This workshop will explore the day-to-day craft of game design through hands-on activities. Working in small groups, you’ll be challenged to rapidly design, develop and playtest some example games.

In the morning session, we’ll be looking at what paper prototypes can teach us about digital games, and how to use paper prototyping to answer the design questions that arise during ideation and early development. You’ll gain hands-on experience constructing a playable paper prototype of a popular video game.

Hands On Design Workshop: Advanced Topics

1pm - 4pm

This workshop will explore the day-to-day craft of game design through hands-on activities. Working in small groups, you’ll be challenged to rapidly design, develop and playtest some example games.

In the afternoon session, we’ll have a few different activities for you to pick from. In “Horns of a Dilemma” you’ll explore the challenges involved in designing ethical dilemmas in games. In “Prototyping Complex Systems” you’ll learn how to identify key levers in your large game systems. And in “Us vs. It” you’ll see how dramatic structure emerges from from game dynamics.

Takeaway

Attendees will leave this workshop with new vocabulary for communicating and analyzing their game designs, a deeper understanding of iterative design, and other lessons that emerge from the small group discussions with their peers.

Intended Audience

Practicing game designers, and anyone who works with them.