The Prologue to Co-Creative Design & Development Practice
Before week one of this module, I came up with a very vague idea; the Idea being that of an in-game map editor in which there is a split screen option. During lockdown, I realised how much I missed split screen games, especially because a lot of game studios make their multiplayer modes online. I feel it really takes away certain aspects of accessibility. I felt by ideating ever so slightly, I could informally pitch my idea to those who I worked with in the Ludum Dare 48 Game Jam via our Discord (2021) server who are also going into this module. I wanted to hit the ground running as best as possible by being well prepared, having at least the foundational elements for our game. This went in my favour as others seemed to possess only a vague idea as to what route they wanted to go down rather than an actual plan. This led to teaming up being fairly straight forward as I was already aware of everyone’s skill set within this server. This isn’t to say that there was not a minority of unwillingness to give a definitive answer as to whether they would like to be on board as theme details were a little scarce prior to the module starting. All we were counting on was that accessibility and automation could be potential themes. Fortunately, it seems that because I was able to get the ball rolling on my own and informally pitch these foundations, it mitigated other’s worries and put me in good standing to be in a team from the very start. Many of us are wanting to become more well-versed in Unity but in different roles. As stated in the previous module, I will be taking a step back from the more narrative aspects and focusing more heavily on level design and a little bit on quality assurance. Because of this, those who wanted to become well-versed in programming, 3D art and 2D art decided that it would be best for everyone that they focus on these aspects solely so that more can be done by those wanting to learn more in the game engine. We will see how this goes – I imagine that everyone will still have to use Unity regardless, especially if some of us are more inexperienced than those looking to expand their skillsets elsewhere.
Even though there was a Mass appeal in the chat, too many people wanted to take part of which resulted in people having to join other teams due to the maximum of 5 per team. I ended up solidifying who the team would consist of by answering any questions about what I was envisioning for the project and clarifying any misunderstandings as to what the game would consist of. I explained that I was thinking was that it would be good to develop a game that includes a sandbox or several individual maps that revolve around user-generated levels that are put together using assets that would exist within the game that we would create for them. Once being an avid fan of Halo Reach (2010) and the game mode ‘Forge’, the feature I would like to implement is the ability to switch between edit and play mode instantly with the press of a button but have the “edit” function be a mode that you still play in in the sense that edits can be seen in real time and can affect players who are playing outside of the editing mode. It did take a while to explain what I meant as others have played level editors in games such as Minecraft (2011) and thought that I merely wanted the game to be a level editor rather than a game that has level editing built in as part of the gameplay elements. Georgi in particular thought that I was keen on devising a development tool (which in all honesty does sound fun to do but I am nowhere near experienced enough to devise such a thing). Georgi jested that programmers only think about themselves but this somewhat emphasised my way of thinking in another sense of accessibility: I want to prioritise everyone in the sense that these tools are made accessible to everyone when they play our games. In my experience, level design seems to be easier to learn, thanks to these games that featured such editors in the past. Regardless of what I have been specialising in over the years, I have wanted to influence others to engage in creative practices. Seeing as games with in-game editors influenced me to get involved in game design, I thought it would be great to keep the ball rolling and encourage even more creative-minded individuals, regardless of age, background, etc. This isn’t to say that I have completely forgotten that we need to make this inclusive for non-creative individuals. Automation seems to go hand-in-hand with accessibility in this instance as we would make the level editing elements easy to use and options easily navigable; we could create shortcuts or make everything possible to do on a console controller for example. One of the most used automated features in the modern world is that of Instagram’s photo editor (Instagram, 2021). This is a simplified version of Adobe Photoshop (2021) or Adobe Lightroom (2021) as the photos can be edited very easily thanks to only a handful of sliders. Of course, the editor isn’t as sophisticated as Adobe’s intricate editors however it makes photo editing accessible to the masses.
To get us thinking in the right way when it comes to accessibility features, I shared an interesting piece from the PlayStation Blog in which the game studio, Insomniac discussed their successfully innovative and inclusive features of Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart (2021) following on from their success from initially turning their focus on accessibility features that were included in Marvel’s Spider-Man (2018) and how they received overwhelming positive reviews from the disabled community which in turn led them to include even more for Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered (2020) and Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales (2020) (Zorilla, 2021). Now it seems that they have no intention of stopping. In Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart (2021), Insomniac included the following options: contrast – in which important information can be made to stand out more for those who are visually impaired by either changing single shaders on particular game assets such as enemies, bosses, and interactable game objects, and/or including the option for a high contrast background in which the background is desaturated whereas the important parts of the scene are still in colour. There are also a variety of customisable options for both button shortcuts and game speed to help those with either Cognitive and/or Motor related disabilities.
Unfortunately, one person had to not like the idea or decide to move to a different team due to the capacity being exceeded before we could move forward. In the end, two potential team members decided to work within another team due to disproportionate programmers and we had to fill the spaces left in our team. At this stage, our team consisted of myself obviously (as nice as it would be for others if I were to give my idea away), Georgi Tsaklev, Luke Quinn, and James Waters. We created a new Discord server GDD730 The Cake is a Lie. (Discord, 2021)
So, it begins… Week 1 actual.
At the time, we were figuring out what we needed to make our team functional, and in turn, make our project successful in the long run, we still needed a 2D artist and animator, UI/ UX designer, sound designer, and potentially a composer. Georgi was quick to put himself down for sound designing and I put sound design down as something I would support in. Even though we were still looking for the ideal person who possessed UI/ UX experience, we decided to get the ball rolling and start realising how this basic idea could grow to become properly developed and form a solid foundation to get properly started from. Seeing as we had an upcoming meeting already scheduled for the Friday (04/06/2021), I thought it best for us to ideate individually and expand on what was already in front of us all before laying everything down at the meeting and discussing as a group. I reiterated that I would be thinking of narrative last and focusing more on gameplay and level design elements and genre of the game.
I asked the question prior to the meeting as to whether we wanted the game to be multiplayer only or whether or not we create a user-friendly story/ quest editor also; we ultimately decided very quickly that it had to be one or the other in the time that we have been given. However, Georgi came up with an interesting idea that the level editing feature could become fully integrated into the gameplay in which the player would have to edit the level to complete it. I was initially thinking more along the lines of giving the player a degree of creative freedom using what is to be the existing gameplay mechanics, level, and the assets that we designed for them to create their own game modes, stories, etc. I didn’t originally imagine giving the player any particular goals; however, it soon became obvious to me that without any incentive for the player, it might get boring for those who aren’t so creatively inclined. We realised that there had to be a balance. When we were thinking of how to improve in game editors, such as adding more logic and making the menus more comprehensible and simpler for adding properties to objects, it led us all to the conclusion that we would be creating something very similar to Core (Core Games, 2021) I attempted to find ways in which we could improve upon Core as it did have mixed reviews, but these were related to poor gameplay elements such as animations, character models and interfaces not being fun to use. It was becoming obvious that this idea was somewhat falling apart as it lacked uniqueness.
Annoyingly for us it seems that user-generated content seems to be the way to go as players are more engaged and spend more of their time with games in which they can be creative and generate in-game content. (pocketgamer.biz, 2018) Plenty of games have story editors, even the likes of Assassin’s Creed however they all appear to be bare bones. Georgi caught our attention again with another idea in which the character has no control and the player/ editor changes the level to get the character to achieve the goal, although I thought it sounded like an updated version of Lemmings, however, this could be co-op! One player could traverse the level whilst the other edits it for them.
During the first meeting, our priority was filling out parts of the team charter such as roles, availability, although this wasn’t finished, and we moved on to discuss ideas for the project.
(Zoom to view)
What we ultimately had after all of this was that we wanted to include level editing as a feature or mechanic and that we wanted to tie in the narrative with another theme that was presented to us, sustainability. Even though we wanted to finish the ideation stage relatively quickly I still feel that because of the complexity of what we are hoping to do, it is justified that we have to spend a little longer.
At least now, Mary has joined us and is now our main UI & UX designer and 2D artist and animator, so we were very fortunate to be fully crewed up in the first week!
References
2021. Adobe Lightoom. California: Adobe. Inc.
2021. Adobe Photoshop. California: Adobe. Inc
Core Games. 2021. Play and Create Games for Free on Core. [online] Available at: https://www.coregames.com/ [Accessed 18 August 2021].
Discord. 2021. Discord | Your Place to Talk and Hang Out. [online] Available at: https://discord.com/ [Accessed 6 June 2021].
Halo Reach. 2010. XBOX 360 [Game]. Bungie Inc: Washington
Marvel’s Spider-Man. 2018. PlayStation 4 [Game]. Insomniac Games, Inc: California
Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered. 2020. PlayStation 5 [Game]. Insomniac Games, Inc: California
Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales. 2020. PlayStation 5 [Game]. Insomniac Games, Inc: California
Minecraft. 2011. XBOX 360 [Game]. Mojang Studios: Stockholm
Miro. 2021. Miro | Online Whiteboard for Virtual Collaboration. [online] Available at: https://miro.com [Accessed 6 June 2021].
Pocketgamer.biz. 2018. Why you should consider developing user-generated content-based mobile games. [online] Available at: <https://www.pocketgamer.biz/comment-and-opinion/67934/why-you-should-consider-developing-ugc-mobile-games/> [Accessed 16 August 2021].
Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart. 2021. PlayStation 5 [Game]. Insomniac Games, Inc: California
Zorilla, M., 2021. Inside the Accessibility Features of Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart – SIE Blog – English. [online] Www-sie-com.cdn.ampproject.org. Available at: <https://www-sie-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.sie.com/en/blog/inside-the-accessibility-features-of-ratchet-clank-rift-apart/amp/> [Accessed 16 August 2021].