Last Monday I presented my concept for PandaBlocs for the iPhone and iPad at SCAD, as part of my final project for the semester.The game itself is inspired by the original PandaBlocs by Ova Studio, an educational construction game for kids.

Introducing PandaBlocs for iOS at SCAD

A few weeks after our visit to Christophe and Slimane’s studio in Sheung Wan, I tried to figure out a way to translate their game’s inherent element of symbolic play into a videogame.

I took up one of their suggestions to make the panda on the original box-art a part of the game and experimented with the idea (besides, who doesn’t like pandas?!). After three weeks I ended up with a fully developed concept..

PandaBlocs concept art

PandaBlocs concept art - Gameplay on the iPhone

..and an awesome game!

Busy polishing my final game pitch for PandaBlocs..uff.. where did time go. Updates on my current projects, XCOM review and more coming soon!

In late July 2012 I started working on a concept for an iOS/Android game. The idea came up while I was waiting for the MTR (Hong Kong’s railway).

If you have ever visited Hong Kong and got to enjoy a crowded ride on the MTR during rush-hour, you will have noticed at least one thing: Everyone is on their smartphone. Couples sitting next to each other, staring down at their iPads, businessmen leaning against doors, watching movies on their iPhones, students huddling together, watching their friends playing some manga-stuffed hack’n'slash game.What most of the games people played seemed to have in common was the fact that they could be played casually, and were easy to pick up. I mused on that for a while and reflected on my own habits for a bit – “what games do I play on my smartphone?”. To tell the truth I don’t often play games on my smartphone. I just get dizzy after staring at things while my body is in motion. However, when I do play, I usually play something for two to four minutes – Angry Birds for instance.

One week later I came up with a draft for an action/platformer game with a main character named Shlorp. After hastily finishing a first rough, I showed it to a friend at SCAD, Mark Caluguy, hoping he might be interested in joining my project. He agreed, and I’m glad he did – his monster drawings are awesome! The game is in development now (stalled at this point however due to additional workload from other projects) and will most likely be finished early next year! (Perhaps a worthy contender for next year’s IGF!)

Shlorp - early rough

You might be thinking, “so what exactly is the gameplay??”. You’re right, I haven’t told you yet. At this stage however, I don’t want to reveal too much – we’re still tweaking some of the gameplay aspects. What I can tell you at this point: It involves morphing. Really awesome morphing. And fun puzzle games.

Back to the classics! For this particular assignment we were asked to derive the rules for an existing game in three categories: developer, player, and implicit rules. I won’t even try and guess how long that would have taken for a game like Skyrim, instead I used minesweeper.

Minesweeper Rules(.pdf)

The rules of Calvinball

Here’s a game summary for BF3 that I’ve created for an assignment. The intention was to pick any game and guess what the original document/thought process might have incorporated. Try guessing what Dice could have intended when they created gameplay for BF3 – it’s fun (seriously!).

Battlefield 3 – Practice GDD (.pdf)

Off to the Canadian Chamber of Commerce for happy hour <:) – topic: Windows 8 as a platform for games….(I found this humorous “artist’s interpretation” below)

Grand titles such as Halo, World of Warcraft, Call of Duty, and many more have acclaimed much fame in this day and age. Even my 73 year old grandfather has heard of a few. Naturally, anyone who decides to turn their passion for games into a professional career certainly has a few games on an equally grand scale in mind. Why not?

When I started entering the magic realm that is professional game design, things turned out to be quite different. Who would have thought that you don’t start at the top of the mountain, eh? Two weeks ago our professor gave us an assignment: Write a pitch document for a game. Curiously, he knew of his passionate students’ tendency to think BIG (and I really mean BIG). But never mind the funding, the manpower, and the time our great games would have required to build. After all, it was an exercise, a chance to get it “out of our system”. As an avid reader of fantasy books, including Trudi Canavan’s The Black Magician and The Malazan Book, and a loyal consumer of decision packed games such as Mass Effect, I was quickly inspired to come up with my own 25 million dollar-budget game. Staying modest.

And that’s what led to my very first (brilliantly crafted) pitch document:

Isolda’s Tale (GDD) (.pdf)

Keep in mind this was my first structured, written out idea, so there may be a lot of weight on the storyline and less on the actual gameplay. But I guess we all have to start somewhere.

Finally managed to activate my blog! (SCAD I.T. should really look into that….)