This section is for those who are new to game design, including those who are experienced childrenâs media producers looking to grow their brand into interactive games. While entire volumes are written on game design and production processes, this section is meant to familiarize readers with the basic tools, vocabulary, and stages of creating a game. This is by no means an exhaustive review of everything involved in the production of a game, but itâs as much as I could reasonably fit! Topics covered include game design documents, game production processes, common roles on the production team, and an overview of business models, budgets, and publishing options for childrenâs games.
Defining exactly what makes a game is the subject of much heated debate. This chapter attempts to provide a working answer to the question âWhat is a game?â
Games Can Be Many Things
For every person you ask, âWhat is a game?â you will get a different answer. It has a wide range of definitions, but for our purposes of focusing on childrenâs games, a game is an interactive experience, where one or more players are presented a goal and has to take action to reach that goal. A set of rules constrains the ways in which the player can reach the goal. The player often has to overcome obstacles to reach the goal, as well.
Tic-Tac-Toe is a game where players take turn placing their icon on a board until one player gets three in a row.
Tetris is a game where the player places blocks in various shapes onto a grid. When a horizontal line is completely filled in, the line is cleared. The game continues until the board is filled with incomplete horizontal lines. For every 10 lines that the player clears, the shapes fall a little quicker.
The goal of Scribblenauts (Nintendo DS, iOS, and numerous other platforms) is to help the character get the starite. The player types words into a giant word bank to get objects. Then the character uses the object to get the starite. So the character might climb a ladder to reach the starite in the tree.
From there, game designers can add numerous layers to make puzzles that range from simple to incredibly complex.
Games have multiple ways of designating the audience, including:
- Casualâa player who tends to have limited time to play. Casual games are often designed to be played in short bursts.
- Core or midcoreâa player who enjoys a wide range of games but will invest time to play games that require a larger time commitment to complete.
- Hardcoreâa player who invests a lot of time and energy in playing, often by playing games that require dozens of hours to complete. Hardcore gamers are often considered the stereotypical gamer.
In addition, games can be identified as serious games or educational games. Serious games are ones that have a learning or prosocial benefit, such as training simulations or games that raise awareness for a topic, such as HIV or domestic violence. Serious games are created for all ages, from kids to senior citizens, on a huge range of subjects, from sex education to military training. By definition, educational games for kids are serious games, but they are rarely referred to as serious games. Rather, they are referred to as childrenâs educational games.
Itâs not uncommon to find entertainment games that have educational extensions that were not expressly designed as educational. Games that are commercial in nature but can be used in education are referred to as âcommercial off the shelfâ (COTS). For example, even though Scribblenauts is an entertainment game, it can also be used educationally for vocabulary development.
Game Genres
Just like films or books, games are identified by genres, which are generally defined by the style of interaction. Like the actual definition of a game, the taxonomy of game genres is debated. It also evolves quickly.
What follows are common game genres, but this is by no means an exhaustive list. Note that these genres cover all games, not just those for children. Genres are not mutually exclusive; many can be combined. Just about any genre can be designed with content and interactions that make it an educational game.
Maze
In the simplest form, a game in the maze genre presents the challenge to navigate from point A to point B. Pac-Man is a maze game in which you also avoid enemies and collect items.
Platform
Sometimes referred to as platformers, games in the platformer genre involve traveling from point to point (often platform to platform) by running, jumping, or other actions. The Nintendo franchise Super Mario Bros. is one of the best-known platformers.
First Person Shooter
These games, often abbreviated FPS, are a subgenre of shooter games. Shooter games are combat games involving projectiles (most commonly bullets of some sort, but other, less violent objects can also be used). âFirst Person Shooterâ refers to a camera angle where the player is viewing the game as though they are actually the shooter, as opposed to âThird Person Shooterâ where the player sees the entire body and weapon of the character he is controlling. Halo and Call of Duty are well-known FPS games.
Shootâ em Up
Another subgenre of the shooter category, this one focuses on shooting a lot of enemies while avoiding enemy fire. Space Invaders is a classic shoot-âem-up game.
Puzzle
Puzzle games require the player to perform actions to solve a challenge. Tetris, Peggle, Bejeweled, and Candy Crush Saga are all puzzle games. The latter two are the Match-3 style of puzzle game, where the user has to match particular tiles to progress. Hidden-Object-Games (HOGs) are also puzzle games, where the user locates items hidden within a picture.
Physics-Based
Physics-based games are often puzzle games, where the player has to perform an action to solve a particular challenge. Angry Birds is the most classic example. In the game, one or more aspects of physics are modeled and become the core interaction of the game. In Angry Birds, the player uses a slingshot to fling birds toward a structure with the goal of knocking down the structure. The angle of release, the distance sling shot is pulled, and the size of the bird all impact the outcome. World of Goo is another well-known physics-based puzzle game.
Adventure
Adventure games involve solving lots of puzzles, often by navigating around a world and interacting with characters. The early adventure games, including Colossal Cave Adventure in the 1970s, were text adventures or interactive fiction, such as Zork or Hitchhikerâs Guide to the Galaxy. These were entirely text-based games, where the player read descriptions and controlled the character by typing âGo Northâ or âExamine Mailbox.â
As computing power and development environments improved, the adventure genre gave way to graphic adventure games, including Kingâs Quest, Leisure Suit Larry, and Myst. To navigate the world, the user points the mouse to a location and then clicks the mouse to move a character to the location, leading to the name âpoint-and-click adventure.â
While they are nowhere near the level of popularity they had the 1980s, the adventure genre continues. One of the most notable of the past few years is The Walking Dead video game, created by Telltale Games for the television show of the same name.
Role Playing
Digital role-playing games (RPGs) evolved from pen-and-paper-based role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons. In the digital versions, the player takes on a character that has special skills and abilities. Through quests and challenges, the player earns ex...
