Non-Digital Prototype
By now you have selected one of your game pitches as the game you will develop further during the class this quarter. The first step towards developing and refining this game concept is to crate a non-digital prototype of one or more aspects of the game.
A non-digital prototype is one where you create an approximation of the final game experience without writing any software. By avoiding writing software, you focus on game design activities, and can quickly create an experience which people play, and then provide feedback. This feedback allows you to rapidly iterate on the design, improving it quickly. Non-digital prototypes can involve a variety of materials, including paper, cardboard, dice, glass markers, hex and grid paper, and fabric as well as some elements of digital media such as music and video that are played during the experience.
A non-digital prototype is a kind of design research activity, where the goal is to answer specific questions about your game's design by creating the prototype, and then playing it. As a result, the non-digital prototyping activity begins by developing these design questions, and then using them to focus the prototype to gather information that can help answer these questions. Example questions might focus on the depth of puzzles, or how players react to a new mechanic, or novel interface. If you have significant doubts about some aspect of your game design, then some of your questions should focus on these doubts so you can gather more information, and increase confidence in the design (or modify it based on gameplay experience).
The non-digital prototype homework assignment has three main parts: In-Progress Documentation, Description and Evaluation, described below. The In-Progress Documentation takes the form of a photograph of your non-digital prototype. The Description and Evaluation are combined together in one document, which is submitted to the shared Google Drive for the class. Submissions may be made as either a Google Doc (preferred) or a PDF. We do not want to see Word, Open Office, Pages, etc.
In-Progress Documentation
The goal of the In-Progress Documentation is for you to demonstrate that you are substantially far along in the design and construction of your non-digital prototype. To provide this demonstration, take a photo of your prototype, or a photo of people engaged in playing your prototype, and submit this to the shared Google Drive folder for the class. This photo is evaluated to determine that you have made reasonable amounts of progress on your non-digital prototype.
Description
- A summary description of the ideal game (i.e., summarize the game from your pitch deck slides, in prose form, usually 1-2 pages)
- Written rules for the non-digital prototype of the game (how does a player of your non-digital prototype actually play the game? How does the "gamemaster" (person acting in the role of the computer) react to player inputs?)
- Documentation of the prototype in the form of photos of prototype, and/or people playing the prototype, placed in the document. Some descriptive text in the caption of the figure will make the action in the figure more clear to readers.
Evaluation
- What design question(s) you were seeking to answer with the prototype
- How did you collect data on people playing prototype (observation, questionnaires, interviews, etc.)
- What answers did you develop to the questions?
That is, you have had people play your non-digital prototype. How did you collect information from these players? Typically this involves participant observation and then a questionnaire at the end. Based on this information, what kinds of answers did you develop to your design questions? What new questions emerged? Are some of the initial questions no longer relevant? How does the information you collected provide justification for your answers?
Grading
Grades for the assignment will be weighted 10% for In-Progress Documentation, 35% for description, and 55% for evaluation.