Makes the work feel like it is really flying by! Tuesday’s boxes are lined up, ready to go. Each time I finish marking a paper I record how many hours it took me to mark (my aim is for 1.5 each) and colour in the box. It is rather satisfying.

Coreopsis Major left clues in the form of call numbers at her library, at first on tables, then leading to books at various locations around the library, to take the finder of these clues on a treasure hunt around the library. Eventually, there’s treasure at the end.

(I borrowed these pictures from Coreopsis Major’s page on SFZero, go check out her project!)

Coreopsis was playing SFZero, a kind of Alternate Reality Game. In this game, players create “Characters” who perform all kinds of “tasks” out in the real world in order to obtain completion “scores” when they report back their progress on the website. In many cases, the tasks, submitted by other players to the game, are simple, yet ambiguous, designed to allow players to exercise huge amounts of creativity.

Coreopsis’ task – that spurred her to create her game – was simply “Leave Clues“. Other tasks are as simple and quirky as “Make it Work” (which players have generally interpreted to mean “fix something”) and “Irregular Animal Documentation” (“document an animal you rarely see”).

Tasks, and Characters (based on what tasks they perform most), are divided into “institutional bureaucracies” which embody particular themes of thought-provoking play. “The EquivalenZ project seeks to fulfill the originating fantasies of Virtual Reality”, “The city suffers from a Humanitarian Crisis and appeals for unilateral humanitarian aid, and basic human rights”, ” The Biome Group concerns itself with an exploration of the living structure of the City”, and so on.

I think SFZero as a project is especially cool because it is encouraging players to think about the world around them in new ways, adding playfulness to otherwise ordinary spaces and activities. In the process of re-thinking their everyday lives, SFZero players also impact others around them. Coreopsis Major’s simple treasure hunt creates a sense of mystery, adventure and exploration in the otherwise ordinary library activity of looking up and locating call numbers. I wonder what other ideas we could come up with to create excitement about common library activities, in ways that teach students basic skills at the same time.Coreopsis Major’s simple treasure hunt creates a sense of mystery, adventure and exploration in the otherwise ordinary library activity of locating call numbers.

Doug Easterly, the course coordinator, invited me to say a few words to the students who are just beginning group projects in which they will work together to create their own original flash videogame title.

Doug told the students that he hopes to see projects that reflect an understanding of some of the deeper theory explored by game designers, as well as showing a grasp of the technical skills needed for flash game development. He hopes that some of the resources held at our library will enable them to further explore and critique their design ideas.

For my part, I showed the students Ernest Adam’s “50 Books For Everyone In The Game Industry” list from the IGDA wiki (see the more detailed article here), claiming that most of these recommended titles could be found in the University Library already, either at A&D, or at another branch. I’ve checked in more detail this evening, and I’m pleased to say that we actually have 32 out of the 50 titles, with 8 more on order. I encouraged the students to stop by and visit me in the library, and handed out my business card with links to the 50 Books list, my LibraryThing catalog (which is very DMDN heavy), and my contact details.

After this, I sat down at the back of the class and looked on as the students presented and discussed their second game design project of the course, and Doug and Kah Chan (the course tutor) gave feedback and critiques of their work. I got to see all of the projects (partly because I left my moleskine notebook up at the front of the room, and was too embarrassed to go up and get it again – a good excuse to stay on) and was blown away by the range of interesting creative perspectives these students were applying to their work. Their project was to experiment with the creation of different game environments – most students seemed to use this as an opportunity to continue to use characters they had created with their first project.

A few of the game environments stood out for me in particular:

One student, Melanie, created an endearing environment for what Kah called a “Square Wheel” character – a little creature whose mission was it is to make red angry blocks turn into blue happy blocks by rolling and bumping into them. While it was quite a simple graphical style, I really liked this environment because the general ‘purpose’ or ‘vocation’ of the game was immediately accessible and something that I could get on board with: This happy thing wants to make other things happy- Let’s go!

The game seemed to effortlessly envoke a catchy happy atmosphere, and I could almost imagine it being played to a katamari-eqsue soundtrack. I gave the game to Michelle to play this evening, and she happily cleared all the angry blocks, but seemed quite disappointed when nothing happened at the end.

Another student, Silard, created a great game environment that used an interesting olde tyme film effect (complete with vaudville style piano track). The style of the game – the way it was animated from drawings on paper, and the way the character was animated – also reminded me of “And Yet It Moves” (winner of the 07 Indepenant Games Festival student showcase). Silard’s character travelled through the environment, which evolved around him from black and white sketches to brighter colours and straight line pen drawings as he went.

Tom, who came to visit us at the library at the beginning of the break, talked about how he’d incorporated his interest in the Art Deco style into his game evironments. Of course I have nothing but praise for Tom’s work, as he’d gotten some of his reference material on Art Deco from the library! Tom spoke about how he was inspired by the famous Tim Schaffer game, Grim Fandango which also has an Art Deco feel to it. Unfortunately though, anyone who doesn’t hear this from him is probably going to think he’s been inspired instead by Ken Levine’s Bioshock, instead, which – released just this month – prominently features Art Deco architecture. Bioshock is certainly not a bad game to be associated with, though! Doug pointed out how Tom’s use of Art Deco patterns helped to somewhat differentiate between the different spaces in which his character appeared, and encouraged students to think about how their characters would appear against various backgrounds.

The student’s final projects, a complete flash game (including packaging!), will be due on the October 10. I really hope they do well, and I’m looking forward to playing their games.