Devlog 10

This week (October 24 and 26), we began work on our next game project for the class based on BattleBattle!. My group chose to create a game about a group of people (the players) raiding a Waffle House and one employee trying to fend them all off. We created multiple characters for players to choose from, including a drunkard, Shaquille O'Neal, and Karen, and gave them unique attributes to set them apart from the others. In Chapter 11 of Players Making Decisions, Zach Hiwiller discusses randomness and compares its use in game design to how a chef uses salt when preparing dishes. In itself, it is neither good nor bad; however, the quantity of it can affect how the result is perceived. Hiwiller also comments on the common failures that occur in games that are completely luck-based or completely skill-based and discusses measures like drafting that can be used to mitigate randomness. In its current state, our game is mostly luck-based, but the use of a waffle to boost a player's roll adds an element of skill to the game. Additionally, in Chapter 7 of Games, Design and Play, Macklin and Sharp discuss three kinds of game design documentation: game design documents, schematics, and tracking spreadsheets, all of which are interrelated and play important roles in the iterative game design process. The design document contains the concepts, values, and description of the game; schematics are maps or storyboards that help to make elements tangible for prototyping; and the tracking spreadsheet includes a task list in order to keep track of everything that has been done and needs to be done during the game design process. While we have begun work on a sheet of instructions, it is not the same as any of these three documents; however, the knowledge of how to use these will be helpful for future game development.