Week 1 Introduction
- Lecture: Introduction to Game Design
- Lab: Open Lab
- Lab: Piskel App
- Piskel App
- Assignment 1: First Open Lab Post
- Create an avatar in Piskel to use for the Open Lab Avatar
- Post on Open Lab
- At least one sentence description of design
Week 2 Character
- Lecture: Character Design
- Lab: Godot Intro, creating player character
- Download Godot
- Download Scripts
- Assignment 2: Character Design and Animation
- Create (at least) 3 character animations (Idle, Walk, Jump)
- Post sprite sheets on Open Lab
- Include screen shot of character in Godot scene
Week 3 Setting
- Lecture: Game Setting
- Lab: TileMaps and TileSets
- Assignment 3: Scenery
- Create the setting of a scene using a combination of scenery sprites
- Scenery should have a cohesive theme that creates an identifiable world
- Document the scenic elements with a screen shot from the game scene
- Post a screen shot of the scenery and sprites on the Open Lab
Week 4 Genre
- Lecture: Game Genre
- Lab: Items, obstacles, rewards
- Assignment 4: Rewards and Obstacles
- Create art for a reward for the player to collect (idle and collected animations)
- Create art for an obstacle for the player to avoid (idle, moving animations)
- Add rewards and obstacles into a scene
- Post screens shots of the items in the game along with the sprite sheets on the Open Lab
Week 5 Indie games
- Lecture: Indie games
- Lab: Moving game objects
- Assignment 5: Moving enemy
- Create art for a moving enemy
- Include idle, walking, and other animations
- Add into a Godot scene
- Post sprite sheet and documentation on Open Lab
Week 6 Level Design
- Lecture: Level Design
- Lab: Level design
- Assignment 6: Level design 1
- Build a level in Godot
- Document the player’s progress through the level
- Post screen shot or video on the Open Lab
Week 7 Sound
- Lecture: Sound effects
- Lab: Sound effects and background music
- Assignment 7: Sound
- Add sound effects to player, obstacles and rewards
- Add background music or sound
Week 8 Midterm
- In class workshop
- Create an itch.io account
- Publish both a Mac and Windows build of your game and post on Itch.io
- Post a link to the game on Itch on the Open Lab
Week 9 User Testing
- Lecture: Browser Games
- Lecture: User Testing
- Assignment 8: User Testing
- Create a user testing form
- Play test games and fill out user testing surveys in class
Week 10 Emergence & Progression
- Lecture: Emergence & Progression
- Lab: Dialog Systems and Add-Ons
Week 11-13 Advanced Topics
- Lab: User Interface Design
- Lab: User Interface Layout
- Lab: User Interface Metrics
- Lab: Checkpoints and Portals
- Lab: Physics and Projectiles
- Lab: Level Design 2
Week 14-15 Final Project Workshop
- Final Project Requirements
- Godot game exported and published on Itch.io
- Original art for all of the characters, items and scenery in the game
- Include at least 2 improvements based on user testing
- Documentation on the Open Lab/Itch
- One video of gameplay
- 3 still images from the game
- Written description of the game
