Designing Play
The process of design is pretty straight forward in theory. You get a problem, evaluate solutions, propose solutions and finally refine. Thats just about it. But as a designer I know that is just an over simplification of the process and it is much more involved and exhausting than one sentence can express.
For this project I began idea generation for a game. I referred to previous game sI had played in the past both digital and analog and jotted down some of the things that made the games fun. I also took one of my favorite games for a spin with people that had never played it before to see if they found the same elements enjoyable. Testing and observing in game design is key, because a perfect game on paper doesn't mean that it was designed well for interaction.
We collaborated and discussed ideas and and executions and arrived on a game that involved a certain amount of physicality and dexterity. Once the gameplay had been refined and defined we moved onto the design of the game elements. For us those included a set of cards with illustrated instructions and a points value indicated. The traditional design process of color, text and layout when relatively quickly.
The most time consuming was the illustration and I didn't envy ours. Jessie did a great job given the time frame and I am no master when it comes to drawing hands. Card layout was challenging the original attempt was to print at standard 2.5" x 3.5" but as I was doing the layout I made the decision to increase the size to 3.25" x 4.25" to increase legibility of the graphics.
Overall I'm pretty excited to see and play the final outcome this morning, even if I doubt I'll be any good at playing the game LOL.