Devlog Journal 3

This week's lesson focused on using the six elements to modify a pre-existing game. This game was a bit confusing for me and my group at first as the instructions were quite a bit and we did miss s few things to read up on. We did eventually get the hang of it as we played more and more. As stated in Chapter 2 "One of the first things we do when learning a new field is to become familiar with the tools of the trade" and we did exactly that. Took trial and error but, we figured it out in the end. In Chapter 3 it says "Videogames are usually thought of in terms of genre…" and we delved into that with this game. When it came down to playing it we realized it's a strategy game but you can turn it into however genre you want by modifying the six elements like playspace. We decided to add a plus one and minus one to the games mechanic. This would add more incentive for people to get further in the game and get more competitive. We even decided to take out the river as it would make it a little too easy for the players to finish. You need a steady and consistent and not something that would make you run laps around too much. In Chapter 4 it is stated "Game designers, particularly videogame designers, need to understand a little but about cognition…" which basically means how does the person unknown to the game understand the game as an outsider. You need to set rules that are easy to understand for someone unbeknownst to the game. For example the biggest I personally would change with the game played in class was the instructions. Those instructions were a little bit of a handful. They definitely needed modifications to simplify the rules. We did take 3 games to fully understand the game as the instructions were quite complex. Complexity is always okay but you must always remember the outsider who is coming in blank.