CIS 300 - September 5, 2006

Communications Lab 2: Feasibility and Originality

The focus of today's lab is to think about how to make sure that your game concept reflects a game that is both innovative and can be completed by your group by the end of the semester.

Tasks

 (1)        (Re)State your weekly outside-of-class meeting time and place. Recall that instructors or TAs may attend these meetings (unannounced), and that you may specifically invite any of us to a particular meeting if you wish. Also state the names of your group members, and the basic team roles they will be filling (programmer, artisit, etc)

(2)         Pair off with another group and tell each other about your concept so far. Each group should be challenging the other on the originality and feasibility of the other's idea. Spend 7 minutes per group.

 (4)        List the strengths/unique points of your concept—the critical core components. (Attempt to distill your game idea into its most important attributes. What is the bare minimum you need to preserve the essence of your idea?)  Spend 10 minutes

 (5)        List the possible limits/challenges for realizing your concept. List the potential traps that could make your game bland or unoriginal. (What are the hardest parts of developing your game? What parts of your game need more thought? What will take the most time? What games is your concept similar to? What don't you know how to do yet? What genre conventions may you be blindly adopting?) Spend 10 minutes.

 (6)        Address each of those challenges, either by obviating them or proposing strategies. Be specific, and realistic. Spend 10 minutes.

 (7)        Submit (1),(3),(4), and (5) through CMS at the end of class.

You will then meet as a group before Comm Lab 3 to:

 (1)        Revise your idea, or come up with a new one based on our feedback.

 (2)        Brainstorm to flesh out the idea with more specifics, including gameplay, setting, interface, etc. Consider using the various design worksheets at the end of each chapter of R&A.

 (3)        Submit, through email to me (mohan@cs.cornell.edu) , your idea so far. This should, as before, include a sentence reflecting the core vision of the game, but this time up to 5 or so paragraphs of information about the game.

This submission constitutes a "proposal" of your concept. Upon receiving it, I (Mohan) will either "accept" or "reject" the proposal. If the proposal is rejected, you can revise it based on my comments and resubmit. You must continue resubmitting until the proposal is accepted, and if I don't accept the proposal by the next Comm Lab (9/12), your group can no longer receive an A for your project grade. I will check my mail for (re)submissions at least once a day for that week, at 7pm, and respond by midnight.

            I will only accept a proposal if I deem it to be