- Introduction to Course: Introduction to the course, grading structure, etc.
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What is a game?: What is a game? What are the defining features of games? Let's think about this and a few related issues.
- Reading: Bartle's Player Types
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History of Games: A brief history of gaming from the 1970s through today. A brief discussion of how the design of games has changed over the years.
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Let's Play Super Metroid: No slides for this one.
- This list has SM as 39th best game of all time. This one has it 10th. Obviously not all lists even include it, but it is widely considered to be a classic.
- Super Metroid Analysis: A breakdown of many of the design elements of this game. We will hit most of these when we play through the game.
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Let's Play Celeste (with Ryan Kann): No slides for this one.
- Wikipedia lists several awards and accolades for this game.
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MDA: Mechanics, Dynamics, and Aesthetics in games. Let's start formalizing our discussion of how games are organized, designed, and discussed.
- Reading: Original MDA Paper
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Formal Elements of Games: A discussion/breakdown of the formal elements of games.
- Reading: Formal Elements Chapter from Tracy Fullerton.
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The Game Loop: Short introduction to the game loop, frames per second, dealing with time in games, etc.
- Reading: Short discussion of game loop architectures. Make sure to click through to pages 2, 3, and 4 for more info.
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Sprites and Transforms: Discussion of Sprites, their properties, coordinate spaces and converting between them, and affine transforms in games.
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Display Hierarchy: Discussion of display trees and how transforms are used to create hierarchical behavior in games.
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Character Design: Short discussion regarding character controls and programming.
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Enemy Design: Description of designing enemies and NPCs using state machines.
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Collision Detection: The basics of detecting and resolving collisions in games.
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Events: Software design of event systems and how they relate to game development.
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Level Design: Ruminations on the design of levels with examples.
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Actions and Interactions: Actions and interactions in games.
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Game Balance: Overview of reinforcement/feedback, stability, and how to balance games.
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Randomness: Overview of how randomness plays a role in game design.
- Daily Announcements: Lecture announcements will appear here as they build up during the semester.