tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30766504.post6021375946407709818..comments2024-01-15T03:36:11.777-05:00Comments on Teaching Game Design: Top two reasons why student projects failUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30766504.post-11401232766260687522013-02-19T12:52:14.877-05:002013-02-19T12:52:14.877-05:00I teach video game dsign to high school students i...I teach video game dsign to high school students in grades 9-12 they are competive and sometimes that works to my advandage. I beleive that each game desgin or in my case each of my student have a different motivation for building the games, and the effort they put forth is evident by the detail and quailty of their game. I do feel that they have to have small successes to not get discouraged. While encouaging them to build small games while planning and modifying their dream game they remain motivated to push toward the finish line. hearttlchttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07770954314610342328noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30766504.post-21624998989177331252010-09-28T17:57:48.007-04:002010-09-28T17:57:48.007-04:00I believe in starting small, too. Start with just ...I believe in starting small, too. Start with just one fully-developed level, which you can finish in a few weeks. Then just add more levels and additional features as you go along.<br /><br />We started doing this last year because you're right. Many of the former graduates abandoned their game projects.skysenshihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15523548799825753320noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30766504.post-66599012421450941372010-09-28T17:55:51.326-04:002010-09-28T17:55:51.326-04:00Your article is right on the nose. I had to comple...Your article is right on the nose. I had to complete a senior project course and I was put in a team to make a game for our final project, even though only two of us had some experience making a game. The project was based on a simple idea: FP survivor/horror game reminiscent of Condmned. But because of many objections from our professors about our direction the game ended up having to take place in the future, having to kill creatures and we had to incorporate a biofeedback device which would take data from the players heart rate and feed it into the game causing visual and auditory effects to change within the game and build up the horror. They expected us to learn an engine, program, and incorporate the device in a matter of 6 months. Needless to say the project fell through and I have to repeat the course this year in order to graduate. And what depresses me is that the professors still carry this mind set that students should be a jack of all trades when it comes to making any type of digital project whether it be games, animations, etc.Peter Riverahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15262060761340509304noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30766504.post-29281318290370157012010-09-28T16:48:51.545-04:002010-09-28T16:48:51.545-04:00@ inCobalt:
I actually see it as the other way aro...@ inCobalt:<br />I actually see it as the other way around - better to have a successful project than a failed one. I'm not trying to dissuade anyone from trying, rather I'm giving my best advice on how to try in a way that gives the best chance of success.<br /><br />For most students I've run into, it is hugely demoralizing to spend hours each week for months at a time only to abandon a project that collapsed under the weight of its own ambitions. It can feel like you'll never get that project working, and it's very easy to give up after something like that, especially if you've put a lot of hard work and effort into it already. Because you get to a point where you can't take it forward any more, but you also can't go back and start over because you'd be abandoning too much work, so the project is really dead.<br /><br />Far better to save those great ideas for later, and bring them out again when you can do them... and in the mean time, concentrate on doing something you KNOW you can succeed at, and build up from there.<br /><br />Yes, it's a slow process. There's no sexy "nothing-to-big-success" story here. But if you look historically at all of the really great student projects, the ones that win awards, I think you'll find that pretty much all of those students already had some idea of what they were doing ahead of time.Ian Schreiberhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03146360375570794401noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30766504.post-1871930580922900622010-09-28T16:39:43.576-04:002010-09-28T16:39:43.576-04:00Part of the reason why I'm leaning away from g...Part of the reason why I'm leaning away from game design and more towards game theory is because of this. I know that I'm guilty of this on many parts. I'm worried that advice like this will discourage people from trying to make anything at all. People seem to become game designers because they have ideas that they want to see in reality. If you take away that motivation, then they won't be excited about being a game designer. I'd say it's better to have a project fail than to never have a project at all.<br /><br />Then again, I'm always trying to do things I know I can't, so my perspective may be skewed.inCobalthttp://incobalt.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.com