Phase 4
Week 8
Time to choose 3 ideas to work on for the presentation at the end of week 9. After a talk on the pros and cons of each game idea [See Sketchbook 1, page 9], we decided on Portage Experience, Anti-Game (with Adam's Logger and Lawyers as a possibility/example) and the Food Web idea. Then listed some questions we felt would need to be answered [See Sketch 1, page 10].
Portage Experience
The Portage Experience is a game idea that will focus on taking the player on a journey through a nature-focused environment. Most likely based in the boreal forest, with an element of the actual act of portage used to create gameplay mechanics. This game idea will rely on the attitude of mindfulness and existential experiences. So it should provide a space in which stopping, doing nothing to a certain extent, will provide more depth. I expect that the game should be able to be completed without doing anything but moving right. The "gameplay" will occur when players stop to interact with the environment or space around them in a thoughtful and mindful way.
Research to back up what mindfulness and existential experiences are have been produced by Adam.
The rest of the team storyboarded the start game, basic gameplay for the idea, what the overall concept of the gameplay would be and how it might be controlled. My involvement was a concern with the carrying of the canoe back and forth while moving the cargo. That this gameplay could cause some painful repetition. I was corrected that the player will carry the only cargo on the character, while also carrying the canoe above their head, essentially meaning only one trip is required. To also battle the chances of players returning in the left direction with the canoe, I thought of a way to stop the characters from being able to move the canoe in the left direction and only the right. But when they drop the canoe, the character can freely walk in both directions. This allows players to feel like they have the freedom to explore while being afforded the goal of continuing the journey in the correct direction. As only certain gameplay will be had on the separate 'islands' of land between the rivers, which are the connecting element for the overall journey.
I wanted to outline some of the core rules for this game idea. This would set the foundations for further ideas to be developed upon in the future if we choose to take this idea forward into Phase 4. I felt it was also important to record any other ideas which might want to be used in the game, but might not necessarily be a core rule to the concept.
Harmonica interaction
[See Sketchbook 1, pages 13,14]
For a prototype, we want to create the idea of learning the harmonica along the journey. Using the workshops on self-learning AI, the character should gradually improve a harmonica melody each time it attempts to play. Creating rules for this type of interaction [See Sketchbook 1, page 13] we decided that the skill of improvement should be effected if the playing harmonica instance is completed or interrupted.
Weiving this idea into the design of the game experience, players will gain a more developed game experience the longer they spend time in the journey. So, if a player recognises that they start playing the harmonica when the character is sitting on a log and that each time they do this, a better played recognisable melody is played they might achieve a somewhat existential attitude within the game.
Through discussions, we realised we could also improve on an increased feeling of independent experiences for separate players by providing a list of melodies which the character chooses to learn at random. I went about to find a few well-known songs, to begin with, and made a choice to cut the melodies down to a shorter version for a shorter, more charming moment. Then recorded the number of notes that made up these melodies to be used in the prototype. Because of the harmonica's system of playing notes, I have developed a string of these using the same system as found on the tab sheets. Then using this system of numbers 1 to 10 and -1 to -10, we have an array of notes that can be randomly picked in a playing harmonica instance to slowly have to character learn each time they attempt.
https://www.harmonica.com/the-15-most-popular-harmonica-tabssongs-in-the-world-ever-125.html
On Top of Old Smokey
4 4 5 6 7 -6 -6 -5 6 -6 6 4 4 5 6 6 -4 5 -5 5 -4 4 4 4 5 6 7 -6 -6 -5 6 -6 6 6 6 4 5 6 6 -4 5 -5 5 -4 4
With how the prototype has been created, using sheet musical notes rather than tabs, I'll use a combination of the two to understand the music in written form and then translate it into a coded form that can simply be added by Jamie.
So far I have found 3 melodies which have been noted in [Sketchbook page 13], but I will focus on learning this system of writing the songs with 'On Top of Old Smokey'.
Score sheet:
https://www.8notes.com/scores/25078.asp
To create a world without any GUI, me and Alex have been discussing how to afford the players to continually move the canoe to the right while allowing the character freedom to explore on the islands. Alex has created a prototype using Pico8 to test iterations of methods to get players to move the canoe from left to right, only moving left without the canoe.
He started by giving information to the player on how to use the controls all in one go. While also refraining the character from being able to move left while carrying the canoe. This obviously worked but feedback from peers suggested that it felt too restrictive. I had suggested that instead while carrying the canoe and the left direction is activated, the character drops the canoe automatically. But this would have still been forcing the player to act in a way which was out of their control which is the opposite to the experience we're hoping for this game idea to have.
From the first feedback, Alex made it so while carrying, the movement speed is reduced by a large amount. Making the carrying of the canoe a thing within itself. Then, if the players don't require moving the canoe, they are free themselves to drop it to move at full speed.
In the final iteration, Alex added a golden cube to spawn on the left after carrying the canoe past a certain point to the right. Doing this, we were able to playtest with students in year 1 whether they would drop the canoe or continue carrying it. The testing showed that 8 out of 8 people chose to drop the canoe to collect the gold box.
What we learned; Provide information sequentially and not all at once, visually indicate which way to go using the game space, don't restrict players from moving with free-agency where possible.
Food Web + Anti Game Ideas
The two other ideas we had thought about exploring further as part of the 3 ideas was Food Webs and the Anti-Game. Because we have spent time into Portage and have found it to be far deeper in terms of a potential impacting and meaningful experience.
The Food Web idea would have used the complex food chain to explore and educate players on the food web of the Boreal Forest and how each animal relies on another even if they may not be directly impacting of one another.
The Anti-Game was an interesting concept as it would approach the topic of conservation of the forest and twist the attitude on its head. To put the player in a position of destructive power, subtly hinting towards their impact and showing them the effects of greed and growth.