A game design workshop to support the elaboration of game ideas

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A game design workshop to
support the elaboration of
game ideas
Christos Sintoris, N. Yiannoutsou, N. Avouris
Human-Computer Interaction Group
University of Patras
HCI International – Distributed, Ambient and Pervasive Interactions
Heraklion, Greece, June 22-27 2014

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Location-based mobile games
Location-based mobile games
...are games that are facilitated by mobile
devices in such a way that the game activity
evolves according to player's location
the place often immerses the players in a
situated context where details of history,
culture and the available physical affordances
provide opportunities and influence the
choice of actions and interactions

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Location-based mobile games
Play is affected by the players' location
Location-specific contextual information is
embedded in the play
Ivisible City Benaki MS MuseumScrabble CityScrabble

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How can we support
the design of such
games?

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Game design workshops
They are focused, low cost activities
that may involve many participants.
They produce rich data, easy to
study.
They can be used for generating
design ideas, design patterns
and study the design process

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The Pompeii game design activity (1/3)
Workshop Framework:
Modalities for interacting with the real world
Game mechanics as “actions, behaviors and
control mechanisms” within a given game
context”
The learning dimension of acting in an
information-rich space
The role of technology in mediating the
cultural experience

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Single Task workshop: to design of a
location-based game for a specific site
The Pompeii game design activity (2/3)
The task is to design a game for the
archaeological site of Pompeii, given
design material and a design
framework
Objective is to observe design activity
of different design groups and deduce
common design patterns for this class
of games

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The Pompeii game design activity (3/3)

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Workshop material
Map Interesting places
WorksheetConcept cards

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Workshop material
Map Interesting places
WorksheetConcept cards

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Game design events
32 game designs were produced in 6
workshops in 4 different countries
2013 Summer School
on Technologies for
Cultural Heritage
Zakynthos, GR

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Game design events
Erasmus IP on
cultural heritage
management,
Pecs, HU, 2013

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Game design events
Game-based
Learning Summer
School in Autrans,
FR, 2011

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Games: the titles

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An example: “Pompeii Total War”
●The aim: Conquer and protect flag
of/from every team (other players).
Your devices assist you: You can see
buildings and NPCs through it. It also
features a dynamic map of your
camp flags and conquered flags.
NPCs will give you hints and help you
to solve puzzles and enigmas through
a dialogue interface.

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●The rules.
–You must protect and conquer flags by
answering puzzles:a foreign flag can be
captured when resolving the puzzle that
an NPC guard gave to the team.
–You can recapture your own captured
flags by answering a new enigma to the
NPC guardian - you can recapture a lost
flag by answering again to the guard
(another enigma of course).
–You have 2 hours for the contest.
An example: “Pompeii Total War”

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An example: “Pompeii Total War”
Game mechanics.
RTS capture the flags - several located enigmas -
time challenge (capture the most flags) -
collaborative resolution (ubiquitous problems for
teams) - building strategies with several roles in
the team - communication with legendary known
NPCs (gods, generals, famous). Some enigmas: on
the same flags there are several possible enigmas.
They are asked in a progressive way: the easier
first, the harder last. Puzzle: the mosaic with
Alexander and find the place where the mosaic is.

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●Use of means and tools.
Tablets/smartphones with GPS
(location), camera (augmented
reality) dynamic map of Pompeii
with list of team flags (conquered)
network connection to a ?? (–
unintelligible) (Real time changes on
the world).
An example: “Pompeii Total War”

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A non playing character asks the players to
find a picture in the pool. But to see the
picture, the pool must be full. So they have to
split into 2 groups. One must stay near the
pool, the other has to find the valve. Once the
valve is found, they open it and tell the others
to look at the pool.
Then all players have to go back to the NPC
and explain who is on the pic and his role in
mythology (Dionysos, god of wine). If they are
wrong, the NPC tells them, but they loose the
flag.
An example: “Pompeii Total War”

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Player behaviour and aesthetic
result:
Competition and pressure -
discovery of amazing places-people
(NPCs) - self efficacy improvement
when a cooperative problem is
solved - fun! - Learning a lot about
past Pompeii.
An example: “Pompeii Total War”

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Open Design Patterns
Similar to: Pervasive Games Design
Patterns Davidsson, Peitz, & Björk,
2004, Björk &Peitz, 2007
Game Ontology Project (Hochhalter,
Lichti, & Zagal, 2005)

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Deriving design patterns
By applying methods from
content analysis and
grounded theory we
identified codes in the design
documents and used these
codes to extract what
patterns and strategies the
designers followed

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Design Patterns
http://hci.ece.upatras.gr/l-bags/ (soon in English)

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Design patterns graph
The cooperation and competition between players/groups is
adjusted by controlling information provided to them.
Information Awareness regulates competition. In a same-
place game, there is the possibility of information because
the players are close (e.g. see and hear the opponent ) .
Information can flow accidentally (eg a sound from the
device other players may reveal some information ) .
Wrong information may be deliberately delivered (see
patterns bluff, sabotage).
If the mobile devices are personal telephones of players,
they can be used as phones for coordination and
information exchange, bypassing or expanding information
channels of the game.
Information awareness concerns management of the
information that is known to the players, it may concern
actions of other players or teams or information about them
(such as their score, position in space, etc.). One example is
the fog of war , where the actions of the opponent is hiding
behind a veil .
Can be combined with diversification of players (two players
Information awareness
Cooperation
Competition
Control
Players diversificationFog of war
sabotage
bluffing
Co-located players

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Experimental use of design patterns

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Using design patterns
- Using it as a checklist
- Getting new ideas
- Refining an initial idea
- Checking old solutions to
new problems
- Relating structure of the
game to game elements

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The Open Design Patterns Repository
An open repository of
design knowledge for
location-based games
hci.ece.upatras.gr/pompeii
game/
Sintoris et al. (2014) on Design patterns

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Thank you
A game design workshop to
support the elaboration of game
ideas
Christos Sintoris, N. Yiannoutsou, N. Avouris
Human-Computer Interaction Group, University of Patras
HCI International – Distributed, Ambient and Pervasive Interactions
Heraklion, Greece, June 22-27 2014