Reading 04: Analysis

 Annotated Bibliography #2

Reading 1: Ultimate game design, building game worlds. 

 

Meigs, T. (2003) Ultimate Game Design : Building Game Worlds. : McGraw-Hill/Osborne. 

In this book Meigs explains in detail the important elements needed to bring a game world to life. 

In chapter 1 on page 5, Architecure for Game levels. Meigs talks about when you are building up your game world it is important to choose carefully which elements to add, for example if you wanted to use a really cool looking prefab but it would bring down the players game performance, it would not be worth it as the player would loose interest, where if you were to use a less demaning building, it would be a worthy trade off as you are increasing the performance of the players game world. 

Reading 2: Why do you playWorld of Warcraft? An in-depth exploration of self-reported motivations to play online and in-game behaviours in the virtual world of Azeroth

Billieux, J. et al. (2013) ‘Why do you play World of Warcraft? An in-depth exploration of self-reported motivations to play online and in-game behaviours in the virtual world of Azeroth’, Computers in Human Behavior, 29(1), pp. 103–109. doi: 10.1016/j.chb.2012.07.021.

 This article was all about the game world of Azeroth in World of Warcraft. This is one of the most detailed and massive game worlds out there. This genre of game is called an MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing game). Every day in the game world of Azeroth, thousands of induviuals play together in a seamlessly open world. Unlike other games the world of WoW never sleeps, when the player logs out of the game the world will not stop and wait for them to come back but the world will continue to grow and develope as other players play gain progress throughout the game world. 

Here is the progress overview of a players character. WoW has a very in depth game world that has thousands of hours of gameplay within it. 

Another reason players keep playing the game is so they can contine to level up their in game character which will benefit them to have an advantage over less expierenced players within the game world of WoW.

World of Warcraft Character Progress Menu

Reading 3:  Myst and Riven: The World of the D'ni

Wolf, M. 2011, Myst and Riven: The World of the D'ni, University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor.

 In this reading the authour Mark J.P Wolf goes in depth about the world in the game Myst, Wolf was a big fan of the game and it inspiered him to write this book about it. 

Myst was a game all about puzzle solving and adventure by progressing through an almost seamless world where you could take different routes through the world and discover new places of interest. The controller the player used in this game was the mouse cursor and they would use it to interact with the 3D world around them, and for a game made in 1993, its very impressive. 

This game world has a purpose and the world of myst is all about the story of a father and his two sons, they are part of the D'ni which is a culture in the world of Myst, they are masters of writing and have obtained the ability to create "linking books" which allows the reader to "link" (travel) to the place in the book.  

In this game they used 3D rendered illustrations which really helped the game for its time allowing the game to look a lot better while still keeping good preformance for the user.

 

Reading 4: Horizons Already Here: Video Games and Landscape

Murray, S. (2020) Horizons Already here: Video Games and Landscape. Art Journal. 79 (2), pp. 42-49. 

 This book by the authour Soraya Murray foucuses on the development of game worlds over time. At the start she talks about one of the first ever computer games called Colossal Cave Adventure which was a game about questions and answers. 

You may not think it but Colossal Cave Adventure had its own game world even though it was just built up through text, it took the player some initive and imagination to create their own game world as they played along, its interesting to think that every player would see a different game world when they thought of Colossal Cave but yet it would still contain the same elements and the same story.

Reading 5: Of Particle Systems and Picturesque Ontologies: Landscape, Nature, and Realism in Video Games

Shinkle, E. (2020) Of Particle Systems and Picturesque Ontologies: Landscape, Nature, and Realism in Video Games. Art Journal. 79 (2), pp. 59-67. 

 In this reading the authour talked about the importance of realism in games. When games first came about they were all mostly 2D platform games with sidescrolling animations, but as the world continued to develop and technology kept getting better, the demand for realism within a game world was a hot topic. Visual realism was the driving force for the development of gaming hardware. 

Now at the stage the gaming hardware is at, it is easy for a triple A company like Ubisoft to be able to create a vast in depth world within a matter of weeks. 

Microsoft Flight Simulator (1982)

Microsoft Flight Simulator (2020)

 

Reading 6: Fundamentals of Game Design

Ernest, A. (2009) Fundamentals of Game Design. New Riders. 79 (2), pp. 106-159.

 This book contained a full chapter explaing all about game world's and why they exsist, and how not every game contains a game world as it may be set in a real place. One great example that stuck with me after reading this chapter is that when you are playing a game of chess there is only a hint of the game wolrd. The names of the pieces in chess hint that there is a medival background but we get no other context so its hard to build the world around that but in a game like Stratego you get the real sense of the game world as it is layed out on the board game in front of you and the the pieces of the game are illustrated with army peronsel so you get a real sense of the world you are playing the game in.

Reading 7: The Art of Game World Maps

Nathan Cheever. (2018) The Art of Game World Maps. pp. 1-12.

In this article Nathan Cheever the authour talks about the importance of game designs and how important small details are in every game wolrd. When nathan is creating a game world he starts by planning the layout by plotting down the most important landmarks and then he builds the roads around them that then connects them all together and allows the player to travel freely from one destination to another.

 

Reading 8: Level Design vs. Enviroment Design

Josh Bycer. (2018) Level Design Vs. Environment Design. Medium. pp. 1-4.

In this article Bryce talks about the difference when it comes to Level Design and Enviroment design, which are two very important elements when it comes to a game world. Enviromental design is all about the aesthetics and architecture of the game world. Level design is the creation of lore for the game world so the in game character has a purpose and the player has a goal to reach or a challenge to over come.

 

 

Reading 9: Rambunctious Games: A Manifesto for Environmental Game Design.

Chang, A.Y. (2020) Rambunctious Games: A Manifesto for Environmental Game Design. Art Journal. 79 (2), pp. 68-75.

In this reading the authout Alenda Y. Chang talked about the importance of game worlds and how they are the very foundations of the game itself and without a game world, there would be no game. Alenda also thinks that game worlds should have some sort of eductational benefit tied into it so that the player may learn something new from playing the game. Alenda also states the importance of surpise within a game, even though the player has never played the game they may have a general idea where the plot or story will be taken next, so as a game developer if you could find a way to drop small surpises along the way for the player it could benefit their expierence immensly

 

 

Reading 10: Cartography in the Metaverse: The Power of Mapping in Video Games

Enrique Parra y Manuel Saga. (2016) Cartography in the Metaverse: The Power of Mapping in Video Games. pp. 1-5. 

 

 In this article Enrique talks about the importance of mapping within a video game world and how it can be an important refrence point for the player. Even some games play from a map view like Civilization for example. So technially in Civilization the game world is the Map. It is a geograpical view of the whole world and allows player to obtain a lot of information about the world all at once, it shows all points of interest and all available resources within the game world.

The most common use for the map is a secondary tool to assist players when they start a new game and are dropped into a huge unknown world. In a game like Skyrim (Example map below) the world is huge and the player could wander around for hours and not follow the main quest line, where with the assistince of the world map the player can see their objectives in a certain area and they can head towards it knowing exactly where they need to go.