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Prompt 1: Describe the central uncertainty in the game.

Fitness Challenge is a game revolving around randomness, uncertainty, and player reaction speed. The central uncertainty in this game is the future obstacles that are going to come onto the screen to block the player from continuing to run. The game warms the player up by starting the game running at a reasonable, slower pace; however, once the player reaches a score of about 120the pace of the runner rapidly increases. Making the uncertainty of obstacles approaching much more difficult for the player to prepare for, but not fast enough that the player could not react properly to the upcoming obstacles. Which makes it so that the players only struggle with their own reaction speed in their pursuit for the highest score. There is no pattern for which the obstacles will approach, making it impossible to master this game perfectly, by just memorizing the path due to its randomness. Instead, to master this game, players would have to better their reaction speed to this game's elements. The tension once the pace of the runner speeds up, is similar to that of actually jogging or working out, it makes the player feel more adrenaline to be more alert of the upcoming obstacles. In addition to the running picking up their pace in the game, at the same time players get introduced to slightly more complex obstacles making for a more interesting and engaging game environment. Such as, instead of one hole in the ground, two will appear next to each other. Same will the tunnel, two tunnels can appear next to each other making the player need to roll for longer.

Prompt 4: Describe how the designer could create more interplay. In this game, the designer has presented the player with the core and sole challenge of bouncing a table tennis ball on the paddle repeatedly, without dropping it. Each bounce increments the user's score until ultimately, the user drops the ball and loses. Despite being an easy ruleset to follow for the player, the game can be quite challenging at some points with the ball’s velocity rapidly speeding up due to a small player error. Perhaps an element of interplay that could be added to this game, would be different types of ‘power ups’ that enchant the user's current game environment. These power-ups could be different in nature and occasionally appear on the screen for the user to bounce the ball over top one in order to receive the power-up. These power-ups could also have a set time limit creating a limited opportunity for the player to get the ball in position to receive the power-up. Different power-ups that I believe could enrich this game experience could be, receiving another paddle for a set time, mirrored to the one being controlled by the player, so that the player has more room for error. A power-up that temporarily slows the bounce of the ball to make it easier for the player to get into position to accurately bounce the ball, or maybe a power-up that acts as a saving grace and resets the ball once the user drops it but keeps the player's score. Each power-up could have different times allocated to being on the screen for the player depending on the power-up’s useability.

Prompt 1: Describe how the shape of the space influences the feeling of play.

In the game “The Vill”, the initial outside space is organized in a narrow, linear fashion. When the user follows the rough terrain that’s being shaken from an earthquake, they’re presented with two houses. While the earthquake, houses, and outside terrain are all analogues with real-world experiences, the game quickly contrasts this when entering the first house. This red house gives the player the feeling of uneasiness or almost hauntedness similar to Boo’s Mansion from the Mario games. The exit of the house also gives this feeling of hauntedness with the large, eerie mansion doors that act as the exit to the house. The space of the house is discrete and gains the haunted feeling from when the player tries to move into certain places of the house, only for what feels like a ghost to forcefully guide the player to different parts of the house. Inside of this house, the user can go up the stairs; however, once the user tries to go back down the stairs, they just collide with them and are unable to go back down until eventually, the ghost forces them to. While the red house exerts a mysterious and abnormal feeling to the user, the purple home further down the terrain employs a homely and safe feeling by surrounding the player with actors that are the same sprite. As well as there being no ghosts nor abnormal experiences occurring in the purple house, allowing the player to freely explore the inside of this house.

Prompt 3: Describe the procedural rhetoric employed by the game.

In the game “Hero” by Weihao, the player enters a medieval world, where the subject matter consists of a knight needing to save the princess. Elements that support this subject matter consist of the graphics of the actors and setting. The actor resembles a person holding a shield and sword, and to further support this, the first NPC the player runs into in the game consists of the same armory. The setting of this game lies within what appears to the player as a castle, with skeleton remains scattered, as well as an opening to a dungeon. Another representational element to support this, is the text when the player interacts with the NPC up the ladder of the castle. When interacted with, the dialogue of this NPC states, “Magic indeed exists!” implying once again that the subject matter of this game takes place in a medieval setting, and to save the princess. Once the player has interacted with this NPC, the sound of the game changes to a song that could alert the player of a forthcoming attack or siege. Another part of this argument that happens through the rules of the game, is that once the player has entered the dungeon, a dragon is seen flying side to side of the passageway the player must take. If the player does not precisely dodge this enemy when trying to cross, the player dies and must restart. The enemy consisting of a dragon, along with the sound resembling a battle, supports the claim of the subject matter being a Hero needing to save their princess.

Prompt 3:

In Bricks, by far the most interesting and helpful combination of rules is how the player can move any crate simply by pushing it with the player, but if a crate is in a corner where the player cannot get under it, the player can move another crate to a position where the player stands in between the two crates. And if the player is standing in between two crates, both of the crates will move with the player, when the player moves. This interaction occurs fairly frequently and is key to completing certain levels. Personally, when this interaction caused me to complete one of the levels, I felt accomplished and satisfied, as it wasn’t extraordinarily obvious to me. This interaction is interesting because it is oddly dreamlike and is not something I have seen before in crate games. This rule could persist even if other rules slightly changed, or if the goal of the game changed from trying to find the staircase, to a common goal of crate games, being just to put crates in specific areas of the level. Another use for this interaction could be the player being able to move any number of crates that are side by side, instead of just moving the two crates on either side of you. Meaning that there could be two or three crates on top of the player and two or three crates under the player, all being moved with the user's movements. This interaction could add some more complexity if the author were to try and add more levels to the game.

Prompt 5:

Waterdrop’s Escape communicates its rules to the player through pre-level text, hinting at both the upcoming new rules for the level and how one can interact with them. The goal of the game is to get the water drop (player) through the pipe, without getting incinerated by lava. I had the urge to continue solving the puzzles in this level through my desire to better understand how the lava moves with the user’s movement. Although I never really could understand exactly all the movements, as I continued to play I got a better feel for different combinations of movements that would free spaces formerly covered by lava. The glass in the game almost subconsciously gravitates the player to move towards it, due to the fact that lava cannot move through glass, and that it’s a safe place for the user. The puzzles help convey the story of a lonely water drop trying to travel its way through the lava and to the pipe in order to free itself from the heat and death that is lava. The tile that acts as the player directly identifies with the story, as you are literally playing as the water drop that is trying to escape. The sound effects in this game also add quite a lot to the experience of the game. When the player moves the water drop through the level, each step makes a drop noise, as if the water drop is literally dropping. The sound the game makes when you die in lava, is very fitting to the puzzle genre, moreover the sound of defeat.

Prompt 3: Describe how the rooms are organized

The rooms are constructed in a linear plot, which helps guide the user through this adventure, providing weapons along the way to defeat the evil monsters. The transitions between rooms move the user in space, but it is not necessarily apparent how much time has passed in each transition without using context from the background colors and dialogue. The user gets to travel across vast distances in this game. The plot of the game entails traveling to the castle to save your love. To do this, the user travels from their home, across a river, into a coffee shop to refuel,  through an open field fighting evil monsters, and finally into their castle, to eradicate the evil monsters and save the princess. Exits in the game are well labeled and clear to the player. Every room, with the exception of the open field, has a door indicating how to progress to the next room. The open field room has a door, but looks unlike the rest, as it’s a part of the tile that makes up the bottom half of the castle. Despite the exit being slightly different in this room, the castle is still a clear indicator of where to exit. Overall, the rooms are organized in a very clear path of progression for the user, which makes the overall story of the game very clear. The user will have no issues with getting lost, spending too much time on a certain side quest, or being distracted from the main plot.

Prompt 2:

The player in Persistence immediately gets introduced to an intricate castle, crafted from different types of tiles to make the larger image. The background of this game clearly was given lots of time and detail. In addition to the castle in the starting room, the background includes a hillside that’s hiding the pulsating sun. When the player escapes the castle through the use of a hidden rope, the style of the background changes quite drastically with a different color palette and overall theme. The houses in this second room seem to have been given less attention than the previous castle, which could indicate that the player is of high importance compared to those who reside on this street. While the houses in this room seem to be given less attention, the street the player walks down has a noticeably intricate tile pattern, that with its color, suggests it’s a mossy stone pathway. The room that the pathway leads to has the same color palette as its previous room. The tiles in the river move in a way that depicts a running river, although the other side of the river doesn’t seem to have been given that much attention. The sprites are very clear among other tiles, and clearly depict what they are. An aspect that bitsy makes difficult for this designer, is the walking animation. I imagine that the designer would have liked for the character to switch the way it’s facing depending on the direction it’s facing. Although it is a tad awkward to be walking backward sometimes, there is nothing the designer could have done to avoid this, as they are limited to bitsy’s constraints.