Reflection #1 – Page 3

A Student Created a Blogpost, You Won’t Believe What Happened Next!

September 20, 2016 by ejp013

Progress on the game was a bit slow at first due to some unforeseen circumstances, which put one of our group members out of commission. As a result we ended up assigning aspects of the project to focus on based on what we were more familiar and comfortable with. Sarah and I would focus on the story and text of the game, while helping with code, while PJ would focus on the coding while helping with the story. To this end, we created a collaborative google doc for the story section of the game, which was nice as it gave the entire group the ability to view and edit the same document. However, there is unfortunately no easy google doc for coding, and the nature of coding makes it difficult to work simultaneously. So we decided to try and focus on our areas separately before coming together for a meeting the night before to be able to work together in the same geographical location, which would allow us to combine our disparate parts into a whole product. To this end I have written an outline as well as a chunk of the actual dialogue, mapped with pseudo-code.

Rough draft of the script, using pseudo-code

Script/Pseudocode

The idea for our game was inspired by another Game Called The Stanley Parable, which despite being a 3d game with a navigable environment, bears remarkable similarities to the text adventures of old. The game features a narrator who describes the player’s actions before they happen. However the player is always given multiple options, including doing the opposite of what the narrator describes. The idea is that it challenges the traditional conceptions of a game, where there is a defined win point and when the game tells you to do things, you generally assume that by accomplishing them you will eventually win. However this game has no win state, but merely multiple endings, most of them bad. The same principles were applied to our game, as we decided that the narrator would actually have the worst interests of the player character at heart, and thus by following what is the perceived path to victory, the player will be working directly against his own interests.

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The narrator of Stanley Parable

This approach to the game allowed us to purposely mess with the ideas of encoding/decoding, as we encoded information that was purposely meant to be interpreted the wrong way, as since the player is assuming control of a character with 0 motivation or backstory, so that it is easier to empathize with. Then we provided the player with a path to follow, and given the tactical lack of other leads or details to grab onto, we hope that the player makes incorrect assumptions. This in particular is what makes this type of communication so interesting, since in a traditional piece of writing, the reader has no agency, and can only follow the path the author has designed. Whereas in a text game the roles are changed since while the creator can design and lay out a narrative or path, the agency belongs to the player of the game, who can choose to follow or subvert the game designer’s narrative.

Weekend_is_for_Gaming.py

September 20, 2016 by Iris Fu

Superheros

We, Matt, Maureen and Iris are from Group 3, and our project is a story about superheros. More accurately, the player will first choose their superpower from invisibility, super-strength and flying, and then randomly assigned to one of the three scenarios and trying to save the people as superheros always do. The objective of this game for the player is successfully stops the crime and save all the people and get to an happy ending. However, unlike in movies, superhero doesn’t always success even if they chose all “correct” answers. We’ll set the possibilities and the computer will decide the ending of the story. In my scenario, the player will control the trend of the story by making subtle personal choices but the ultimate challenge will be a moral question that has no right or wrong answer to it. My scenario will be in second person narrative which can furthermore make the player feels and acts in their role as a superhero.

Our work will be presented with a digital form. Like mentioned in the introduction of Literary Gaming: “With a new generation of cross-media writers emerging on the horizon, a greater variety of explorative texts will become available. ” Our game relies on algorithms that enables the player to interact with the text. Their decisions will affect the ending of the game. Such interactions might be hard to present without the help of modern computer science technology. However, our works are subject to constraints as well. We need to set a bunch of rules based on our discussions and write the scenarios accordingly. For example, we even set how many options will we give the player each time. Although our scenarios are not written collaboratively, but for the good of the project we worked like The Unknown mentioned in Rettburg which is built upon respect.

The benefit of team working is that we can divide the work up and thus each of us don’t have to write as much as we have to when working individually. For example, each of us only have one scenario to write but when adding up in total we have three different scenarios. Also different scenarios that has different perspective in them will make the game more playful. However, since we need to write the algorithm to achieve the functionalities and to present the texts as an interactive game, we need to work collaboratively and determine the trend of the stories in advance. If we didn’t agree and shared how we’re going to write our scenarios, it might cause difficulties when writing the computer program later on. Also, each one of us has different schedules so finding a commonly available time to meet might become a challenge. I assume later on coding might be a real challenge. In my experience combining individuals code might cause a great problem of what should a function takes in and what should comes out. If this cannot be handled properly, the program will not run and we’ll spend lots of time changing what we’ve coded.

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We’re thinking about finish writing the scenarios before this Tuesday and starts the coding part later this week.

The Best Text Adventure Game of Them All

September 20, 2016 by Duoyang Huang

Our group project is a maze escape text game based on Python. We have come up with the general ideas and designing of the game. Since the setting of the game is in a maze which contains 10 different rooms, it is almost impossible to explain without a graph.

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The protagonist would wake up in the center room at the start of the game. The player would be provided with some instructions at the beginning of the game, such as “The way to escape is in north”, and “Here is a list of verbals that you might use in this game: …”. On this picture, there are useful items located in different rooms. For example, a key is needed for opening the door, while the key is locked in a locker which requires a code, and the code is written in a book where guarded by a dog. To reach the final destination, the player must utilize all the useful tools which can be found in different rooms. Before entering each room, a description or warning would appear on the screen, like “the room is completely dark” or “there comes the sound of a hungry dog”. There will be names and descriptions for each room on another drawing soon. To increase the difficulty of the game, there will be useless items and extra information as well. They would be shown on a third picture.

We have not yet come up with a complete background story for the game. But the fundamental logic is rather simple: you are trapped in a place with only limited food and you have to escape from there! You will win by escaping the door of the maze and lose by either eaten by the hungry dog or beast, fall into the river, or have no more food to consume. Our next plan is to write all the words that would appear in the user interface and design a block diagram which encodes all different states and changes of states based on user input. With these foundations, I believe we will write the program much faster! We think we should do most of the project together so that all of us three would get some knowledge and practical experience for all aspects of the project – designing, imagination, programming, and logic. However, since each group member is coming from different majors, each can focus more on his/her own favorite parts. Jingya is a CSE major and she likes and is good at programming, so we believe she can write more code in Python. Jake is an ECON major and hes is good at planning and communication, so it is reasonable that he will write more texts for the game. I am an EE major and I have taken some courses in block diagrams and state transitions, so I think I will be able to design the logic of the game. Since we are all from different background, we will enjoy even more benefits of working as a team besides sharing our ideas and reviewing each other’s work. There could also be challenges of working collaboratively, such as insisting on one’s own idea without concession or relying too much on other members.

Actually, before thinking about our own game, we all have played quite a few games on text games online. We got quite a bit inspiration from those games. Additionally, we evaluated each game we played and would try our best to learn from their strengths while avoiding their weaknesses. For example, some game descriptions were too general and we could not figure out which words we could actually use; some games were too easy that we would not want to play again once we figured out the strategies. Therefore, we would provide a list of possible vocabularies, extra information an items, and more than one way to win the game.

It is tempting to aim at fun and excitement as the goal of the game, but we could not forget the fundamental pursuits of literary gaming. According to Astrid Ensslin, literary gaming combines various techniques and game design to “explore the affordances and limitations of rules, challenges, risks, achievement-drivenness, and other ludic structures” (Literary Gaming: Introduction). Also, as we are going to publish our project onto the Internet, we have to be aware of our roles as authors of digital publication. The updating of our work would be like an ongoing conversation with the players and our game would be transparently evaluated by players of different tastes and skills (Bronwen Thomas, Harry Porter Fanfication and Narrative as a Participatory Process). Hence, it is important for us to be aware of our roles and aims of doing the project and not deviating from them.

Finally, having talked so much about text games, what on earth are they? Below is a game called Door that we played one Playfic, which we took some inspiration from.

door

And Then There Was One

September 20, 2016 by Julia

and-then-there-were-none-hb Coming into this assignment, there were numerous games that our group considered as our text adventure game. It all came down to choosing an intriguing game that would be entertaining to play as well as make. At first we were hooked on the idea of a spin off of either Sherlock Holmes or a sitcom. However in the end we decided it would be more enjoyable to create a game that is a little out of the ordinary. We settled on a game that is a combination of Escape the Room and And Then There Were None. It will be a mix between horror and mystery.

While deciding the logistics of the game, such as how many players it would be, what type of setting, and how the game would flow, it was apparent how helpful it was to be working as a team. It was even more helpful that the members of our team come from a range of backgrounds. Yash is a computer science engineering major so he was the obvious leader when it came to the programming of the game. He let us know if our ideas were plausible or not. The coding that comes along with making this game is incredible- almost anything that we imagine is possible to incorporate into it. On the opposite side of the spectrum is my other teammate, Tong. She is a humanities major, whose job is to set up the plot of our computer game. She will think up new puzzles and scenarios that players will have to solve in order to, by the time limit, escape the room! There will be a timer on the page, and the player will only have a certain amount of time, between 1 and 5 minutes probably, to solve the puzzle or characters die one by one. There is going to be a certain amount of characters, and the player dies when they are the one left, so the objective of the game is to solve all of the puzzles in the shortest time possible to escape the room. screen-shot-2016-09-25-at-9-27-59-pm

My skills fall in between that of Yash and Tong when it comes to creating our game. One of my jobs is to give a third party perspective by pointing out pros and cons to the game, and how we can improve it. I will look at the game logistically to see if the timeline of events make sense as well as assist Tong in creating the brainteasers that players have to solve in order to escape the room.

When thinking about this assignment as an approach to communication, there are both strengths and weaknesses. The creation of this computer game shows how effective one-way communication can be, from the creator to the player. However, communication the other way around is not possible. Due to this, the creator cannot receive any feedback from those playing their game, which is negative for both parties involved. My job will be to give third party feedback, so although I will be slightly biased and more knowledgeable about the game than a normal person, it will still be helpful and necessary knowledge.

Best Game EVER seriously, guys!

September 20, 2016 by Sarah Rosecky

My group’s project is a murder-mystery game. So far there are 3 characters that are interactive: the narrator, the player, and the detective. Of course, the murder victim is also a “character,” but he will not be a major part of the game. He was murdered, so he does not need to be an interactive character. The objective of our game is to figure out who murdered the victim. The player is trying to find out the real story, along with getting questioned by the detectives himself. The conflicts that we are building into our game is that the player is actually the one who committed the murder, but the player does not know it. The whole time they think they are innocent or also trying to find out who the murderer was, but it was the player the whole entire time. The player’s storyline begins with waking up and not knowing how he got there. Also the narrative adds specific clues and ideas that serve as alibis for the player. However, if the player decides to let the detective him, he fails, and it is “gameover”.

Rettberg analyzes the relationship between readers and authors in actual printed material. Readers know their favorite authors, but not their favorite editors (Rettberg). With digital editions and the World Wide Web, we can serve in all aspects of the project. We are the authors but also the editors and other important roles that go into publishing a work of art. Rettberg writes that “any time of collective narrative mst be understood not only in terms of a resulting “work,” but also as a performance (Rettberg 197). This project is not only about the final result; it is about the experience off creating the work of art,

There are many benefits and drawbacks of working collaboratively in completing this assignment. Some advantages are that the workload can be evenly distributed. Also, when working with others, there is a type of courtesy to your peers that allows yo to get work done in a timely manner and with good quality. Because others rely on your work for their own grades, it is very important that work is completed on time and with good effort. Another benefit of working with others is that it is very easy to ask or help. If an particular aspect of the assignment is challenging for you, your teammates are there to assist you. An advantage that may be the most beneficial is the creativity that can be conjured up by three people rather than just one. It allows the project more room to be creative and more successful.

A disadvantage to working with others on a project is that sometimes it is not on your own time. Sometimes, for example, I may get a creative revelation and want to change the project, but I cannot just go ahead and make changes. It is not only my project, and I must consult my peers. Also, the other team members may not agree with my opinions about the direction that I see the project going. As a finished project, I helped collaborate with my team to make the best quality that I could, but it is not “mine” and cannot speak about all of the creative decisions.

Each team member is contributing creative and artistic talents, time dedicated to Python, and opinions about the story line. Each member has a few chunks of the story that we all will put together. Also, the work with Python is going to be as a group and will be exclusively collaborative.

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