Week 1.4: ICEDIP Clarity — Game Jam 1

Following on from my ICEDIP Inspiration and incubation phase I want to now turn my attention to clarifying the goal/outcome. “The main aim of the clarification phase is to discover where you are heading, to find the meaning or purpose of what you are doing” .

What specifically do I want to achieve from this game jam?

• Design, develop and submit a working prototype for a game that meets the theme of the game jam by October 28th.
• Develop a simple to use game that can will help children to get better at basic mental arithmetic and times tables.
• I want the game to be visually appealing to a child.
• I want the game to present the right level of challenge that they feel accomplished and don’t get bored because its too easy or give up because it’s too hard.
• I want the game to be very easy to use with a intuitive and obvious UI
• I want the game to be fun and feel like a game, not homework and not a maths test

What features do I want in the game?

Initial feature list. This will be reworked and modified later

• Start screen where the player can select the level to play and view high scores
• Game over screen where the player can see their progress, score and how well they’ve done
• Deck of cards (remember the theme?) from which numbers and the operation (+, -, *, /) are drawn
• Input field and/or multi-choice answers. Question — Could this be selectable on a Settings screen?
• Progress bar through level
• Timer expiry bar that changes colour as time runs out. Answering questions quicker Gets a bigger reward. The bar will have two timer thresholds to represent the stretch and normal challenge. Stretch will be green, normal will be amber.
• Timer expiry sound (can we get the tune on the Japanese metro that increases tempo the closer it gets to the time to close the doors?)
• Simple animation. (Think mouse animations from Bagpuss, specifically the “Row your boat” episode)
• End game –> sky castle?
• Obstacles. Colliding with an obstacle will lose one life (present)
• Projectiles, maybe birds that fly horizontally towards the player’s avatar? Colliding with a bird will lose one life.
• Wind — speed up/slow down boat making the game momentarily harder/easier
• Winning streak — answer 10 questions correct in a row and win one life back

References

Photo by David Travis on Unsplash