Game Studies - Task 1

Week 1- Week

Guan Wee Lun/0364012
Game Studies/Bachelor of Design in Creative Media

Task 1

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Lectures

• The module is more focused on functional more then design
• Learning to User experience transforming into game component
• REvisit old game
• Keep it simple without any complicated rules

Alpha Game

• Two set of user experience that are from group and class

Principles of Game Design

What is Game Design?

• Game is to get user happy
• Combine creativity, technical skills, and user psychology of creating experiences

Core Principles

• Player experience
• Emotion
• Excel oneself : Suffering, challenge, completion
• 
  
• User-Centered Design
• Flow state
• A psychology state
• Optimize balance of challenge and skill
• Gameplay Mechanic
• Primary Mechanics
• Core action players perform in the game
• Secondary Mechanics
• Additional enriching gameplay feature
• Feedback loops
• positive and negative reinforcement systems
• Storytelling in Games
• Player Agency
• Enviromental Storytelling
• Narrative Arcs
• Balance and Challenge
• Difficulty Curve
• Kick start
• Skill vs luck 
• Player Progression

How? enhance gameplay

• Feedback and interaction
• Playtesting
• Feedback loops
• Fine-tuning the experience
• Immersion and Worldbuilding

Week 2

Balancing fun and education elements (boring part) in game design

• Fun
• When game offer engaging mechanics, rewarding challenges that make user feel emotionally satisfying
• Come from player
• Player choice
• Competition
• Discovery
• achievement
• Education
• Educational components range from simple knowledge to complex problem solving
• Involve teaching concepts, improving skills, enhancing understanding

Goals: Make learning feel natural and rewarding without sacrificing fun

Layered learning: layering gaming experience

Problem solving in game

Problem solving to unlock level

Educational content is seamlessly integrated into the mechanics of trading, managing resources, and building infrastructure, which requires strategic thinking and decision-making

Narratives as reinforcements

Create a narrative that reinforces educational objectives while remaining engaging to ensure story provides emotional stakes and relevance to the educational content

Gameplay mechanic

avoid making the educational content too overt or forced, focus on fun mechanic that naturally integreate learning

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Project Progress

Requirements 

• Make our own table-top game, it can be card game or board game: 
• Can get reference from existing board game or from own idea Game created need to be fun and interesting Play time cannot be too long Suitable to play during party Game must fulfill at least one of the playful experiences

Week 2

• Brainstormed concepts inspired by Werewolf, adapting it to an office world setting to make it relatable and humorous.

• Identified potential villain roles (e.g., “The Manager,” “The HR Spy,” “The Lazy Employee”) and basic employee roles (the innocent players).

• Studied Werewolf mechanics to extract usable systems — voting, bluffing, elimination rounds, and hidden roles.

• Conducted research on balancing mechanics for multiple villains and maintaining fairness.

• Began outlining role abilities, round phases, and win conditions.

Week 3/Week 4

• Get playtest within the original werewolf game
• We have gather a few of friend to play with us and getting to have a close look on how this game play
• what is good and what is bad
• what role are the most fun to play
•  what role are the most difficult
• what issue is needed to notice
• From this game, we have gather some player experience based on our own observation, in this game there will be some of the character
• Silence Player
• Bluffing Player
• The leader

• We observe about the basic rules of it
• The minimum number of player and roles needed in a game
• For example:6 players
  -1 werewolf
  -1 seer
  -1 priest
  -3 villagers
• Further understanding the game mechanics

• Phase A: Night (The Action Phase)

  During the Night, all players close their eyes. The Moderator (an impartial referee) wakes up specific roles silently to perform actions.

  • Werewolves: Wake up together, silently agree on a victim, and signal the Moderator to "kill" them.

  • Special Roles (e.g., Seer, Doctor): Wake up individually to gather information (Seer checks a player's alignment) or protect players (Doctor saves a player from death).

  Phase B: Day (The Social Phase)

  During the Day, everyone opens their eyes.

  1. Revelation: The Moderator announces who died during the night (if anyone). That player is eliminated and leaves the game immediately (usually without revealing their role, though rules vary).

  2. Discussion: The remaining players discuss, accuse, and bluff. The Villagers try to deduce who the Werewolves are based on voting patterns, behavior, and social reads. The Werewolves try to blend in and mislead the Villagers.

  3. Voting & Elimination: The players vote on who to "lynch" (eliminate). The player with the majority of votes is removed from the game.

  Victory Conditions

• Villagers Win: If they successfully identify and eliminate all Werewolves.

• Werewolves Win: If they systematically kill enough Villagers so that the Werewolf count equals or exceeds the Villager count (parity).

Week 5

• Finalized the official game name — Corporate Conspiracy.

Figure 1.1 Corporate Conspiracy

• Developed all characters, roles, and gameplay scenarios inspired by Werewolf but adapted into a corporate story setting.

• A total of 12 characters + 1 moderator were created.

• Basic version includes 3 core roles + 1 moderator, while extended versions add advanced and neutral roles for complex gameplay.

• Created a 6-scenario gameplay sheet to manage roles and difficulty progression.

Week 6 Proposal Presentation

Corporate Conspiracy: A Social Deduction Card Game

Game Studies Group 04 - Proposal by DraftLeap

Game Concept: Corporate Conspiracy is a social deduction card game of power, paranoia, and gaslighting within a workplace environment, inspired by Werewolf and Among Us. It reimagines the suspenseful mechanics of those games by replacing a fantasy village with a modern office. The core theme is "Trust No One in the Office".

Gameplay Basics:

• Players/Time/Age: 6–16 players (up to 25 players are listed in the audience profile), 25–45 minutes playtime, Age 14+ (Age Rating 13+ is also listed).

• Goal of Employees: Identify and fire all secret Corporate Spies before the Spies outnumber them.

• Goal of Corporate Spies: Secretly sabotage the company by targeting one player each night and outnumbering the loyal Employees.

• Game Cycle: The game follows a rhythm of discussion by Monday (Day Phase), where players debate and vote to fire a suspect, and deception by Friday (Night Phase), where Corporate Spies sabotage and special roles act. The first Friday night is a teaching round with no one fired.

• Key Innovation: Scenarios:
• The game features six unique scenarios that introduce new roles, abilities, and mechanics to increase replayability and offer progressive learning.

• Role Transformations: Werewolves become Corporate Spies, Villagers become Employees/Interns, the Seer becomes the HR Manager (audits a player's file), and the Protector becomes IT Support (safeguarding an account).

• Target Audience: Primary audiences include corporate offices and student groups for team-building.

• Example Roles: Corporate Spy, HR Manager, IT Support, Intern/Employee, Corrupt CEO, Compliance Officer, and Union Leader.

Week 7/Week 8/Week 9

Playtest 1