War On Terrorism!
The
Making of:
Battle for the Body
BATTLE FOR THE BODY
….An
Overview
The Making of
….Part I
….Part II
….Part III
….Part IV
Picture
Gallery
Game Design Document
PART II (Videogames
are meant to Entertain)
Late October, 2004
My intellectual development in the world of videogames has brought me to conclude that initiating game design from the perspective of ‘what concept can this game teach’ and ‘how can it effectively do so’ is problematic as it negates the primary purpose of games – to entertain. This is not to say that games cannot teach specific concepts, but simply that in my opinion games are meant to be fun first and educational later. In fact, according to Rollings & Adams in their article Game Concept “the chief purpose of a computer game is to entertain someone else.”(pg. 34) I believe that by incorporating this understanding into our game design we will ensure that our game is effective. Once the game is fun, it will then be more appropriate to consider 'tweaking' the game to teach a specific concept beyond the elements of educational value inherent in all games.
Key Concept I Learned: Focus on the gameplay experience as the primary purpose of games is to entertain.
Application to Battle for the Body: From this point onwards the design element of our videogame was focused on what would be creative, exciting and fun. We realized that although there were specific concepts that we wanted to teach, those could be infused after the gameplay was established and satisfactory. Time was therefore spent thinking about the conflicts, characters, interaction model, victory condition, and player’s role.
