Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
The origins of the style can be found in tabletop games where players use
trading cards or carefully written descriptions and storylines and then discuss
how their characters react in different situations.
Dungeons & Dragons,
cre-
ated by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson,
was released in 1974 by Tactical Studies
Rules, Inc. This highly popular game, often known simply as
D&D,
is an excel-
lent example of one of these tabletop games. One player is the Dungeon Master,
who assumes the role of the storyteller and adjudicator.
Live-action games of the RPG type are also quite popular and are known as
live action role play (LARP)
. Devoted gamers refer to themselves as LARPers;
they write and then play out elaborate storylines while dressing as characters
and interacting with each other.
Gamers still gather to
play tabletop games,
especially
D&D
.
information about
when and where they
gather, along with
storylines, can be
found at the Wizards
of the Coast website,
action Games
Action games challenge players through physical challenges, testing their hand-
eye coordination and reaction time. Action games include shooters, discussed
later, along with fighting games and platform games.
An early, successful action game was an arcade amusement called
Space
Invaders,
designed by Tomohiro Nishikado and released in 1978
.
During game-
play, the player manipulated a laser cannon that moved from side to side across
the bottom of the screen. The goal was to shoot as many aliens as possible as
they descended toward the bottom in rows. If the player succeeded in shooting
all the aliens during this timed game, he won. However, if any alien touched the
ground, the game ended instantly and the aliens were declared the victors. The
popularity of this game is one of the reasons shooters tend to be thought of as
their own category.
Figure 2.1 shows what the alien creatures from
Space Invaders
looked like.
They were extremely simple, made from just a few pixels; because of the game's
limited memory, that was all the designers had to work with.
platform games like
Donkey Kong
show
the playing field
from the side. the
gamer navigates an
avatar through a
series of obstacles—
for example, jump-
ing from platform
to platform—while
evading hazards.
Pixels
(those tiny
squares you see
when you zoom in
on an image) are
the smallest units
of data in a game.
different color com-
binations are used to
create graphics.
FiGuRe 2.1
The block-like appearance of the
Space Invaders
aliens is due
to the small number of pixels used to make them.
