Designing Outside of the Box by Gamification

Jesse Schell did a talk in Dice 2010 where he talked about unexpected phenomenal of game development opportunities such as Facebook. He used an example of Farmville which has more players than number of twitter accounts. Using of virtual money has expanded social gaming to the extent that players tend to upgrade their own character or their own virtual world by spending hundreds of dollars to feel better. We can see that for many people who are social network savvy, virtual friends have become like real friends or even better. There is a lot of psychological tricks involved with social games in order to making players spend money. 

He also pointed out an interesting though that the virtual-technology-fad during the past 20 years has made us demanding the real world even more so. Creating many reality shows on TV, promoting organic products groceries stores, and even the movie Avatar which in core is about how can we use technology to penetrate back into the reality are examples of that. It seems that there is demand in for authenticity.

He later concluded with his original point in regards to Gamification and designing outside of the box by introducing inspiring ways to Gamify everything. From class curriculum (leveling up rather than gaining grades), to every daily life activity such as shopping (gaining points upon purchases), transportation (using public transportation in peak hours to gain more points), hanging out with friends, and watching TV; Even integrating point system to brushing your teeth every night. 

In my opinion, in order to effectively integrate Gamification and point system with daily life's activities, game designers should be involved; All they have to do is doing the best they always do when they create a video game.

Solving World's Problems with Video Games

Jane McGonigal talk about gaming can make a better world was about solving worlds problem by playing games for 21 billion hrs a day. She presented of an immersed face of a gamer caught on camera right before an epic win and referred it as the real face. In order to solve the world's problems we need that kind of impression. The World of Warcraft provides this virtual world that everything is achievable if you try hard enough. According to her, WOW players have spent 5.93  million years of gameplay on this game. This is equal to the time of human's evolution; Is there something that gamers are learning in games? They seem to be pretty good at it. Based on her talk, interestingly playing MMOs or Social games have evolved us into more collaborative species. So she believes if we can figure out what players learn and how they solve problems while playing video games, we can propose solutions for real world's problems such as world hunger, global warming, oil, etc.


Later she continues saying that WOW has made its players to believe that they can solve the virtual world's problems; but what about the real world? how can we turn the real world into games so people as player can solve the problems? We're using games to get away with dissatisfying real world's problems so let's use the idea of games which encourages us to employing our current experiences, solve problems in order to make the future a better place .

In my opinion, Many problems are solved within video games' virtual scope but what if resemblances of real world's problems could be introduced and implemented in games in order to create an opportunity to have everyone involved in problem-solving and decision-making process which later, it could inspire people first and then alert the authorities. After all, a problem is never fixed until it is eliminated from the root and that is why creating a culture of problem solving among the people is more effective rather than assigning authorities to solve issues.  

here is the link: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/jane_mcgonigal_gaming_can_make_a_better_world.html

How to act as a leader in chaos

When everything's broken, art assets are not in the game, the game is buggy, the camera just decided not to display alphas, your Tech Lead is missing and not answering his phone, and the build is due in 2 hours, how a leader should behave? Is there a place for me as a leader to push them more than this? everyone is stressed at this point so how should I lead my team when they are working hard but it seems impossible to deliver the build on time? 


One the things I learnt in such situation is to act calm. Everyone is already stressed therefore, pushing them to hard worker or asking them to give me a build, is not going to go anywhere at all. I need to act cool and motivate them. In the mean time, I need to use every resource that I can find to help my team. Worst case scenario, I will deliver a build which is playable but lacks certain features. I will NOT fail; I was told to "deliver a build" and I WILL deliver a build.

Did he understand?

During my management experience for my Final Project, as a leader,  I learnt that when I explain my request, my comment, or my feedback to a team member, it is NOT completely conveyed until they can rephrase my message back to me accurately. Having them to take notes is one thing but to ensure that he/she understood what I need from them is another. They must be able to repeat the request for me in their own words and even better, provide examples based on their own interpretation of the message.

A Good Milestone Acceptance (MSA)

During my Final Project, I learnt that a good MSA should reflect equal amount of productive work hours for every single team member. When a producer decides to prioritize game features to form a MSA, the amount of work hours for every team member must be considered. If I do that right, once every task is broken down on Hansoft or MS Project, the working hours for every team member will be pretty equal. This means every one spends the same amount of time on the project during each sprint. efficient time allocation for resources leads to a proper flow of the project and ends in project success.

Indecision

Through my experience as being an Internal Producer for Revenge of the Fat Ninja I learnt that I must make a decision on time no matter what. Making a bad decision is more effective than not making any decision at all. A team looks at its leader as a person who has a say in any situation. This is not to encourage bad decision-making skills; A leader can make the best decision and slowly but surly guide the team to the right direction even though he/she knew the decision was a mistake in the first place. Sometimes, it's about choosing between bad and worse. Therefore, I learnt that I need to make the good or the bad decision once it is needed to maintain the flow of my team. The last thing that a team wants from its leader is creating blockages. After all, removing blockages is the initial purpose of a leader on a team. A pretty funny and cool example of indecision in general is in Simpsons Movie where the guys gets smashed under the dome since he could not make up his mind. Below is the link to that video:


00:41-00:51


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dDSdJ5EOyE

What will I post in this blog

I will be posting everything that I learn through my life experiences mainly pertaining to my game development and game production.