Week 8 Reading & Writing

And so, the time to reflect and look back is here... And honestly, I don't remember most of the things I read throughout the last 7 weeks. All I know is that some articles were old, some mentioned Mario 64 and others talked about board games.

Looking at it, week by week:

Week 1:

"Sometimes, you read an article, you follow the sentences with your eyes, letting the words sink into your brain... and then you realize that someone is just so terrible at writing that reading is impossible. Greg Costikyan is one of those people. In the article "Don't be a Vidiot", which is also his speech from 1998 game conference, he talks about games so old that most students won't even recognize them."

So this was the first reading homework we had to do, and I can still say that the first article did an amazing job at making me hate the reading Tuesdays. I still have nightmares. The other articles... they were alright, but nothing really sparked my attention. I read them, because I had to.

Week 2: 

"Today, I have read the Formal Abstract Design Tools article by Dough Church. It talks about "modern games"(article from 1999, so its definition of "modern" is a little bit outdated.)"

Week two was another out-dated article and it was another one that I didn't enjoy. I would have loved to read about something newer, something that I can relate to, but instead, it was about Mario 64, which came out in the year I was born...

Week 3:

MDA stands for "Mechanics", "Dynamics" and "Aesthetics", and are extremely important when designing a game, they are essentially the aspects that make the game "fun".

Week three was about MDA, and that was actually somehow decent and I feel like I learned something... but I can't quite pinpoint what...

Week 4: 

"I have read the article Design Considerations by Greg Aleknevicus, and it seems to be mostly talking about actual board games and something that has a box, and within the box, rules and the components needed to play the game."

Another week, another article about board games and designing a box. It was kinda interesting to read... but I am not designing a board game, so I feel the informations given wasn't particular useful.  What I did find useful though, were the three videos I found on my own and watched. They were up to date, nicely structured and made sense.

Week 5: 

No readings! 

Week 6: 

"One of the reading's for this week was about making decisions-making and flow-theory. One of the first pages goes through what sort of decisions are bad and good, which I found really interesting."

Finally something that was interesting. This article sparked my interest and I actually read it properly from start to finish, instead of scanning and skipping. It talked about game decisions - the good ones and the bad ones. It also talked about flow-charts. Second article for the week was Cozy Games which was a little bit weird... I wouldn't ever call a game "cozy", but okay.

Week 7: 

"Another article about fun, this time you can view it here Fun is apparently another word for learning... and as we currently know things that are fun, this article focuses on why those aspects are fun."

So, another article about fun and what fun is, and why its fun... Fun! It was a decent article. It was long, but I enjoyed reading it because I was thinking how those "fun types" and "player types" relate to me.


Biggest Accomplishment: 
Learning Unity through youtube tutorials and with help of google.

Favourite Image: 

Its an image that I both love and hate... It's beautiful and, to me, it speaks more than a thousand words - a little baby being connected to chemotherapy, while he is asleep on his father. The game itself is a masterpiece that will make anyone cry... And its done in a very unique and interesting way, with a very personal touch. 

Looking Forward: 

I am repeating myself over and over on this one - I would love to read about newer games, understand them not only as a player, but also as a beginning developer.