This week’s task is to select and engage in a community.

The purpose of this is to encourage socialized learning and attempt to expand our mindset from fixed intelligence thinking to a more incremental learning approach.

Identify a community of practitioners that aligns with your interests and aspirations for the future.

I initially wanted to use the meshtastic community, which I engaged in an earlier challenge activity. One of the statement’s objectives is to align with my interests and aspirations for the future. Meshtastic does not fulfill the second condition.

The two game-jam sessions have been practical and have allowed me to focus my thoughts and ideas around game development and provide a safe space to explore and direct my attention to self-improvement. Further exploration into other game jams didn’t prove successful as most are large time commitments that I would struggle to prioritize.

Through a recommendation on one of the Reddit game development boards, I discovered https://designoriented.net/. It describes itself as a learning community that focuses on game design. There is also a discord channel which has rooms dedicated to specific game genres, including:

  • action-adventure
  • puzzle
  • narrative
  • shooter
  • tabletop
  • sports

There is a dedicated channel to daily challenges based on a weekly theme, including a challenge chat channel. Over the last week, topics have included using the IDID system for defining game mechanics.

How many mechanics are mapped it each button? How many mechanics are performed in a certain context? How many actions are require multiple buttons to perform? How many actions require a “command” input to perform?

Marcus Terrell (https://twitter.com/DrHadji) - November 17, 2020

A second topic was Kishoutenketsu style, where an entire story arc is told in 4 panels. (Bagoum 2019)

  • The Introduction (Ki)
  • The Development (Shou)
  • The Twist (Ten)
  • The Conclusion (Ketsu)

Each activity is highly participated in, often building on the work from the previous challenge, which somewhat limits newbies’ ability to participate.

There is a strong Nintendo theme in the responses, which doesn’t fit with my aesthetic. I’ve never been particularly enamored with Nintendo games but can respect them for their ingenuity and storytelling approach. The Simpsons make a regular appearance, typically around the storytelling topics.

Feedback is often provided around effort and not so much towards participation or delivery, indicating that the founders are subscribers to the (Dweck 2010) method of maintaining focus on incremental learning vs. natural talent.

The general tones and language are positive and encouraging. Social aspects include a shared anime watching channel, indicating a high degree of crossover with anime fans. A “whatcha making” and “whatcha playing” provide dedicated spaces for gameplay mechanics’ deconstruction.

A design-oriented topic wheel [2] is an interactive tool for exploring critical components of game design. This particular tool is handy for considering through a standardized approach to one specific game mechanic, upgrades, for example. This formal approach to each element will provide a structure to ensure that I have each foundation level of design and concept before moving ahead with the next kanban task.

Regularly scheduled let’s play sessions, billed as play, chat, or watch experiences. These sessions are streamed live on twitch and encourage discussion around the games played. Reviewing the back catalog of game streams, I do not see much crossover with the kinds of games I enjoy playing. I do not think this is an ideal location for testing game ideas associated with simulations, tycoon, or incremental games.

References

  • DWECK, Carol S. 2010. ‘Boosting Achievement with Messages That Motivate’. Education Canada 47(2), 5.

  • BAGOUM. 2019. ‘Understanding Kishoutenketsu’. Medium [online]. Available at: https://bagoum.medium.com/understanding-kishoutenketsu-d7cf0c5ce642 [accessed 12 Dec 2020].

[2] https://www.designoriented.net/wheel