Changes, Revisions and Panic (Oh my!)

Per my promise in the last post, I have been diligently working on a High-Level Document as described in Ultimate Guide, but it’s a lot of damn work! So, rather than not posting until I have that finished, I have progressed through a bit of the reading and am now mostly through Chapter 11. It seems the deeper I get into this book, the less exercises are available because the lessons tend to be aimed at how to compose yourself once you’re in the hot seat as a game designer/writer. It’s never too early to be prepared for inevitable situations should you continue on this path to becoming a game developer, right? And no one’s backing out yet, right? Right. Then, on we go!

Chapter 11 discusses the multitude of changes that come about when working on a game. Generally, these changes stem from marketing demands or budget restraints. As discussed earlier in the book, your story and characters should be written “to break” meaning there are built-in ways for characters to absorb the plot responsibilities of those that will be cut. Let’s say I have a rogue character that is charming/lady’s man, etc. I also have a Hulk-ish warrior who’s rage knows no equal. I love these characters. They are the two sons I’ve never had. And now, one of them must die. That’s right, the order from on high is that we do not have the time or the budget to model both characters and come up with all their animations, outfits, voiced lines, etc. But there was a huge story arch involving the warrior’s rage and how he takes on an entire village of evil gnomes and slaughters them all without realizing any of the damage he has taken. Furthermore, it’s this damage that leads to seeking out the incredibly attractive and chesty cleric that can save our warrior from kicking the bucket. If we never meet her, she never joins the party and never falls in love with time-bandit who threatens to erase the existence of the world when he discovers that she cheats on him with the rogue.  

So, how does one go about wiping out one of the characters who is so important to the story? Reduce, Reuse and Recycle? Sort of. How about a small of description early in the rogue’s story of how his parents were viciously killed by a band of evil gnomes, leaving him to fend for himself and slyly fight his way through the ranks of “The Orphanage”? He once swore revenge on these gnomes and when he comes upon them, he completely loses his cool and calculating exterior and turns into a raging gnome-killin’ machine! Now, with the damage he takes, the sexy cleric finds him dying in the street, helps heal him and secretly falls in love with his newly acquired scars. Could that work? Maybe. It’s one of many possible/probable rewrites. And I’m sure there was more than one spot in the story that the warrior was going to be of importance, so have fun filling the gaps.

Key Lesson Learned: Don’t panic in the face of criticism and don’t defend everything you write as the best idea you’ve ever had. Realize that changes will need to be made; take precaution when writing a game to create seams that keep the damage from spreading.

I’ll Take Two Sequels and a Movie Deal, Please

After settling into the new place and hanging one of my personal paintings above the fireplace, I had the wacky idea to build my own coffee table from scratch (none of this prefab crap-in-a-box). With the help of my girlfriend, the table now sits proudly in front of the couch, waiting for a final sanding and an eventual staining. Take THAT, IKEA!

As for game design, I’ve managed to finish both chapters 7 and 8 since the last post without a great deal to show for it. Chapter 7’s final Gold Action Item is a brutal 3 – 5 page high-level design document based on a game idea. Though I have game ideas I could push into this (and probably should, in all honesty), I’m a little hesitant and I don’t know why. Okay, you’ve convince me. I’m being a schmuck and I need to just do it. Tomorrow night, I’m going to sit down and start it. Promise.

Chapter 8 was all about thinking like a publisher – and that means franchising. What savvy businessman wants to invest in a game which will probably take years to produce along with countless millions only to have it stand alone on the shelf? No one! Could your main character interest movie-goers a la Prince of Persia? Will fans of the game drool over comic spin-offs or books? How soon would the sequels be ready? These are all great ideas to think about at all times, but it didn’t supply me with many exercises to work through. I suppose if you happen to be friends with an venture capitalist, you can practice running big game ideas by him/her and explore the possibilities of franchising the character/brand/game mechanics, etc.

One exercise that I did enjoy without even putting pen to paper was the Alpha Action Item called Violating the Franchise. Essentially, you need to think of a moment in a favorite game/movie/book where you felt the franchise was violated. This immediately brought up angry memories from the last book of Terry Goodkind’s Sword of Truth series. This will be a spoiler for anyone who enjoys the series and hasn’t made it all the way through yet, so you’ve been warned. After however many books (11? 13??) about Richard Rahl, the only War Wizard to be born in over 3,000 years, not having any understanding of how to use his ultimate kick-ass magic, he suddenly (AND CONSCIUOSLY!!!) duplicates the world and “puts” the bad guys in the other world. Put a different way, the franchise ability of this main character is his inability to consciously control his magic; it blasts out of him in his greatest times of need. To end the series, it just clicks for him and he now knows how to control it. Boo, Mr. Goodkind! If you cannot think of a better way out of the impending and impossible battle you’ve spent 8 books setting up, perhaps you should lay down your pen.

Key Lesson Learned: If you want funding for a big game idea, you have to think even bigger. Where can the game go after the game ends? Sequels, yes, but where after that? Cereal boxes? Movies?

Design Rock-u-ments

Who needs to play Dragon Age or Mass Effect 2 when there are design documents to write, huh? Not this guy.

Chapter 6 of Ultimate Guide really started getting meaty with thinking of ways to combine your game ideas into possible game material. Not only that but Flint and John begin talking about the inevitable happenings during game development: the good and the bad. What’s interesting to me is how two guys who have worked on movie scripts and Triple A games discuss relevant issues that occur in the most minor of leagues. From the game(s) I’ve worked on, many of the same issues with feature creep, lack of vision, deductive game making, etc. all come true.

Anyway, I worked on several exercises since the last post, but the Executive Summary exercise in Chapter 7 was my favorite. Unfortunately, I’m not going to share it here simply because I want to kick this particular idea around a bit more and maybe even pursue it with some people I know who happen to have experience with Facebook apps (gasp!). I will say I feel like I’m progressing in my thinking, if not also in my ability, of game design; thus, I am content so far with this segment of the All-in-One Gamer Project. Chapter 7 focuses on the higher-level design documents and when you begin understanding these necessities and how they work, I think you begin to separate yourself from the ”scene writers/designers” and begin becoming more of the all-around writer/designer. Accepting/understanding the needs of marketing and even becoming a sales rep in your own right to show others why you feel this game will sell – it’s all very…professional. All part of this thing Owen Wilson talks about in Wedding Crashers when he says, “Grow up, Peter Pan. Count Chocula.” (Hmmm…wondering if quoting Wedding Crashers is any way to back up the ideas of growing up and professionalism. Marked for possible edit. ).

Key Lesson Learned: The earlier you can make the hard decisions on things like who your target audience is, what platform(s) the game will be released on, what key game mechanic will be presented and a title for the game, the easier development should be in the later stages.

I’m Gonna Burn One Down

Let’s skip the small talk this go around and jump right into what I’ve been working on. This has actually been one of the more entertaining and challenging exercises presented in Ultimate Guide thus far: Action Item (Gold) – Character Template. At first, I wasn’t sure what character I wanted to flesh-out, but I decided to go with Cinder from the previous post to just see where it might lead. After finishing this 3 and a half page template, I gotta say I’m really pleased with how much I now know and envision in this little guy’s game. There is impossible love, racism, banishment, friendship, domination, dreams and…wood!

I’m only going to post a few sections of this template, but I highly recommend buying the book for this alone (or look up the Character Template online). The answers it forces you to create from the simple questions it asks really help bring a character from a shadowy figure in the back of your mind to a replete vision on paper. No more waving your hands at the idea of a full-blown character and saying, “Yeah, yeah. I already know what he/she’s going to be like.” Just sit down and do it. And have fun!

Name	Cinder
Story Purpose	Cinder’s adventures to reunite with or dominate the Flames, his former people, will lead us to make tough decisions on choosing friends and making enemies.
Gameplay Purpose	Player Character
Alignment	Starts off middle of the road but can become a wicked blaze or an altruistic warmth based on in-game decisions.
Persona	Naively curious.
General Disposition	Full of wonder and curiosity as this is his first time away from the safety and monotony of life with the Flames.
Special Abilities	Unlike the other Flames, Cinder can leave a bit of himself burning in a safe place and should he ever be snuffed out, he can return to one of these places, thus allowing him to take more risks than others of his kind. Cinder also learns how to focus and temporarily harden parts of his body (giggle) like his hand or foot.
Education/Intelligence	Cinder really only knows the rituals of the Flames and the teachings of the Eternal Fire. He is a child, on par with a grade 5 student.
Family	Orphan; his parents were snuffed out in a storm before he ever knew them. The Leader of the Flames brought Cinder into his home to show his generosity, but mainly kept the boy out of sight.
Aspirations	Cinder dreams of joining the Eternal Fire, as all Flames do. Perhaps these dreams change as he experiences life away from the Flames.
Addictions	Getting close enough to unsuspecting creatures to singe their fur – makes him rofl.
Occupation & attitude toward it	Adventurer; lonely at first but begins to love it
Objective(s)	1)      Gain the respect of all Flames2)      Find DryWood 3)      Acquire help from others
What does this character want?	To achieve something so great the Flames will never forget him.
Who or what does he/she love?	All Flames love the Eternal Fire instinctively, but maybe Cinder will, unlike any other Flame, learn to love something more.
What is he afraid of?	Being hated or forgotten by his people
Why does he involve himself in this situation?	The Flames are the only “family” he knows and the Eternal Fire is dream for all Flames. He has no knowledge of other options.
Other roles and identities?	Upon consuming Kindling, he can temporarily flare up into a Torch, a wild and uncontrollable Flame.

Dichotomy of Character (inner conflict)	Cinder begins to realize there is life outside of the Eternal Fire and is torn by the teachings he grew up with as a Flame.
Character reaction to different events in the game	Cinder, even though an outcast of the Flames, begins the game with the pompous attitude of all Flames. Through persistence, a friendly creature breaks through this snobbery and Cinder begins seeing the intrinsic value of all life.
Relation to other significant characters	The Leader of the Flames is his guardian, but perhaps Cinder is his illegitimate child. Making Cinder an outcast was the only way to be rid of any suspicion. As Cinder’s popularity/power grows throughout the game, the Leader may have to take stronger measures.
What I’d think if I saw this Character on the street	Depending on Flames size compared to us: small) I think Cinder would be pretty cute and cool to watch; as big as me or bigger) I’d crap my pants and run
Three days before the party started:	Since the game will start with Cinder’s banishment, 3 days before he was doing menial tasks around the Leader’s house and trying to stay out of sight as much as possible. He might cause one of many accidents through his curiosity which leads to the opportunity for the Leader to banish him.
How did this Character lose his or her virginity?	Phew! I’m safe on this one because Cinder’s a virgin…and Flames don’t really have sex so much as momentarily burn wood together (eek!).
Morality	This is dependent on the player. Cinder is a blank slate, not really having ideas on good or bad. He knows what he wants and will learn either team building or coercion through player choices.
Emotional Stability	Though down at first, Cinder bounces back from his banishment in a healthy manner. His curiosity and sense of adventure keep him pretty level, though he might experience same teenage angst and hormonal stress when he meets an ever so lovely Dew Fairy.
What do they do to comfort themselves?	If he’s not pulling a prank on someone/something nearby, Cinder finds comfort in learning about himself and the world around him.
Phobias	It might be interesting to have Cinder’s greatest dream also be his biggest fear: joining a fire that he can never again separate from. This would get worse as he learns more about the world and thus, furthers his independence.

Key Lesson Learned: Spend some time with the characters that jump in your head and figure out what makes them interesting. Experiment with them in a template like this; nothing here is concrete. If they’re good, keep going. If not, throw them out and pick up the next one.

Take me as your Avatar

It’s been a hectic week for me with the move, but I’m in the new place! I have boxes scattered across the floor, but the bed was in place as of last night, so I’m here today, well rested and sore.

As Dragon Age: Origins continues to pull at me, a new contender for my time has entered the ring: Mass Effect 2. Priorities, priorities!  

Which brings me to what I’ve covered in Ultimate Guide recently: character rewards, punishments and priorities (and he nails the segue!). The book has covered world creation: story in a believable/consistent setting. To aid in that – or to make it even possible – the characters must be believable. They need real motivations we can all understand. If a player can get behind his character’s agenda, he/she will play to the end to see what happens (and possibly want to order any downloadable content that comes after).

And if the character is accomplishing goals by way of the player’s competence, rewards fitting to the world and to the character should be bestowed upon them. In World of Warcraft, your avatar receives specific quests depending on what type of character you chose to roll. How rewarding would it be for a warlock (clothie) to jump through quest hoops only to receive some mythical heavy armor they can never use? 

What about punishments for failure? I know a lot of people who hate the idea of dying in games to the point where they don’t want to play based on the anxiety it causes. Braid handled this in a very Prince of Persia: Sands of Time style with the ability to rewind away from your death. Other games, like Grim Fandango, just don’t give you the option to die (but you can lose your will to live when a puzzle that must be solvable isn’t ). Resident Evil began using the crippling effects of being injured to slow your movement until you could find some green herb, which is always used for medicinal purposes, right? All in all, the punishments for these games fit the styles of gameplay and the worlds and reemphasized the overall immersion and believability.

I’ve decided to put together a little hero/world right here, right now to see how well these ideas are clicking with me.

Cinder is a small, orphaned Flame, a pariah among his own people and forbidden from joining the Eternal Flame. Cinder’s true desire is to do a great act that will force his people to accept him, hopefully through love and respect, but through coercion if necessary.

As he travels around his swampy world, he must avoid being snuffed out by falling in water or from a heavy wind. He begins to search for the mythical DryWood which will supposedly burn faster, hotter and brighter than anything his people have ever seen. Along his way, offers to help other creatures of his world and gain their friendship and services will present themselves – but Flames generally don’t mix with anyone other than their own. He will have to overcome the “racial lines” to form friends or become powerful enough to force these creatures to do his bidding.

Rewards: Internal Kindling makes him a bigger flame temporarily, Checkpoints could be candles – something that will keep his flame alive should he be snuffed out.

Punishments: Returning to the checkpoints, getting hit with water (highly likely in the DewDrop Fields) weakens Cinder’s flame and ability to find clues to DryWood’s site.

Priorities: First and foremost: Gain the respect of all other Flames. Second is to find DryWood. Third, find other’s to help.

Key Lesson Learned: Your game world needs consistency across all lines, but since the player will be playing a character, the world’s consistency (or lack thereof) is from that character’s perspective. This could be useful to explain some seemingly incongruent parts of the world later in the game as the character/player comes to a certain understanding.

How’s THIS for Progress?

This will be short on my normal chit-chat and long on an example of what I’m working on. The Dramatic Template from Ultimate Guide really helped focus an idea I’ve been working on and pounded it into somewhat of a decent design layout for an opening level.

Category	Description
Level Title	These Foreign Mists
Brief Outline of Scene: Grabber, Bump, Climax, Resolution	Player Character (PC) jokes with tribal elder on the way into a clearing, learns how to divine the future through smoke tent meditation. She sees the entire village slaughtered and is sick when she awakens. She tells the Elder and is quickly escorted down the mountain to inform the leader of her vision. The leader refuses to accept any bit of her vision and is dismissed. The Elder then quickly teaches the PC how to focus on someone and overpower their will.
Problem/Solution:	As a novice, the PC is told she will not be very good at divining any visions on her first time. You must conquer this and show great talent.
Game Objective and How It Is Learned:	The player will be hedged in to the clearing by dense woods and the Elder blocking the only exit. PC will have to enter the smoke tent. Once inside, the soothing voice of the Elder will guide the player through divination. After the meeting with the Leader, the Elder will once again guide the player in Overpowering Will.
Location (Unique things about this location):	A clearing on a wooded mountain side. Though trees will be dense around the clearing, above them to one side will be the image of the mountain’s peak. In the clearing’s center is a short squat hut made of hides and bent saplings. Outside of it is a spare pile of river rocks, firewood, and a few buckets of water. Birds and small woodland creatures can be heard all around. The tent/house of the Leader will be decorated in researched paraphernalia of a certain type of Native American tribe.
Mood/Tone:	The mood of this level will be one of inspiration and happiness. This is the PC’s first step in become a tribal Elder, a greatly revered position. After the vision, the mood becomes much more urgent and dark. A form of innocence is now lost.
Time Day/Weather:	Mid morning in late autumn with storm clouds in the distance heading your way. After the vision, the storm will have hit.
Initial Intention:	The player will simply think they are to learn the concept of the controls and how to use the smoke house meditation.
Opening Conflict:	The vision of the slaughtered village.
Major Characters and How They Develop in the Level:	The PC’s character goes from being fairly naïve to realizing she has an incredibly strong talent for divining the future. The Elder is no longer a simple village wise man, but a caring mentor to the PC. The Leader will be seen as a steadfast and stubborn fool.
Level Boss, Minibosses, Thugs and Other Enemies or Potential Enemies:	The battle of wills with the Leader will be the only true battle in this level.
Plot (Game info to get out): Raw Exposition:	How to use the controls for smoke-tent meditation and Overpowering will. The friendship between the PC and the Elder and the explanation of the vision to the Leader.
Threatening or Actual Crisis:	When the actual slaughter will occur – could be anytime as the Elder explains that the visions, if not happening simultaneously with real world events, generally show something within a week.
Bump/Reversal:	The vision will be the Bump, changing the level from happy and hopeful to dread-stricken and urgent.
Final Action Taken:	The PC will convince the Leader that the village must pick up and move or risk annihilation.
Keep Other Story Threads Alive:	The Elder will smile at the PC and congratulate her for a job well done. He will also mention that there is a particular young brave that would probably enjoy helping her spread the word of the migration.
Value System:	The value of the tribe is of the utmost. Research will be conducted to discover more of the day-to-day needs of the Native Americans in this particular setting. Hunting tools such as bows, arrow heads, etc. along with weaving looms, hides, etc. will be of significant value.
Presence of Other Realities Existing Simultaneously:	The spirit world where the ancestors of the people watch over them and guide them through visions in smoke.
Payoff from a Previous Level:	n/a – opening level
Setup for Future Level:	Will the tribe get moving in time? Who is going to attempt to slaughter all of the people?
Matching Elements (Repeating symbols, etc):	Perhaps a crow flying overhead or any number of symbols that could appear in the smoke visions could be used to signify the upcoming vision of even more gloom (raising the stakes!)
Bridging Out:	With the Elders congratulations, he reminds the PC that her work today has shown more promise in divining than anyone before her. He also tempers her hope with the reality that they already may be too late.

Key Lesson Learned: Having a good idea is important, but really sitting down and writing it out with some sort of structure and flow is infinitely more valuable. You’ll be amazed at how many problems arise and how quickly your imagination will think of ways to bridge these unexpected gaps.

Stumbling and Grumbling

I’ve hit the first of what is sure to be many rough patches. One of the exercises was to up the stakes which means you start with a simple event and keep escalating them until you have a somewhat major catastrophe. What I thought would be a simple task for any writer worth his weight resulted in me staring at a blank page for quite some time, thinking I finally had something and then ending with a huge bracket to the side pointing to the word “SUCK”. After a few moments, I jumped back on the horse and tried again. This ended in “Not as Suck”. Though this is an important exercise that needs to be practiced repeatedly, I’m already feeling the pressure of how short the 3-month design segment really is and how my leisurely pace will not cut it. This said, “not as suck” will have to suffice as a reminder of what I need to work on in the coming months along with progressing through the book.

I did, however, successfully break down the elements required in the opening scene of Bioshock (after the whole airplane fiasco). From listing the graphical elements of the external and internal parts of the deepsea pod to the cutscene of Rapture as you descend and the underwater attributes to the audio description of Rapture to the lighting and character design of the first witnessed murder. It’s quite a great deal of  artwork and audio and a great vision for an opening scene to set the tone for the rest of the game.

I am hoping to complete Chapter 3 of Ultimate Guide this week and even push into Chapter 4 a bit. Plus, I intend to read a couple of chapters from Professional Techniques. It is not that I don’t have time to do these things, it’s that I allow other things to get in the way. Damn Dragon Age for being so addictive and the desire to maintain some sort of social life.

Key Lesson Learned: Raising the stakes is absolutely necessary to maintain interest and can be accomplished in a variety of ways, but to do this effectively, it will require a great deal of work – much more than I have put into it so far.

Conflict, huh? This should be easy.

The hardest part about being a gamer and wanting to learn the elements of developing a game is that there is so frakin’ many good games out there calling to you, begging you to put down your goals for just one hour to spend some time with them. You can spare one hour, right? I mean, these are the things you want to create. How can you resist? And yet, it’s that hour here on this game and another hour there on that one that add up to a lot of game time and very few results on your own project(s). Here’s to you, Dragon Age: Origins. Just one more in the line of sweet, sweet distractions.

I’m still in Chapter 2 of Ultimate Guide, which is not as far as I’d hoped to be by this point, but I knew this week would be a little tough. Regardless, the first Gold Action Item of the book is something I could/should do over and over and maybe one day – years from now – feel that I have the hang of. The title is: Write a setup and payoff narrative sequence. Simple, huh? Just use your narrative abilities to create a task for the protagonist (or the player), and then BAM! Hit ‘em with some sort of payoff. The truth is, it is really easy to do this…once. Now, do it again. Still easy? Keep going. Stories, told through books, movies and games alike, are all about these moments. You read a book and jump from event to event in the protagonist’s journey, events which are defined by setups and payoffs. Some are better than others, but they all have this. When you’re telling a funny story to your friends, you lay a bit of ground work to let your buddies know the setting and then you end it with the punchline (BAM!).

From what I can tell, the payoff in games are all the moments when the jumping, shooting and puzzle-solving makes sense or gives you a sense of accomplishment. You clear all the blocks on the Tetris screen: BAM! The hero finally gets a moment alone to kiss his/her love interest: BAM! You decide to nuke Megaton, killing all the residents within: BAM! Well, more BOOM! but we’ve got a pattern going here. The point is a game takes more than just one of these, so get good at the process.

And the process involves creating a conflict and raising the stakes. The book lists a few generally accepted conflict types, but the one I started using for a game idea is Man vs. System (you might recognize this as one of the 36 plots). My playable character will be the one to come upon the truth of what is really going on and strive to make believers out of those around her. That’s the core conflict, but mini-conflicts that vary throughout the game will be what takes this idea from blah to wow. That and a steady rising in the stakes.

Key Lesson Learned: Practice, practice, practice the setup and payoff exercise with simple to difficult conflicts and constantly raise the stakes. This doesn’t just tighten story, it flexes your brain to think of new gameplay mechanics.

Interest and Inspiration

 That’s right, inspiration has struck. As I lay in bed in this morning, drifting in and out of consciousness, an idea came to me. One involving a human shapeshifting father and an animal mother. Before you click off this blog in disgust, hear me out! When the father shapeshifts into animal forms, he loses his human consciousness or desires or whatever. So, technically, it’s not perverse or socially unacceptable for him to impregnate, say, a wolf. But these are all details that can be polished into whatever moral system I wish to throw them. The important aspect is the offspring of this joining because that is the protagonist of the game. A wolf cub with the ability to occasionally become human and unlike his father, be aware of what’s happening.

Hmmm…I think I’m missing something from the dream because this doesn’t sound as amazing as it did when I awoke. The Key Lesson Learned for this post should be: Write down your damn dreams as soon as you get a chance (like when you wake up)!

I have now completed 6 of the exercises in Ultimate Guide and I’m really starting to enjoy it. From listing iconic elements from one of the best shows ever – Battlestar Galactica (new show, not 70′s) – to retro imagining Uncharted 2: Among Thieves on the Atari 2600, I’m engaged and entertained in these exercises. The last exercise I completed (shown below) is a Beta called “Don’t Diminish the Hero”. I remembered this exercise from my earlier read-through because it’s such an important idea that transcends every aspect of art. Flint and John talk about games in which the player’s character is the dumbest character in the game – he/she doesn’t know anything about anything and everyone has to spell everything out for them. With the interactive nature of games, the player’s character must be proactive, otherwise the player has nothing to do.

The authors also talk about staying in character with this proactive style. It made me think about Batman and Nathan Drake in their most recent gaming adventures. Batman’s a genius, so he figures things out on his own. How did the creators handle dropping information the player needs to progress the story without Batman coming across as an idiot? The Dark Knight pieces together parts of the answer and then radios Oracle to run tests on his data. The player listens and becomes informed of Batman’s correct hypothesis, all while under the impression they are playing as one of the greatest criminal detectives ever! Nathan Drake has it a bit easier in some regards. He makes mistakes, painful mistakes. His cockiness adds to the comedy when things don’t go his way. Sometimes he figures things out and sometimes he relies on Elena or Chloe to get him out of a tight spot, but he’s never passive. Interesting stuff.

The Exercise: 3 men have separate info your character needs (who to see, where to go and when). Create a proactive sequence of your character getting this info (i.e. no asking for it or waiting for someone to give it to you).

My “Don’t Diminish the Hero” results:

Protagonist sees a derelict old man on the street who probably knows everything that happens in this neighborhood. When Prot approaches, the man’s lips are chapped and his voice is raspy so the player can offer him water in lieu of alcohol. After the man drinks his share, he clears his throat and says, “Thanks for that, sonny. I can only bet you’re after the stolen goods. Well, I don’t know where they took them, but you’ll be looking for the guy named Fat Jake. I saw him and his crew casing the joint. They all have F.J. tattooed on their shoulders, so you can’t miss ‘em.” The man looks a bit nervous for talking to a stranger, so he takes off.

Protagonist walks around town a bit and finally spots a couple of street toughs with “F.J.” on their shoulders. They’re pushing each other and talking loudly, so Prot, rather than face them, walks by at a reasonable distance and overhears one telling the other, “If you don’t return my car by tonight, I’m walking my black ass over to Bogart’s in the middle of Fat Jake’s dinner to let him know. Think he’ll be happy?” Now the player knows when to find Fat Jake, but doesn’t know where Bogart’s is located.

Since most people here know Fat Jake, it would look suspicious to ask about his main hangout. Protagonist sees a woman on a smart phone. Protagonist happens to be an expert pick-pocket so he waits until she puts the phone in her purse before staging an “accidental” run-in. With the smart phone, he looks up Bogart’s and discovers where he must go to meet Fat Jake.

Key Lesson Learned:  Always search for ways to allow the player to do more and watch/read less within the confines of the game’s mechanics.

Testing Out the Ol’ Sea Legs

This is the first official post while working on the All-in-One Gamer Project.

I’ve read and reread some passages from Ultimate Guide (I’ll be honest with you, I started reading this book about 9 months ago and put it down, so a bit of this is a refresher course) and there’s some beauty in the introduction. When they (Flint and John) talk about all the things going on in their lives while they’re trying to hash out the introduction to the book, I couldn’t help but think, “Gee, a ton of crap is going on in my life now, too!” I’m starting the All-in-One Gamer Project this week and my new job next week and looking for a place to live and worrying about the increase in rent due to losing my awesome cousin as an even more awesome roommate (wait, should I create a donations link on this blog? hehe.) all while balancing a long-distance relationship in California with an incredibly awesome girl (Use “awesome” 3x in one sentence: Check).

Phew! Ok, now I can get started.

Though I’m working through the exercises (alphas, betas and golds) in this book as directed, I’m not going to post all the results here as that might be the most boring read ever. However, I do want to sprinkle in a good sampling of what I’m doing to actually show progress. The first exercise actually seems worth reporting: Play a Game (ugh, okay, if I must). Fortunately, I had Rocksteady’s Batman: Arkham Asylum for the PS3 to play. Unfortunately, I was at the end and too many details about my experience would be a huge spoiler. What I can say is that the “control” talked about in Ultimate Guide is sooo prevalent throughout this game – it’s what I enjoyed most in this Batman title: controlling one of my favorite superheroes in the ways I’ve always wanted. A good deal of Batman’s favorite gadgets are at your disposal and there is an almost limitless way to use them. Add to that the anticipation of using new gadgets based upon seeing unreachable Riddler question marks around the map and you’ve got not only great gameplay, but a hook to keep the player playing.

Key Lesson Learned: Hooks in your story are good; hooks in your story AND gameplay are genius.