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The Beautiful Path: WoW New Player Experience Critique

Takeaways The New Player experience tends to follow the pattern of "teach the player three times"  The Beautiful Path: WoW New Player Experience Critique The good: Effectively introduces the player to core mechanics and game loops in the game, as well as familiarizing them with controls and player progression systems. In the early parts of the tutorial sequence for WoW characters, the player is asked to hit a target dummy.  The player is told via text, verbally, and then visually with obvious indicators to execute the attack. This combination of "teach the player three times" is a key lesson explained in one of our USC courses- games often have a lot going on, and their complicated systems require reinforcement and time for players to grasp them. The bad (what can be improved): Feels very much tutorial-y, and the premise of the locale, while believable, is not immersive and feels removed from the rest of the game and the way WoW is marketed to the public (there are
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Update: What I'm working on now

Why USC? Games. When I chose to attend USC for my bachelor's degree, I had to weigh a lot of options against each other. For one, I had an inclination to study out-of-state, trying to get out of my comfort zone of sunny California. University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign (UIUC) presented a great opportunity to pursue a degree in Computer Science and Philosophy, especially with my interest in Artificial Intelligence and growth of AI everywhere. That program nearly became my pick - attracted to the prospect of challenge combined with thinking about the ethics behind AI while I implemented it. UC Berkeley offered a similar opportunity to be on the cutting-edge of computer science, while being near Silicon Valley to sate my growing interest in entrepreneurship. Ultimately though, I just want to create positive experiences for people. Thus, USC has been a great decision, and much of my choice was driven by SC's(well deserved) prestige as a game design school.  Junior year

Here There Be Pirates Game Design Doc

Takeaways Invest the time early to carefully choose dramatic elements that adhere strongly to your mechanics Being a pirate is cool and exploration is fun Be thoughtful with time-estimates to finish things, then double the number you arrive at Under-promise and over-deliver Particular game strengths: Aesthetics (pins for player markers, pirate-map art, gold coin points) and dramatic elements (pirate exploration & stealing) complemented mechanics (moving, staying, looting, stealing, attacking) excellently. Design Journal - “Here there be Pirates” Team members from left to right: Laura Littleton, Charlie Feuerborn, Reid Weston, Abigail Sullivan. Our affordance object: A reversible sequin throw pillowcase Our team was quick to jump to work, experimenting physically with the object and bouncing ideas off one another. We found that the object interestingly affords: Throwing Rubbing/color changing Holding things Wearing like a hat or hood Spinning Multiple people interac

A Statement of Abstraction

A Statement of Abstraction: An Analysis of Titan Souls Pre-reading note: For readers who have never played the game, there is an amazing speed run by Scrublord at https://www.speedrun.com/titan_souls/run/zpqldvny Key art of Titan Souls The story of David and Goliath informs every aspect of the U.K. developed indie game Titan Souls, published in 2015. From character design to core mechanics to its very development and publishing, the game is shaped by this influential story. Our understanding of the game’s experience goals is enriched by understanding the parallels between the biblical story and Titan Souls’ gameplay. In exploring Titan Souls’ cultural background, one discovers that the Protagonist’s journey to defeat almost two dozen supremely challenging bosses is not only a reflection of the human journey of challenge and triumph but also a manifestation of small businesses’ struggle to “make it” in a mega-corporatized economy. The story of David and Goliath strongly info

Off With Your Head Game Design Doc

Takeaways Combining disparate game mechanics inevitably leads to new and interesting games Memory abilities vary widely between players, making it a useful game component to segment the market (only players with good memory will enjoy memory games) Block towers' aesthetics naturally induce a sense of fear and excitement in players, making it a useful component to be added to other games E.g. Dread by The Impossible Dream Players have a natural tendency toward competition, even within a cooperative game such as this. To combat this, it is useful to have an artificial opponent piece to "compete" with Design Journal - “Off with Your Head” Team Members: Alan Karbachinsky, Ani Devoian, Evan Wright, Charlie Feuerborn Initial Design Designing our board game, we had to keep in mind the certain constraints given to us; 1. A cooperative team setting wherein all players either win or lose 2. Utilizing a “press your luck” mechanic 3. There must be some so

Infatuated Game Design Doc

Takeaways: Emotion is a crucial part of player experience Knowing and understanding how and why you feel things is valuable Always get a prototype in front of a player as soon as humanly possible INFATUATED Game Design Documentation by Charlie Feuerborn My inspiration & background: “Turning Out Pt. ii” by the indie pop group AJR. A sequel to the soul-searching “Turning Out” from the EP What Everyone’s Thinking, the songwriter, Ryan Met, describes it as a tearjerker. “It was the hardest song I’ve ever written. 100%. We don’t even wanna play that one live, ‘cause it’s such a sad, brutal song.” The target emotion of the player experience: Heartbreak Earliest iterations of the game pull some questions verbatim from a psychological study on love and affection, published in the New York Times by a participant in the study. The questions begin as surface-level ice-breakers, but gradually escalate in depth and personal connection. The fir