Issues faced when designing a Key Stage One game.

With particular reference to the readings you have undertaken this year what are the major design issues you have faced in developing a game for Key Stage 1 children
There are many ideas and methods I gathered from the earlier readings in the year to go forward with the key stage 1 game, for instance weather the gameplay mechanics are suitable for the sort of ‘fun’ a child would look for in an educational game and if it too easy that there is no struggle. I will go into depth on these along with some more readings which correspond with the struggles and design of our key stage 1 game. I will be using Greg Costikyan ‘I have no words I must design’(2002), Doug Church’s ‘Formal abstract design tools’(1999) to reference about the design issues we faced along with Noah Falstein’s article called ‘Natural Funativity’(2004)

Firstly the game we made had some constraints such as it being targeted towards key stage one children. When after my particular concept of an archer shooting down balloons with letters in them to spell a word we were put into where the design faze started and 6 people who have barely met before certainly would have difference of opinions so getting an overall concept which everyone was happy with became a problem at first but after research and some of the reading we remembered helped us such. Costikyan states ‘The structure, like the plot, is invented as needed – but kids do feel the need for structure, at times’ we took this and a lot of what he said about structure in the article, we decided that a decent structure backed up by an important story will be important for the game so that it becomes an enjoyable game which children would like to play rather than some of the educational games which can be uninteresting to some children of that age. The structure was going to be obvious from the outset and this problem was ironed out fairly quickly after some discussions over how it would be done. We decided on keeping it simple but try to keep the children entertained at the same time, so one item clicked and the bubbles coming down to spell the words was the final idea we went with along with background which should draw them into the game.

Another issue we faced was the idea whether or not the child would actually find the game fun and enjoyable as we wanted to come up with something that didn’t feel like an educational game to play but in the end it was. In ‘Natural Funativity’ by Falstein he goes on to say under physical fun ‘Our primary urge is the survival instinct. Anything that directly threatens our survival automatically commands our full attention. It's not surprising that games, and in fact most of entertainment, use themes of survival to similarly capture the attention of players.’ And under the heading mental fun he states ‘Even though we use our intelligence with physical and social fun, there is an entire set of entertainment activities including quite a few video games which focuses primarily on mental fun. We practice and improve our mental abilities in our leisure time just as we exercise our muscles and build social relationships’ The idea of having turning the concept of an archer shooting game which would come under the physical fun means the primeval instinct of shooting something and attacking, which seems to be more so in males into a mental challenge and mentally fun was a good idea. Mental fun is perfect in making the game a decent educational game that seems to be enjoyable at the same time, crossing physical and mental fun to make a game which rekindled some of the primeval instincts of fighting and those of mental challenges. Obviously being a children’s game we could have anything too dangerous or inappropriate so even something simple like when you click on the dog or a bird so you can spell the item an arrow doesn’t fire which may seem trivial but had to be done for a children’s game. Lots of issues about the game being suitable for children while still having some of the physical fun elements to it was thought about as no one had paid much attention to games of this sort before. This was probably was the biggest issue we had when designing the Key Stage One game as if it too dull or just not actually suitable for the children we would have failed. Reading into what Falstein said we decided to go along more of the mental route and keeping the physical fun to just the archer and some of the backgrounds in being adapted to that. Due to the game being a spelling game the mental fun is a big issue we decided on having 3-5 letter words because the research done had shown us they should be comfortably is able to spell those words. Having some 3 letter words and some 5 letter words in one stage was important for the fun too otherwise if a young Key Stage One child played the game and could only spell either 3 or 4 letter words that would be fine too.

Costikyan writes that Goals, structure, struggle and endogenous meaning are to be considered when trying to make any successful game. I have already spoken about the structural issue we faced so taking into account of the other points we did have some issues surrounding the goals of the game. The goal of the normal levels of the game we obvious at first but after going into more detail with the coding we came across some simple thing like how many words should be spelt in order to advance to the next level and others like I said before if the goal is actually achievable for children in the lower age bracket of Key Stage One. Mixing up the words so there are enough 3, 4 and 5 letter words on each level was key. The overall goal/final boss goal was to be to shoot the evil wizards name which is jumbled up in bubbles floating around him, this also goes back to the physical fun and hunting or destroying something evil. We wanted to have a climatic ending that made the game end on a high along with it being more on the game and fun side of things rather than education just to finish off. For the child to have a slight change in game mechanic to avoid being bored was another aim for the boss level and final goal, at first we wanted a mini boss to break up the gameplay too with the possible goal of having to knock him off a bridge. The mini boss would very much tone into the physical fun again which was a popular idea at the time, as the overall goal for the game was to have something exciting to play while being educational at the same time. Time constraints hindered the progress of these extra two levels, the mini boss being cut not too long into development but the final boss was cut near the end after some hiccups with the code. Therefore getting the goals and story of the game would have to be played out in another method.
Seeing the two boss levels cut strengthened the cut scenes importance in order for the story to come across still. This didn’t cause too many problems apart from the script which was made slightly earlier in production being edited slightly to compensate for the bosses.
A big issue we faced from the beginning actually was what items we were going to have for the children to spell; this being a huge issue certainly would halt development if not done quickly. Being adults all over the age of 18 made this even harder, the thinking and research became incredibly important as we needed to get the correct item as the whole game depended on spelling and the children need to know what they are spelling. After many days of deliberation we started jotting down some words here and there trying to come up with some suitable ones, luckily we could test some of the words as another group member has a child at the age of 6 which was ideal. Once we heard this news thinking of some words became a bit harder as some of the suggestions seemed to be tricky. This is where the research came into play, we looked at similar spelling games which were aimed at the same age range to help with the sort of words which could be used.

Greg Costikyan, (2002), I Have No Words I Must Design, Costik
http://www.costik.com/nowords2002.pdf

Noah Falstein (2004) , Natural Funativity, - Gamasutra
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/2160/natural_funativity.php

Doug Church, (1999), Formal Abstract Design Tools - Gamasutra, http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3357/formal_abstract_design_tools.php

This is still a draft of the essay and i will include more quotes and expand on a few more points over the next few days.

Flash game update!

I didnt plan out every level as planned but instead I decided on making a background and new skin for the character. I done these so it added a bit more style to the game as it was looking rather bland. There were some bugs when i changed some of the code too so it may run smoother too, but its a project which will be on the go for about a month more so everything should be finished soon.
I have noticed it loads up full screen and bugs about a bit as its designed for 700x500 instead of the high desktop resolution you have, so i will try to get it so the game wont be able to resize but for now enjoy.

The embed hasnt worked for some reason so i will just post the link for the game instead.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/24968932/flashgame.swf