The PrOCESS
Reflecting on the process for designing this assignment's game mechanics, it abundantly obvious that I do my best thinking in pencil. Sketching ideas, crossing some out, circling others-- the iterative nature of the process and the transient nature of what I thought I wanted to do is obvious, looking at the scratch paper on my clipboard.
Having a significant amount more narrative design experience that I once had, starting this project with Freytag's Pyrmid made perfect sense. It was much easier to build game mechanics around a solid storyline. In that sense, I'd have to say that using Freytag as a quick foundation to make sure a narrative could be spun up into a game is something I'd absolutely do again.
If I had opportunity to design a digital game again, I'd make sure I had a better understanding of what the game engine was capable of before getting started. Learning Construct3 was humbling; although it's simple to use, its capability far surpassed the needs of this project. With so many fun choices, it was hard not to build the game to fit the mechanics! Still, it's much easier to make a plan when you have a sense of what's possible, and I'll admit I enjoyed teaching hamburgers to levitate.
The design process was different for this game in that it felt very summative-- like a culmination of everything we've worked toward this semester. Narrative structure and decision-making were still key facets, but not the only needs to focus on. The social mechanics of gameplay were important to our analog games, but less so for this digital game. Almost every skill we added in this class came to fruition with this project.
The Product
Digital Game Brief
Title: Yes, Chef!
Subject Area: Customer Service knowledge of CompanyName meal types (low/moderate carb; low sodium; etc.)
Learning Domains: Declarative and Conceptual knowledge
Basic Core Loops: the core loops for Yes, Chef! are simple:
Level One: recognize the meal type and label it.
Level Two: recognize the meal type and build it.
Level Three: recognize meal types, classify them, and design a menu.
Mager Learning Objectives
Learning Objective 1: After playing Yes, Chef! the player will correctly identify meal types.
Learning Objective 2: After playing Yes, Chef! the player will correctly build meal types.
Learning Objective 3: After playing Yes, Chef! the player will synthesize meal types to create a new menu.
Assessment, Scoring and Reward
Scoring for Level One is simple and works like this:
• Labeling a meal correctly earns +$10.
• Labeling a meal incorrectly earns -$5.
• Not labeling a meal or burning a meal unnecessarily earns -$10.
As you can see, the overall reward system is points based, using “dollars" as the form of currency the points take. The game is also difficulty leveled, and on completion of a game level, the player moves up to a more difficult challenge. Ideally, the game would mandate the player earn a minimum of 80% of the dollars available to be earned on any level as a measure of correctness, although the learning objectives don’t stipulate that specifically, and the game mechanics haven’t been built to accommodate that. (But I'll get the developer on that in a future release!)
Game Play
Companyname, a high-end meal service delivery company that caters to customers with particular dietary needs and good taste. You’re working to make their cranky head chef happy and earn promotions to rise through the ranks. Level One sees you working in the kitchen to get meals labeled as they come off the conveyor belt line. Companyname is counting on you to check the macros and classify which meals are low carb and which are diabetic friendly. Shoot each meal with the right label and avoid meals that aren’t in one of those two categories! Earn your promotion and move up to sous chef. Level Two has you choosing from a variety of proteins and sides to build meals that match the needed macros. A cheeseburger and fries taste great, but you can’t use them together to build a dairy-free meal! Cook up a week’s worth of meals and move up to Level Three as a junior chef. Can you work with companyname’s head chef to build a weekly menu of 10 meals across the necessary protein types, flavor profiles, and dietary types? If you can, congratulations! You’re companyname’s newest head chef!
Decision Types
Decision types are largely trade-off. The player is given two or more options, each with its own unique benefits and drawbacks compared to the other available options. The player could decide to tag a meal even if they're not sure if it's low carb or diabetic friendly; because not labeling a meal or burning the meal will cost the player more points than making an incorrect choice, they may be more likely to make a guess than not.
Assets
I was also really proud of figuring out how to add frames of animation to these meal tray sprites for state changes! Now, when the player tags a meal, the meal changes state. Coming down the conveyor belt, the meal tray just has macros. When the player tags a meal, the film and label are added. If the meal was tagged correctly, it moves to the box. If the meal was tagged incorrectly, the yellow triangle is added too. Both of those state changes are immediate feedback for the player. I'm still working to implement instance variables to reflect those changes in the scoring system, but I'm having fun with it. (Pleasurable frustration, anyone?!)
Feedback
Feedback on my game design was helpful. I retooled some ideas about how to address decision types and how to approach incorporating higher order thinking skills. That feels like the challenge of every game designer; it's always a challenge for me.
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