your adult characters. This does not mean they think that everything is nice and fuzzy but that they aren’t aware of a lot of the evils of the world. You have to be careful how you play innocence, for example I bet most 9/10 year old know exactly what sex is. So think carefully about how you portray this!

Naivety

Children are naive, this does NOT mean stupid. They have less world experience and have no independence so they haven’t really seen everything in the world. This makes them naive to other cultures other people. How naive they are depends on their age, personality and background.

Impulsive

Children are more impulsive than adults. We learn through making mistakes and children are still learning (aren’t we all). So children are more likely to display impulsive behaviour. This involves saying exactly what they think. Small children of 5/6 don’t really have a dam, they just say what pops into their head.

Intelligence

Children aren’t stupid. In fact you can have a pretty good conversation with a small child and be surprised what they say. But children haven’t learnt as much as adults and their knowledge grows as they do. Intelligence however isn’t just what they know but how they apply it.

Dialogue

Dialogue is where you are going to slip up with your child characters. This could be by making the language too mature or not mature enough. You need to know before you start writing how a child would talk, you may have to do research for this.

It’s hard to remember what we talked like when we were that age so you may need to talk to others, watch some movies with children and read books to see how other authors have portrayed characters of a similar age.

So how do I make my child character realistic?

Research!!! If you know friends or family with young children spend some time with them, see how they interact with others and take special notice to how they speak and what words they use. The wording in dialogue is the kicker in making children realistic.

Think back to when you were a child or look at family videos, how did you act around family? How did you play?

Mibba: Writing Realistic Children

Writing Child Characters for Adults

Writing Realistic Children

Writing from a childs perspective (forum)

Writing from a unique perspective

The voice is the most difficult part of any character development and finding a voice for your child character is even harder. But if you can find the right voice that suits the age of your character then that’s fantastic. Don’t be put off if you don’t get it right in the first few tries, keep trying.I look forward to seeing more children characters in your works :)

Hope this has been useful to some of you!!!

-S

Another useful little tidbit for my fellow rp’ers.

I would say a useful little tidbit for writing in general!

Why Hotline Miami is an Important Game

Tue, 30 Oct 2012 22:16:45 -0700

Why Hotline Miami is an Important Game

The case against Zynga: What if EA wins

Thu, 16 Aug 2012 21:26:59 -0700

The case against Zynga: What if EA wins:

I can only hope that EA wins this lawsuit. Though it wouldn’t do much for small indies like me that cannot afford to take on companies with much larger (read: existent) legal budgets, at least it would give some hope that some case can be won against counterfeiters.

Four Ways to Make Better Horror Games

Thu, 02 Aug 2012 06:20:30 -0700

Four Ways to Make Better Horror Games

michaelburnley: New documentary pulling together the thoughts...

Mon, 30 Jul 2012 22:55:00 -0700

michaelburnley:

New documentary pulling together the thoughts of some of the greatest minds in gaming on what exactly a game is. Anna Anthropy and Tim Schafer in the debut trailer? Count me in when this thing comes out!

Going Indie: The Story Of Independent Android Game Development From Concept To Completion

Mon, 30 Jul 2012 09:45:00 -0700

Going Indie: The Story Of Independent Android Game Development From Concept To Completion

"I think there’s a fair lot of people so desperate not to take games seriously that they see..."

Sun, 08 Jul 2012 19:37:00 -0700

“I think there’s a fair lot of people so desperate not to take games seriously that they see “fun”where there isn’t any.”

- Leigh Alexander, Sexy Videogameland

Jenova Chen: Journeyman

Tue, 10 Apr 2012 09:45:29 -0700

Jenova Chen: Journeyman:

Great article detailing the life and ambitions of thatgamecompany’s brilliant game designer, Jenova Chen.

The (Ever-Growing) Game Design Book List

Wed, 04 Apr 2012 07:26:04 -0700

So, I’ve just finished Rules of Play! Its really the first textbook I’ve read cover to cover and definitely glad I did. I can’t recommend it highly enough! Not sure what I’m going to start first, but I think I’ll take a look at one of the two Bogost books at the end of the list.

~~Rules of Play: Game Design Theory~~
~~Half-Real: Video Games Between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds~~
~~Replay: Game Design + Game Culture~~
The Ambiguity of Play
The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses
Persuasive Games: The Expressive Power of Videogames
How to Do Things with Videogames

(strikethrough: finished, bold: working on it.)

"…the status of games as culture is not something to be negotiated or debated. They are indisputably..."

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 12:27:00 -0700

“…the status of games as culture is not something to be negotiated or debated. They are indisputably cultural. As a game designer, it is your responsibility to acknowledge this fact and make use of it in your design process. The recognition that you are designing in the context of culture can become a powerful game design asset. It can lead to new audiences for your games, new kinds of game content, new forms of mischief and subversion, and new ways for people to play. If your aim is to design truly meaningful play for your players, your games should be effective on every possible level.”

- Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman, Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals (via michaelburnley)

Where Can't We Go?

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 12:21:50 -0700

Where Can't We Go?:

I’m a little late to the party with this one, but its a great post. Michael Abbott of Brainy Gamer fame recounts a GDC talk Margaret Robinson gave this year about the limits of game design and development.

Computer Problems...no more!

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 10:54:01 -0700

Finally, finally, finally!

After a good 3 months of suffering I finally have a working computer. Well, technically its been working since last weekend, but I’m just now getting into the hang of things again. I don’t think I could’ve lasted much longer.

Anyway, back to development and back to blogging! Hopefully I can get some good stuff up here pretty soon.

Computer Problems

Wed, 21 Dec 2011 17:18:13 -0800

So, I’ve been away for awhile because I’ve been trying to build a new computer. But like everything else that I start to do, I ran into some pretty big problems.

As a preview of things to come, my PSU crapped out in my old computer day of me getting all the parts for the new one. Then, after hooking up a new PSU to the new motherboard, it decided not to recognize either of my old hard drives nor the new one I bought to test it with. And its highly possible the two drives are entirely wiped and that I’ve lost most everything that was on them (But not all! Thank god for Dropbox and Google Docs.) Fun times.

Anyway, I’m all plugged into my girlfriend’s computer and will be continuing to write and work from here until she comes back from Winter Break. Hopefully, I can finally finish the second part to that article I wrote a couple of weeks ago within the next two days or so.

Until then, adios.

The Game Design Book List

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 08:12:10 -0800

This is the booklist that I’m currently working through. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Rules of Play: Game Design Theory
~~Half-Real: Video Games Between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds~~
~~Replay: Game Design + Game Culture~~
The Ambiguity of Play
The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses

(strikethrough: finished, bold: working on it.)

That first one, Rules of Play, is a doozy but its coming along. I think I’ve gotten through a good 100 of the 600+ pages in the thing over the last 3 weeks, so steel yourself for a long ride with that one. Not to say that its bad! Just…dense (seems to be my favorite word this week!)

dottiff: The Daily Show tackles all that’s manipulative about...

Sat, 10 Dec 2011 09:39:06 -0800

dottiff:

The Daily Show tackles all that’s manipulative about the Freemium game model, particularly when the target audience is children. Pretty much perfect!

via A Bunch of Game People on Twitter and Facebook

Designing Limbo's Spider

Sat, 10 Dec 2011 05:10:00 -0800

Designing Limbo's Spider:

Just an interesting look behind the scenes of the development of Limbo and that giant freaking scary spider.

Ben Kuchera of Ars Technica speaks at RunJumpDev on how to get...

Fri, 09 Dec 2011 09:46:12 -0800

Ben Kuchera of Ars Technica speaks at RunJumpDev on how to get your indie game noticed in the gaming media. Pretty good stuff!