Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
open-source game engines or game development environments such as GameMaker
or Unity , even if your target platform will be something completely different.
The advantage of using software prototypes is that you can get a good indication
of the gameplay of your game, even if the art is only temporary and the features
might be buggy or incomplete. However, the disadvantage is that creating software
prototypes takes longer than creating the other kinds. Depending on the available
options and the skills of your development team, it might take almost as long as
making the real game. Still, it is a good idea to build software prototypes, even if
you end up throwing away all the art and code that was produced for them. Having
an early software prototype will help keep the project on course. Programmers will
know what type of game elements are needed, level designers will have an idea of
the direction the design takes, and game designers will have an environment to play
around in and test ideas. Software prototypes function almost as design documents:
The development team can refer to the prototype when building the real thing. The
prototype can illustrate some aspects of a game, such as interactive features, better
than a description in words can.
T IP many of the
prototypes for Spore
are published online:
www.spore.com/comm/
prototypes. We suggest
you download a few
and play them for your-
self. These prototypes
will give you an unique
insight in the devel-
opment process for a
triple-a title by a pro-
fessional game studio.
One critical factor of a successful software prototype is easy customization of the
game within the prototype. When a game's gravity is vital for the gameplay of your
3D platformer, make sure designers can change the setting easily during play in
order to get a feel for what works best. If you have a factory producing resources for
a real-time strategy game, make sure you can change the production rate easily in
order to find the right balance quickly. Don't waste time creating a fancy user inter-
face for this; store key initial values in a text file that the program reads when it
starts up. This way, the designers can play with the values simply by editing the file
and rerunning the program. Or even better, include a simple, off-the-shelf console
in your game that allows you to make changes while playing the game. This will
speed up your development-test cycle even more.
Paper Prototyping
Because software prototypes are relatively slow and expensive to create, more and
more game studios are using paper prototyping techniques. A paper prototype is a
noncomputerized, tabletop game that resembles your game. Some game mechanics
are media-independent. If your game does not rely too heavily on precise timing,
physics, or other computation-intensive mechanics, you should be able to create a
board game from your video game concept. If your game does rely heavily on com-
putation-intensive mechanics, it can still be worth your time and effort to create a
paper prototype for those aspects of the game that don't. Remember, a prototype
typically zooms in on a particular aspect of the game, and you just might want to
zoom in on the internal economy of a game that otherwise derives most of its game-
play from its extended physics simulation. It's important to know what aspect you
want to explore before you start designing a paper prototype.
 
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