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portal: testchamber sixteen
So I've been playing my way through Portal again this winter. I first played my way through Portal in 2009, on Dave's computer, but now that I can run it on my own device I figured I'd give it a second run-through, just for the pleasure of it. It's not exactly breaking news to say that Portal is a really well-designed game. According to Amazon, it won "over 40 awards, including 15 Game of the Year honors." It was also recently added to the curriculum at Wabash College (part of an all-college course called "Enduring Questions"). But regardless. In my replay I'm up to Testchamber Sixteen, and I was struck by that level in particular as a piece of exemplary game design. Why? 1. It's challenging in a way that adds on to the already-established challenges of the game. Portal is a puzzle game, and a lot of the levels feature some head-scratching over the question of how to get from Point A to Point B. But there is very little "action" element to the game up until this point, although a few levels require you to move and aim quickly to complete certain portions of the level. But Testchamber Sixteen introduces enemies—the Aperture Science Sentry Guns—which introduce some live fire into the gameplay. Suddenly things are shooting at you, in a game where things haven't shot at you before. Danger! 2. It's funny. The Sentry Guns are in and of themselves little design masterpieces. They're sleek-looking and evil, but they're also granted incongruously perky personalities, and they have some of my favorite lines in the game. 3. It's satisfying. Most of the level involves disabling the Sentry Guns, and although they're incredibly dangerous they also shut down as soon as they're tipped over. Figuring out various ways to knock them down is a delight. 4. It provides narrative information about the game world without disrupting gameplay. Testchamber Sixteen is also the first one that contains a Rat-Man chamber, a side area that's outside of the "official" testing area. Exploring the chamber reveals graffiti that provides narrative information and suspense, without ever interrupting player control or disrupting the pleasure of exploring the game world. Related: Portal 2 arrives within the next few months: I look forward to it. Labels: game_commentary, game_design
Monday, February 07, 2011
i made this, part three: "inevitable"
Inevitable is a board game, set in a slapstick dystopian future. Inevitable is a work of commentary, satirizing the contemporary landscape of corporate and political power. Inevitable is a device which uses what Matthew Kirschenbaum would call the "procedural granularity" of complex rule-systems to produce robust narrative experiences in a deep imaginary world. "Inevitable is a game of layers within layers; the product of analysis, deconstruction, reconstruction, and meta-analysis. [It] overtly and covertly works to thwart you and subvert the board game experience overall." —Jonathan Leistiko, the game's co-designer. So... what is Inevitable, really? It's something that I began designing a long time ago—the earliest sketches I own of Inevitable materials are from 1988. It's something I have continued to tinker with, on and off, throughout the years: it enjoyed heavy play and extended development with my college crew circa 1991-1993, and then went into a re-development process in 1999-2000, right after I finished up with graduate school. Now it's alive again, and slouching towards a commercial release. It has a dedicated website and you can follow it at Facebook. Is it playable? It is playable! I just playtested it again this Sunday. Is it perfect? No, it's not perfect. (These recent playtests have reminded me often of game designer Jesse Schell's "Rule of the Loop," in which he declares that "The more times you test and improve your design, the better your game will be.") But tinkering incrementally with a long-running piece of design feels strangely satisfying at this point in my life. Labels: game_design, me, projects
Monday, February 01, 2010
blinkout is live on the internet
The first Flash game that Dave and I worked on together throughout the spring is now live on the Internet. PLAY: Play Blinkout on Kongregate (with Achievements) DESCRIPTION: How good is your visual memory under pressure? You'll have to use both your agility and good resource strategy to navigate your spaceship through an increasingly hostile dimension. How far can you get? INSTRUCTIONS: Move ship with ARROWS Illuminate levels with the SPACEBAR (costs energy) Find the key and go to the gate Regain energy by picking up charges There are 8 levels that will repeat for 6 rounds. The charges are persistent across all rounds, so don't use all of them the first time around... MORE INFO: The player will have to use their visual memory as most of the game is played in complete darkness. Illumination of the levels comes through collecting energy charges along the way. The catch is that a charge collected on an earlier level will no longer be available on later iterations. Charges picked up later are worth more energy, so the player will be able to manage their resources accordingly to make it to the harder rounds. In these later rounds the player is faced with greater energy costs for hitting a maze wall as well as greater costs for illuminating the level. The level time limit reduces and the movement speed increases. We realize this game is quite challenging and will likely intimidate at first as using visual memory, keyboard agility, and resource management together may prove to be a new experience for many players. We are very happy to have gotten the game sponsored by King.com and they have been great to work with. Enjoy! Labels: game_design, personal, projects
Wednesday, August 05, 2009
wikipedian tag
So I've been busy with loads of project-work this month, but I also had time to invent and playtest a new game. It involves using the vast, super-complicated structure of Wikipedia as a play space, an environment through which one player chases another. I like to think of it as a kind of competitive parkour through the architecture of all human knowledge, but calling it "tag" is a little simpler. It's easy to learn and loads of fun. I've put the full rule-set on a separate page. Labels: game_design, personal, projects
Thursday, July 02, 2009
triangle man
This is a lovely video: moiré (piano and organ) from defetto on Vimeo. I don't know what you thought about while watching it, but I thought about videogame design. What would it be like to "play" a game that had a possibility space that looked like this? Labels: game_design, videos
Monday, May 11, 2009
playtesters needed
OK, the prototype of the game depicted below is up and running. It won't be live on the Internet for another few months, but we're inviting playtesters to look at a private, locked beta. If you're interested in being added to the beta tester list, drop me a line via the usual channels. (Note to beta-testers: The level depicted in Friday's post does not actually appear in the current version of the game, so don't knock yourself out looking for it.) Labels: game_design, personal, projects
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
where I've been and what I've been up to (no. 1 in a series)
Those of you who have known me for any length of time know that I've had a long-standing interest in thinking about and designing games. What I haven't talked about on this blog is that I've been collaborating lately with my good friend Dave Evans of Hybrid Mind Studios on some video-game design. We have a massive list of ideas, and this past month we've been pushing hard on the first of those. We'll be seeking sponsorship for the game, so I can't say too much about it just yet, but I wanted to say that part of my absence from this blog lately has been due to cranking hard on some level design. It's been a very rewarding creative experience, and I thought I'd share a screenshot: There are some interesting mechanics we've got in mind, but more about that later. Labels: game_design, personal
Friday, April 24, 2009
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