Greenlighting Process

Games: From Concept to Greenlight Approval

The primary goal of the Game Deisgn Studio I class is to create a large number of game design concepts, prototype and evaluate them, and then select the best of these ideas for realization as a functional computer game during the rest of the year.

Creation of new ideas occurs via a process of students giving a series of two game pitches (a presentation of a game idea) over the first two weeks. Over 85 students are expected in the class, so there will be over 170 game ideas pitched. Each pitch will receive brief feedback from the TAs, and more extensive feedback will be given in TA office hours.

Once both pitches are complete, every student will select one of their two ideas to go forward. Each student will then individually develop their game idea via the creation of a non-digital prototype, a digital prototype, and then a game design document.

From the pool of ~85 student game ideas, there will be two stages of downselect to choose the ~10-12 games that will be greenlit. In the first downselect, all students will give a final pitch of their game concept in week 7 of the class. At the end of these pitches there will be 20 games selected by the instructor and TAs, and an additional 5 games selected by a vote of the class, for a total of 25 games. 

At the Greenlight Final pitches (during week 8), the instructor, TAs, and an external judges panel will listen to the final game pitches, and the external judges will provide feedback on the pitched games. Students will have an opportunity to vote on their favorite games as well. The judges feedback, student voting results, pitch decks, digital prototypes, game category (see below) and game design documents will then be evaluated to determine the 10-12 games which will be "greenlit" (announced in week 9 or the very start of week 10). All greenlit games will go forward for development in Winter and Spring. In the end, the best 6-7% of all game ideas generated in the class will go forward.

Game Categories

The greenlight process will consider many factors in selecting the best game concepts. One of these is a series of game type categories, and associated limits for total number of games that will be greenlit in that category. When developing game concepts keep in mind that a game concept in a less popular category will have a better likelihood of approval.

For 2016/17 the game categories are:

Open category (4 games maximum): A game that does not fit one of the other categories, and would generally be expected to be a novel computer game running on a PC or mobile platform using standard controllers.

Rhetorically focused game (4 games maximum): This category encompasses games designed to explore a particular social issue, be it a persuasive game, or a game design centered around values-based play. 

Idle game (2 games maximum): Web-based games where the core mechanic is a simple action, and the gameplay is built around elaborate progression and reward systems.

Mobile casual (3 games maximum): A small, tightly focused game designed for a casual to mid-core audience on a mobile phone device.

Game using a non-traditional/custom hardware controller (an alt.ctrl game) (4 games maximum): A game concept that involves the use of novel or custom user interface hardware. The custom controller could be a custom hardware device created by the game team, or some existing user input device that is not in widespread use as a game controller. Games made using the Kinect would also qualify for this category, as would games that make use of custom hardware of any form (e.g., custom hardware with functionality similar to the Skylanders figures).

Virtual Reality or Augmented Reality game (3 games maximum): A game created using a commercial virtual reality headset, such as the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive or an augmented reality device, such as Google Tango or Microsoft Hololens, or an augmented reality library for a mobile device (e.g., such as for Pokemon Go).

Game designed around a specific visual art style (2 games maximum): A game where the concept was built around a specific visual art style, where the art style serves as a guiding principle in the design of the game, and other aspects of the game are secondary to achieving the specific visual style. Games such as Proteus and Mirror Moon EP are games you might imagine resulting from an "art direction primary" design process.

Game designed around a specific audio track or style (2 games maximum): A game where the concept was built around a specific audio track or interesting audio style. Such a game might explore what a music video would be in game form (i.e., making a game matched to a specific song), or pick an unusual musical style (e.g., Spanish flamenco) and build a game matched to it. Game concepts will ideally explore beyond simple button-mashing rhythm-match games, though novel rhythm-based concepts will be considered (e.g., Crypt of the Necrodancer).

Innovation in an existing genre (4 games maximum): A game that is firmly rooted in the conventions and approaches of a specific game genre, but which is innovating within the genre in some non-trivial way. Examples of such games in the shmup genre are Everyday Shooter and Resogun. We note that the bar for innovation in the platformer genre is very high.

Interactive art experience (2 experiences maximum): An interactive experience whose goal is to create a novel experience for the player/experiencer. Such experiences may have only light game elements, and may not be entirely recognizable as a game. They will be evaluated using an art frame of reference, not a game frame. These Monsters by strangethink is an example of this category.

The instructor and TAs recognize that these categories have fuzzy boundaries, and will be somewhat liberal in our interpretation of whether a game fits within a category. That said, the instructor, with input from the TAs, will be the final arbiter of whether a game concept fits a given category. As well, the instructor reserves the right to change the number of games admitted in each category depending on the distribution of game concepts to categories (large quantities of excellent game concepts in a given category might lead to an increase in the number of games greenlit in that category). Finally, if you have a game concept that clearly doesn't fit any of these categories, please discuss this idea with the TAs or instructor, as any novel game concept will be considered.