notes from the final lecture

Hey guys,

I am posting this in the middle of a pile of work so I'm going to make this quick, but you have all of Thanksgiving week to work on this so I'm not too worried.

For next class, please bring your latest version of your game and your architectural space so we can discuss them. I am going to talk to Rafael about whether or not he will be coming in to speak.

Here is the homework from the previous lecture:

Journal prompt: Site-specific resistance: Create a simple game designed to be played in a certain physical context, such as a landmark, Metro car (no, the Rhode Island Challenge doesn't count), urban space, Starbuck's, etc. The game should both use elements of being in that space as part of the game (ex. people in the location), and change their contexts so they can become part of the game without having players behave too outlandishly (i.e. In a vampire game, talking to someone can equal "sucking blood", and that could ultimately lead to points.) Technology may or may not be integrated in some way. The game should be something that can be played without others knowing you are playing a game (don't get arrested). Play the game and write about it, discussing how elements of that place that you have chosen are meaningfully integrated into the game and how any technology that you have chosen to integrate is meaningful and assists or tracks progress.

Here are concepts from the lecture:

1. Augmented reality - a term in computer research that refers to a combination of real and virtual world data.

2. Augmented reality recalls the Persuasive Technology Tools of self-monitoring and surveillance.

3. Pervasive games - Games where players' real world actions take on virtual world meanings through the player's interactions with mobile technologies.

4. Alternate reality games - Games which use the real world as a medium for delivering game content through websites, e-mail, phone calls, or actual gatherings. They put players into real-world stories that are affected by their input.

5. These technologies are informing the ways the mobile technologies are used within real architecture to assist people using those buildings. An example of this is the use of Nintendo DS's to get MLB scores within Seattle's Safeco Field.

That's it! Enjoy. E-mail me with any questions.

whoops!

Hey guys,

Sorry I forgot to get last week's lecture notes up...it's the fallout from last week's "hell week."

Here's your homework for last class...I don't think there will be homework for this class so you can turn it in next week.

Journal prompt: Changing the world with conceptual design: Choose an idea that you would like to inform or persuade others about. It can be political, religious, social, or fun (but please be respectful of others opinions and non-degrading) and create a concept for a game that would help you achieve your goals. You can even choose a specific candidate, event, or product to endorse as well. Begin by describing your core concept and the set of rules governing the game. How do you win the game or can you win? What is the incentive for playing? Likewise, imagine and describe a building that could inform or persuade someone about the same idea. How do the spaces in the building help inform your occupant of your idea. Please include diagrams.

Here are some of the ideas from the class:

1. Metagame - The experience of a game in the outside world

2. Metagame has 3 parts: what the player brings to the game, the effect that the game has on the player during the game, and what the player takes away from the game.

3. Procedural rhetoric - the unique ability of a video game, computer program, or any interactive media to persuade or discuss ideas through participation in cause and effect relationships and procedures.

4. Many games use procedural rhetoric to discuss political, commercial, or academic ideas.

5. Games can allow us to explore historic events or places.

6. Architecture is seen by many as a built symbol or space that is capable of using rhetoric in the same way that a game can, through it's system of formal and spatial rules.

That's all you really need to know. There are a lot of historic notes for this lecture but those are not as important. I actually wrote most of this lecture out of my thesis background materials so don't worry too much about it.

The laaaaaaaaaate notes from the 10-30 lecture

Hey guys,

Sorry for the extremely late post, I am in the middle of the week from hell. I also got a puppy!

Let the cuteness consume you!

Okay, so here's the stuff you need for the past week's lecture:

Journal prompt: Spatial Storytelling: Find a short story or write one on your own. Describe the plot and describe what kind of game and space it could make. For the game, give a brief description of what kinds of mechanics could be implemented to be meaningful to the narrative. For the space, design it as though it had to match the events or emotional tone of your story. What kind of spaces can you create to guide an occupant through the narrative? How could your game design and your spatial design work together to create your story?

Since I am essentially writing this the day before it's due, you can have until Sunday to send it to me, but feel free to send it earlier if you can.

Here are the concepts from this lecture:

1. Narrative is another generator for either a game design or spatial design.

2. Mechanic vs. Motif - The idea that a game can be designed starting from either the game's core mechanic; with a narrative created for presentation purposes; or the narrative and expressive parts of a game; with mechanics designed to enhance the story.

3. Games designed with story first include games from the Final Fantasy series. Frank Lloyd Wright builds some houses beginning with narrative, such as how he built Fallingwater based on the client's family stories about the site.

4. Narrative space - A space that can "shape a narrative frame and experience." There are four types of narrative space:

• Evocative - Evokes preexisting narrative associations - using familiar imagery and settings
• Staging - Creating a space on which events are enacted - room type created for specific story events or encounters
• Embedded - Placing narrative within the scene - game world becomes an information space, or "memory palace." Parts of the space tell the story of what happened there.
• Providing resources - Putting the right pieces in place for emergent narrative

5. The Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C. utilizes these types of narrative space within a piece of architecture.

6. Narrative descriptors - Any component of a game that participates in a game's "system of representation", such as instructional text, in-game cinematics, interface elements, game objects, and other visual or audio elements.

7. Rules must match the story so they can both contribute to meaningful play.

8. There are two types of narrative:

• Embedded narrative - A pre-written story that is programmatically shown to a player or occupant within a narrative space.
• Emergent narrative - The narrative that comes from the player's interaction with a game. This is similar to thinking of a game as a book that is being written while the player plays, with the player's actions carrying out the action scenes and other parts of the story that they have control over.

9. In architecture, emergent narrative is the story of a space and how people move through them. It can also be the story of what people experience in the space based on their own personalities and prior experiences.

10. Reward of exposition - Narrative that is used as a reward or rest from intense action.

11. The hero myth is a precident for how materiality is used to tell a story. At the beginning of a story, the materiality is natural and perceived as "safe." As the hero moves to more and more dangerous territories, the materiality steadily becomes more bleak and unnatural, eventually becoming the materiality of "evil", with things such as fire, brimstone, and machines. This is embodied in stories such as The Lord of the Rings, and video games such as The Legend of Zelda, and even in Super Mario Bros. within each world.

12. The quality of a space can establish mood when used in a narrative space. Using the qualities of light, shadow, prospect and refuge, or size of spaces can set a safe or happy tone or a dark and unsafe tone based on how the qualities of these spaces are articulated.