Students design video games for local competition
Two winners from a December indie game competition and their professor share their secrets for building a crowd-favorite video game.
Playing video games helped Steven Ledsworth keep his sanity growing up, and creating them for others is his way of giving back.
The Port Heron senior and his competitor Josh Whaley's games were voted crowd favorites during the ExtravaGAMEza Smash Bros tournament held by by the Game Development and Design Club in December. A second ExtravaGAMEza will be April 24.
The indie game-creation winners said successful game-designing requires creative brainstorming, a timeline and keeping things simple. When Whaley is brainstorming, he said he usually starts with something popular.
"I think about what I want different (in games) or what would make it more entertaining," the Perry senior said.
To aid the brainstorming process, Computer Science Professor Anthony Morelli said he asks his students to do five or six game design challenges a semester. In one challenge, students were tasked with brainstorming a game design idea that only used one switch to interact.
"(Design challenges) help people learn how to design games in their head, which is a hard process," Morelli said. "The idea for the brainstorming part is not to spend a whole lot of time designing, but to come up with a solid idea."
After brainstorming, Morelli said the next step is "implementation," deciding where the graphics and sounds will come from. Designers must also build a timeline for when graphics, music and coding will be completed.
"The best games are the ones that are really thought out and are to the ability of the person (creating) it," Morelli said. "When people over-think their abilities, they get frustrated and don't finish."
Ledsworth and Whaley both developed games in Morelli's classes using Unity, a game-development software downloadable for free. It requires minimal knowledge of coding. Morrelli said after building the gist of what the game will be, test driving it and making sure it is fun to play is the next step.
Morelli said the first time a game is played, it is guaranteed to be flawed. He also said one of the most rewarding things about game creation is watching someone else play the game you created.
"When people take my class, they quickly realize that they can make something they can show their friends and be quickly impressed by it," Morelli said. "(They) like to get that feedback."
