One of my biggest failings when it comes to study is the efficiency of my working process. Nearly every single creative coursework submission i’ve handed in over the past three years has had trouble meeting the deadline. I undertake projects that are far too ambitious given the timescale and I get so involved in the process that I regularly fail to heed the warnings of an approaching deadline. Well, on the one hand it’s true that you can’t schedule creativity, but needs must so now I plan to do something about it.
One of the sites I enjoy giving the occasional glance is Three Hundred Mechanics by Sean Howard, aka Squidi. He challenged himself to come up with a new game idea or gameplay mechanic once a day for 300 days. He stopped around 50 but still updates occasionally (currently up to #106).
Inspired by his project, i’m proposing The 24 Hour Project. The idea is simple: I will try to create a different game within each 24 hours for a period of seven days. These seven games will each have to fit a specific genre and can be created in any order:
1) Platformer
2) Interactive Fiction
3) Role Playing Game
4) Shoot Em Up
5) First Person Shooter
6) Strategy
7) Puzzle
Where possible, these games will all be created using Unity3d (except of course the IF which will be easier created using Inform7), and the genre definitions are quite flexible. What I mean by this is, it will be necessary to capture the essence of that genre rather than having to create a full and complete game. So, for example, the RPG will not need to be fully developed, but should probably include some kind of party combat scenario at least. Likewise, it would be incredibly difficult to create a Real Time Strategy for the strategy game given my inexperience with pathfinding, therefore this is more likely to be a turn-based strategy in the form of something like Risk.
The focus is on content rather than quality, therefore different graphical approaches can be employed as appropriate, most likely minimal style in most cases. The 24 hours need not be consecutive, although these shouldn’t be spread over more than three days. Furthermore, it may be that a game is developed in less than 24 hours and in this case it will be submitted online. However, to be considered complete, each mini game will have to meet three requirements:
1) Have a clear goal
2) Have a system of definable rules
3) Involve conflict
The first is to ensure that I don’t end up creating an entertaining sandbox utility rather than a game, while the second is somewhat inevitable but should be considered during design. For the third, I’m really thinking of conflict in the narrative sense: as an obstacle or obstacles to be overcome by the player. This may simply be the environment itself, as in the case of a platformer, or it could be an actual enemy, as in the case of the first person shooter. These conditions are very loosely based on Salen and Zimmerman’s definition of a game in Rules of Play (2003):
“a system in which players engage in an artificial conflict, defined by rules, that results in a quantifiable outcome” (Salen and Zimmerman, 2003: 96)
however similar definitions involving ‘rules’ and ‘objectives’ can also be found elsewhere. An interesting discussion on the definition of games by Jesper Juul can be found here.
I have no doubt that this project will be incredibly difficult! For starters, I will have to think fast in terms of generating ideas for each genre. I already have a few ideas, but i’m deliberately avoiding exploring them further until I sit down to make that particular game. There will also no doubt be serious technical skills required, not least given my limited experience with Unity3d itself, but circumventing major problems (read: knowledge gaps) will be part of the challenge.
I should also point out that i’m deliberately not specifying that these games be original. While I always try to put my own touches into every project I undertake, i’ll be honest and say that i’m running on empty at the moment. Hopefully this project will rejuvenate my imagination and some originality will find its way in there, but no promises!
The only slight hiccup in my plans is my return home to Scotland for a week on Monday. I won’t have access to Unity during this period so i’m considering paper prototyping the IF at least. Before then, i’m hoping to have at least one game completed but we’ll see how it goes.
Bonne chance!
