Game Design Documents

So as I said in the previous post I decided to take Tynies forward and create a GDD (Game Design Document) for it. I will be taking all of the information from my concept documents where I'll improve and develop the ideas.

The concept doc for Tynies was only around 7 pages long, the GDD will have to be around 45 - 55 pages, this means every single aspect mentioned will have to be expanded upon and explained, some new mechanics may even have to be implemented to beef out the game a little and make it even more fun to play.

Rather than creating one single large GDD, the documents will be split into three different and separate docs; Game Mechanics, Interactive Design and because Tynies doesn't really have any level design I will instead be creating a Gameplay Design doc, where I'll structure it as if a player is giving a walk-through of the game form start to finish.


Game Mechanics Document 
Ok so to begin I started off with creating the Game Mechanics Document, this is where every single mechanics in the game will be described and detailed in full.

The mechanics document will probably be the largest of the three documents so I am prepared to spend more time on this than spreading out my time evenly for all three docs.

I started off by first going through my concept document and creating headers for all of the key mechanics, followed by sub header for additional information on the subject. Once that was done I started filling in some of the information, which will often lead me to extra ideas or thing I hadn't previously mentioned. The new ideas was also given headers for later.

After a few days of bulking out the structure and headers I was pretty confident to continue filling in the rest of this information, this took a while. I had filled up quite the amount of pages by simply talking about the mechanics, next it was time I started adding some images. I first of all added in the images I'd previously done for the concept document, this gave visual information for the key areas, but not enough, so I opened up photoshop and started creating an image for most mechanics I was talking about, as I typed it.

After I had finished with the majority of the document I was advised to add animation state tables to my document, detailed when the animation is played, what it reverts to as well as a description of the animation. This didn't take up too much time however I was starting to think it's about time I moved onto the other documents.

Now all of the information, structure, images and animation tables are complete, even pictures of all the Tynie breeds have been done. the document totalled at 29 pages long. giving me the rest of the page count to split between the other docs.
Below is the finished game mechanics document:

Password is: xb3002

Tynies - Mechanics Document

Interactive Design Document

The next document I decided to move onto was the interactive design as this is where I could explain HOW the player actually uses mechanics and interactive with Tynies.

Like the mechanics doc, I first went through and added in headers and sub header for all of the things I was going to talk about, fortunatly there wasn't as many as mechanics so I was confident I'd be in the limits of the page count. 

The first challenge I encountered was now I needed to truly think about the controls of the game, how the player was going to play and interact with Tynies easily and effortlessly. The best way I could think of hitting this challenge head on was to grab my own PlayStation Vita and pretend I was playing Tynies myself, I imagined quite a few scenarios of me running through various aspects of my imaginary Tynies game. Eventually I found myself wanting to use the touch pads more than the buttons to physically interact rather than feel more like a proxy. The player can use both buttons and touch pad to navigate the menus, I made sure everything could be done with both,

Now that I finished the controls I moved onto the menu flow charts, detailing how the player would navigate them and also how they can reach the other menus and also go back to the main menu. It took a little while to grasp how to structure the chart, but once I got stuck in it all just flowed together. (Pun intended)

I had to create an image for all of the menu screens that the player will see, this helped me also realise how the player could navigate them and also if I forgot to add anything to the flow chart, which I fortunately didn't.

After filling in all of the information on how the player interacts with the game and after adding in all the images, the document was 18 pages long.
Below is the finished interactive design document:

Password is: xb3002

Tynies - Interactive Design Document

Gameplay Design Document

Ok so now I only have one more document to do and it shouldn't take too long to finish, my gameplay design document is basically an alternative for a level design doc, with Tynies not having any levels it's clear why I went for gameplay.

Now with my gameplay doc I approached it as if I was playing the game and giving a walk-through, what steps would I go through, and how would I do them. So that's what I did. I began the structure again with just the headers, followed by sub headers of the things the player could do in that section. Soon I had pretty much a walk-through tha detailed many aspects of Tynies from the player's point of view, from navigating the starting menus and finding their tynies, to playing and having them grow.

There was no need to create any new images for this document (with the exception of the cover image which featured a different Tynie) as all of the points raised already had an image that could be recycled. This document was completed rather quickly as it was only short and required me simple giving information as if the player was playing, instead of my giving detailed information of every key aspect of each mechanic.

The finished document had only 10 pages but this is all that was needed.
Below is the finished gameplay design document:

Password is: xb3002

Tynies - Gameplay Design Document

Concept Documents

I used Microsoft Word to create the concept documents that will get my initial ideas down on 'paper'. from here it is easier to advance my ideas and decide which one I'd like to take forward into a game design document.

At first I was very exited about Mercenary Mayhem and thought that would be the idea I'd choose, then I began work on my second idea, then the third. I found as I continued with my ideas I found myself swaying towards the idea I originally least liked, then decided there was much more that could be done than I had originally thought.

Here are the concept documents I've created for my three ideas:

Concept Document: Mecenary Mayhem
Concept Document: ARacers
Concept Document: Tynies

After presenting these ideas the my class and tutor it became quite apparent that I should continue with Tynies as it had the most potential. I'm happy with the way things have gone so far and look forward to my progress.

Concept Mindmap

So after doing my research I now need to further my ideas, so I went on bubbl.us and create a mindmap that can be edited from any computer without needed to bring any software with me, this helped quickly adding an idea if I wasn't at home.

This is the mindmap I created for my three ideas, I started with AR GAME in the center and each idea branches off in a section of it's own.

I found this method of idea building to be quite efficient as it keeps visually any ideas you put down and also helps you link and think of new ones related to others with losing your original thoughts.

Now my ideas have been explored I need to start working on my concept documents.

Market Research

I have the ideas that I want to develop but before I get ahead of myself I first need to do some research into the selected genres look at similar game to the ideas I had, this way I can get a good feel for what works.




Turn Based Strategy
First of all I looked at some turn based game:

Jagged Alliance series

The Jagged Alliance series have been some of my favourite turn based isometric games for years, still going today with the release of Jagged Alliance: Back in Action. The player controls mercenaries and must complete tasks to get money, then the player can renew a mercs contract or purchase a stronger merc. The player isn't able to control anyone other than the mercenaries and there are no vehicles that the player can use.

Fallout 1 - 2

The fallout series (prior to 3 and New Vegas) were a slash between an RPG and TBS, the combat was TBS and that's what I needed to look at, it played very similar to the Jagged Alliance Series and player were able to pinpoint what body part they'd like to attack, harder areas would have a lower hit chance.

Both Series were good to look at because they gave me a good insight of what sort of combat I could include.

Warhammer 40,000: Squad Command 

I liked this because it shown a visual clear line of where the units' line of sight was and also where they could move, this could be handy when thinking of augmented reality.


Table Football

As far as augmented reality goes there isn't really much on turn based strategy games however I found this. Table Football is a turn based game that will be released free with the PlayStation Vita and uses 6 AR cards to place a football pitch in your living room, then the players take turns passing, shooting and defending while trying to score goals.






Racing
Now I need to look at some racing games that were also similar to my racing concept, such as:


Micro Machines

Micro Machines is a great example of a game that could take advantage out of augmented reality. The player races around with miniture cars in large scale everyday environments avoiding things like giant toasters and traversing over tables. 


Micro Maniacs

Micro Maniacs is very similar to 'Machines' apart from the racers are no longer vehicles but bipedal characters, this is an interesting concept for racing other than vehicles.


I think my idea could work well with augmented reality, repleacing the virtual items in the previous games with real ones placed by the player. There also isn't really anything in the market for racing with augmented reality so this would give the racing idea a pretty unique place.

I have found some racing examples but not really games, more like tests to their tech in action. The sort of things i've found however are quite a few years old too.

Spacecraft Racing

 This shows that racing games using AR could work although I don't like how this is limited by the marker cards. Fortuantly recent devices like the PlayStation Vita do not require them.

Pet Management
Now I need to look into the market for pet management games:

Tamagotchi

The Tamagotchi have been VERY successful pet management games, it is played on a small handheld so players can use it on the go, this is a great feature and personally a reason why it got so big. The player can feed their pet, keep them happy, train them and all the other things you'd expect do be able to do. Tamagotchi is even still going today in Japan which goes to show there is still a market for this.


EyePet

The EyePet is also a pet management game only this one uses augmented reality, this is good as I could see how they use it and also see what doesn't work so well. EyePet is suppost to be based in the player's living room or house and the Pet is styled however the player wants, this is a cool idea however it is restricted to only being able to be played in such a large area and the camera cannot be moved during play. 


Another thing is while the pet can be customised with colour and clothes, there is only one type of pet and the player can't manage multiple pets or even have them interact with their friend's pets. This is something I will take into account when furthing my idea.


Invizimals

While Invizimals is more a fighting game than a pet managements game, it has some really cool features that include augmented reality that I think could work great for a pet management game, the fact the player has to search around for the creature and that they can trade and collect a variation of Invizimals.


After looking at a few of these things I can see that pet management is not only still popular, it can work with augmented reality and there are lots of features that can be combined to still improve upon it. Now I need to go throw a few more ideas down to develop my concepts.

Ideas - Refined

After I had a chat with my tutor, he helped me narrow down my list and said which ideas he liked, so we went through the list and crossed off the ones which didn't really have much 'flavour'. Here is what we came up with:

Turn based Strategy - control units of troops on real battlefields

Racing - race around tabletops and surfaces with tiny vehicles

Sniper game - use an AR device (such as vita) to aim and snipe tiny enemies

RPG - control a custom character around randomly generated environments, projected wherever

God game - raise and manage a civilisation

Pet management - look after a tiny pet with augmented reality

Life Sim - Similar to The Sims series only with augmented reality, build house and can interact with friends

Chopper Collect - Virtual chooper flying around real environment collecting items or rescuing people

Jet Fighters - Dog fights in jets flying around rooms

Brawling Fighting Game - fight a life size virtual opponent 

Fireman - put out virtual fires in your own home or work place

Rampage - stop and destroy virtual cities as if you was godzilla

The list was halfed and I now only had six ideas, but I still needed to half it yet again and choose three for the concept documents...


I spent a while weighing the possibilites of each idea, what could be accomplished and whether or not the idea would make it as a decent game or a gimmick that'd be played for a few mins before the player is bored.

I decided to go with:

Turn based Strategy 
Racing
Pet management

Now I needed to do more reseach into those areas before I further develop the ideas.

Ideas

So continuing from my last module I've now taken into account all of the research I've done on augmented reality, now I need to come up with Ideas.

To begin I decided I'd come up with a large amount of ideas first to see what I could come up with before I set my mind on the first few ideas that pop into my head. The following is the list I came up with for game using augmented reality:

Turn based Strategy - control units of troops on real battlefields

Life Sim - Similar to The Sims series only with augmented reality, build house and can interact with friends

Chopper Collect - Virtual chooper flying around real environment collecting items or rescuing people

Jet Fighters - Dog fights in jets flying around rooms

Racing - race around tabletops and surfaces with tiny vehicles

Brawling Fighting Game - fight a life size virtual opponent

Sniper game - use an AR device (such as vita) to aim and snipe tiny enemies

RPG - control a custom character around randomly generated environments, projected wherever

Fireman - put out virtual fires in your own home or work place

Rampage - stop and destroy virtual cities as if you was godzilla

God game - raise and manage a civilisation

Pet management - look after a tiny pet with augmented reality