Level Up! The Guide to Great Video Game Design (eBook)

Scott Rogers (Autor)

eBook Download: PDF

2014 | 2. Auflage
John Wiley & Sons (Verlag)
978-1-118-87721-0 (ISBN)

Infos

Want to design your own video games? Let expert Scott Rogers show you how!

If you want to design and build cutting-edge video games but aren't sure where to start, then the SECOND EDITION of the acclaimed Level Up! is for you! Written by leading video game expert Scott Rogers, who has designed the hits Pac Man World, Maximo and SpongeBob Squarepants, this updated edition provides clear and well-thought out examples that forgo theoretical gobbledygook with charmingly illustrated concepts and solutions based on years of professional experience.

Level Up! 2nd Edition has been NEWLY EXPANDED to teach you how to develop marketable ideas, learn what perils and pitfalls await during a game's pre-production, production and post-production stages, and provide even more creative ideas to serve as fuel for your own projects including:

• Developing your game design from the spark of inspiration all the way to production
• Learning how to design the most exciting levels, the most precise controls, and the fiercest foes that will keep your players challenged
• Creating games for mobile and console systems - including detailed rules for touch and motion controls
• Monetizing your game from the design up
• Writing effective and professional design documents with the help of brand new examples

Level Up! 2nd Edition is includes all-new content, an introduction by David 'God of War' Jaffe and even a brand-new chili recipe -making it an even more indispensable guide for video game designers both 'in the field' and the classroom.

Grab your copy of Level Up! 2nd Edition and let's make a game!

Scott Rogers (Thousand Oaks, CA) is a Principal Imagineer at Walt Disney. After deciding that game designers have more fun, Scott embarked on a career creating game designs for a number of successful titles including Sony's GOD OF WAR, Capcom's MAXIMO: GHOSTS TO GLORY and its sequel MAXIMO VS. ARMY OF ZIN, Namco's PAC-MAN WORLD and THQ's DRAWN TO LIFE series. He lives in Thousand Oaks with his family and a large collection of video games.

Inhalt

Contents 7
Introduction Press Start! 17
If You Are Anything Like Me 17
No, You Can’t Have My Job 19
Who Is This Book For? 20
Why a Second Edition? 22
Level 1: Welcome, N00bs! 23
A Brief History of Video Games. 26
The Brave New World of Gaming: Mobiles, Online Distribution, and Touchscreens. 30
Game Genres. 32
Who Makes This Stuff? 33
Have You Thought about Publishing?. 41
Level 2: Ideas 45
Ideas: Where to Get Them and Where to Stick Them. 46
Getting Ahead of the Game. 48
What Do Gamers Want?. 51
Brainstorming. 52
Breaking Writer’s Block. 54
Why I Hate “Fun”. 56
Level 3: Writing the Story 59
Once Upon a Time . . .. 59
The Triangle of Weirdness. 66
A Likely Story. 68
Time to Wrap It Up. 71
A Game by Any Other Name. 72
Creating Characters Your Players Care About. 74
A Few Pointers on Writing for Kids of All Ages. 78
Writing for Licenses. 78
Level 4: You Can Design a Game, but Can You Do the Paperwork? 81
Writing the GDD, Step 1: The One-Sheet. 84
Writing the GDD, Step 2: The Ten-Pager 87
Writing the GDD, Step 3: Gameplay Progression 97
Writing the GDD, Step 4: The Beat Chart 98
Writing the GDD, Step 5: The Game Design Document (and the Awful Truth about Writing It) 101
Writing the GDD, Step 6: Above All, Don’t Be a Jerk 105
Level 5: The Three Cs, Part 1: Character 109
Who Do You Want To Be Today? 110
Finally, We Talk About Gameplay 127
Level 6: The Three Cs, Part 2: Camera 147
Get It Right: Camera Views 148
First Person Camera 152
Third Person Camera 154
Giving Up Control 158
Two and a Half D 161
Isometric Camera 162
Top-Down Camera. 164
AR Cameras. 165
Special Case Cameras. 165
Tunnel Vision. 166
Camera Shot Guide. 166
Camera Angle Guide. 169
Camera Movement Guide. 170
Other Camera Notes. 173
Multiple-Player Cameras. 175
Level 7: The Three Cs, Part 3: Controls 179
Control Is in Your Hand. 180
You’ve Got the Touch. 183
Dance, Monkey, Dance 185
Character or Camera Relative?. 191
Shake, Rattle, and Roll. 193
Level 8: Sign Language: HUD and Icon Design 197
Heads Up!. 197
There Are Other Screens Than the HUD. 215
A Final Word on Fonts. 223
Level 9: Everything I Learned About Level Design, I Learned from Level 9 225
The Top 10 Cliché Video Game Themes 228
The Name Game 234
Everything I Learned About Level Design, I Learned from Disneyland. . 236
Following Procedure 241
You’ve Got the Beat 243
Re-using Re-use 245
The Gary Gygax Memorial Mapping Section 246
Sandbox Play 249
Illusional Narrative 252
The Dave Arneson Memorial Mapping Section 253
Wrapping Up Mapping 264
Gray Matters 267
Leave the Training Level for Last 269
Levels without Characters 270
Level 10: The Elements of Combat 273
400 Quatloos on the Newcomer! 275
Put ‘Em Up! 278
And a One and a Two 282
The Big Finish 284
Live by the Sword 286
Now You Have to Kiss Me 289
Let’s Get Defensive 289
Dodging the Bullet 292
On Guarding 293
State of the Art Bang Bang 297
The Best Gun for You 302
Run and Gun 306
Not Just Shooting 309
Dang it, Jones! Where Doesn’t It Hurt? 313
Death: What Is It Good For? 315
Conflict Without Combat 317
Level 11: They All Want You Dead 321
Sizing Up the Enemy. 323
Bad Behavior. 324
How Rapid is Rapid?. 329
Movement Style . 332
Bring on the Bad Guys. 334
I Love Designing Enemies. 343
I Hate You to Pieces. 353
Non-Enemy Enemies. 357
How to Create the World’s Greatest Boss Battle. 358
Who’s the Boss? 358
Size Matters. 360
Location, Location, Location. 365
Why Not to Create the World’s Greatest Boss Battle. 367
Level 12: The Nuts and Bolts of Mechanics 369
The Mechanics of Mechanics. 369
Holy Death Trap!. 373
What I Learned from Making Kids Cry. 376
Time to Die. 377
The Music of Mechanics. 380
Chip Off the Old Block . 384
A Nice Little Calm Spot. 387
Riddle Me This. 388
Puzzle Me That. 391
Minigames and Microgames. 393
Level 13: Now You’re Playing with Power 397
Powering Up. 397
“Love Thy Player”. 404
Seriously. “Love Thy Player.”. 406
More Wealth Than You Can Imagine!. 407
Bonus Section about Bonus Features 416
How to Win at Losing 418
Level 14: Multiplayer—The More the Merrier 421
How Many Is the Right Number? 426
MMORPGS, or Hell Is Other People 426
Designing Multiplayer Levels 431
Level 15: Everybody Wins: Monetization 435
Cashing In 438
Money Is the Root of Something Something 439
Level 16: Some Notes on Music 443
I Know It When I Hear It 445
Music with Style 446
And the Beat Goes On 447
Sounds Like a Game to Me 450
Level 17: Cutscenes, or No One’s Gonna Watch ‘Em Anyway 457
A Cut Above 458
How to Write a Screenplay in Eight Easy Steps 460
Finding Your Voice 464
Level 18: And Now the Hard Part 467
No One Cares About Your Stupid Little World 468
Who’s Paying? 471
Video Games Is a Haaaard Business. 472
What to Do for an Encore?. 478
Continue? 483
Time to Level Up!. 483
Index 485
About the Author 500

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 11.4.2014
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Mathematik / Informatik ► Informatik ► Programmiersprachen / -werkzeuge
• Themenwelt: Informatik ► Software Entwicklung ► Spieleprogrammierung
• Themenwelt: Informatik ► Weitere Themen ► Computerspiele
• Schlagworte: 1st person • Arcade • Attack • Bandai • Character • characters • Computer Science • context-sensitive prompts • Design • Enemy • Game • Informatik • Ion • Level • massively multiplayer online • memorial mapping • MMO • Mortal Kombat • music • Namco • players • Playstation • Programmierung u. Software-Entwicklung • Programming & Software Development • Spieleprogrammierung • Story • video games • World
• ISBN-10: 1-118-87721-7 / 1118877217
• ISBN-13: 978-1-118-87721-0 / 9781118877210