Production - The Multiplayer Classroom: Designing Coursework as a Game - page 239

Level 14

Production

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Level 13 addressed the first half of the development schedule. Up until now, it s

all been about getting our thoughts in order, putting them down on paper, and if
necessary, assembling the team. Now it s time to roll up our sleeves and get our

hands dirty. That should be easy as we look at

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“

Adventures in Gardening: The

Game, � an entirely fictitious educational experience.

But first, I want to issue a disclaimer. Multiplayer classrooms come in all shapes
and sizes. Not every game you design will need the amount of preparation that
goes into a video game. Video games come in all shapes and sizes, too. I ve

written several game design documents that were several hundred pages long.
I

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ve also written game design documents that were under a hundred pages and
some even shorter than that.

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While it is better to err on the side of too much preparation, particularly the first
time, you can run the risk of overwhelming yourself with the project. You don t

want to get so caught up in the details that the big picture gets lost. I find
designing classes as games not only to be rewarding, but also much more fun to
teach. Find an amount of detail and structure in the design and development
process that you are comfortable with, and go with it. If you don

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t have fun, your
students will not have fun. Keep that in mind as we dig into the production of
“ (see Figure 14.1). (And that will be the last

gardening pun on this level, I promise.)

Adventures in Gardening �