MetaInformation: Presentations

1
Meta-Information Presentations

• Giving a talk
• Writing a game proposal
• Game History
• Game Genres

2
Giving a Talk

• What to say and How to say it
• Getting through to the audience
• Visual and Aural aids
• Question Time

3
What to say How to say it

• Communicate Key ideas
• Dont get bogged down in details
• Structure your talk
• Use a Top-Down Approach

4
The Introduction

• Define the problem / issue / thingy
• Motivate the audience
• Introduce terminology
• Discuss earlier work
• Emphasize your new work contributions
• Provide a road-map
• For very short presentations, economize on this
  section

5
The Body

• General
• Abstract the major results / thoughts / plans
• Explain the significance of the results
• Technicalities
• Talk about the vital details that make the
  general points true
• Conclusion
• Hindsight is clearer than foresight

6
Know your audience

• Who are they--
• The Public?
• Scientists?
• Computer Scientists?
• Computer Scientists in your area?
• Classmates?
• The more expert or familiar the audience, the
  more you can focus on details

7
Getting Through

• Use repetition
• Remind the audience
• Dont Over-Run!
• Maintain eye contact
• Control your voice
• Be well-groomed!
• Avoid anxiety by Practice!

8
Visual Audio Aids

• PowerPoint slides
• Dont overload them
• Dont write sentences
• Allow 1-2 minutes per slide
• Dont cover slides
• No special fonts!!!

Dont animate text! Its irritating!! You waste
time waiting for the text to show up
9
Visual Audio Aids

• Use pictures!
• Show a picture as soon as possible!
• Use overlays for stop-frame animation of
  algorithms

10
Visual Audio Aids

• Use pictures!
• Show a picture as soon as possible!
• Use overlays for stop-frame animation of
  algorithms
• Use animation if appropriate

11
Visual Audio Aids

• Beware the microphone
• Dont beat your chest!
• Try turning it off while you are putting it on or
  taking it off
• Test your video
• Cue it up
• Be ready to switch from source to source
• Be ready to adjust sound

12
Question Time

• Request for Information
• Implied request for adulation
• Come up with a complimentary answer
• Malicious question
• Be prepared
• Be ready to take them off-line
• I dont know

13
(No Transcript)
14
How to write a Game Proposal

• Todays games have a production team
• Artists
• Designers
• Musicians
• Programmers
• 20-100 experienced people

15
How to write a Game Proposal

• Think Small

16
Think Small

• Really, I mean it

17
Do One Thing Well

• Make the game stand out in one way
• Dont do a mediocre job in all things
• Do NOT to lots of levels in the game
• One level will do nicely

18
Do One Thing Well

• Possible areas
• Great graphics
• Witty sounds
• Clever puzzles
• Compact concept

19
Understand your Tools

• The various tools have strengths weaknesses
• Dont fight the tool
• Understand what the tool is good for and tailor
  your project for that tool
• Also.. Dont fight your teams skills
• Its understood that your team may be CS heavy

20
Plan in Layers

• Detailed development schedule
• Functional Minimum
• Your Low target
• Your Desirable target
• Your High target
• Your Extras
• Maybe do these after the term is done

21
The Proposal

• The game description
• 5 pages of text
• 1-3 pages of sketches/ mocked-up screens
• Layered Development Schedule
• As on previous slide
• Also state who is responsible for what
• Assessment
• What One Thing will be cool about your game

22
The Presentation

• 7 minutes In class
• Describe your game
• Argue for the One Cool Thing
• State what your primary development environment
  will be and why
• Show your development schedule
• Indicate why you think its do-able
• Practice your talk!

23
(No Transcript)
24
Game History, Genres

• Space Invaders Pong Grand Theft Auto
• Action, Adventure, Puzzle, etc

25
History

• Spacewar 1962
• PDP-1
• 2 Ships controlled by 4 buttons each
• Rotate left, right, thrust, fire
• http//lcs.www.media.mit.edu/groups/el/projects/sp
  acewar/
• Adventure 1967
• Text-based adventure
• You are in a maze of twisty little passages

26
History

• Pong 1972
• First arcade hit
• Home version of Pong 1974
• Fairchild Channel F 1976
• Cartridges!
• Hardware Crash 1977
• Millions of Pong clones saturate the market

27
Some examples
28
History

• Space Invaders 1978
• Activision 1979
• First software house makes Atari 2600 Cartridges
• Asteroids 1979
• Record score 100,000,000
• Two guys played it for a week in 1982

29
Asteroids (Clone)
30
Arcade Games 1980

• Defender
• Missile Command
• Battezone
• Tempest
• Popular with Men AND Women
• Pac-Man
• Frogger
• Centipede

31
Defender / Stargate
32
Missile Command
33
Centipede
34
Arcade Games 1981-83

• Donkey Kong
• QBert
• Tron
• Zaxxon
• Joust
• Pole Position
• Punch-Out

35
Joust
36
Pole Position
37
Home Games Late 70s Early 80s

• Atari 2600
• 1.18MHz 6507, 128 bytes RAM, 4KB ROM
• Atari 5200 (incompatible cartridge with 2600)
• 1.8MHz 6502, 16KB RAM
• Colecovision
• Mattel Intellivision
• Bally Astrocade

38
Software Crash of 1983-84

• Market of 1982 3 billion
• Market of 1985 100 million
• Millions of clones and lousy cartridges
• No rating system
• No licensing system
• Consumer confusion!

39
Mid 80s

• 8-bit Home Games
• Nintendo Entertainment System (NES)
• 1.8MHz 6502 256x240 pixels
• Released 1986
• Most popular toy of 1988
• Mario Bros.
• Sega Master System
• Released 1986

40
Late 80s

• 16-bit Home Games
• Sega Genesis
• 7.8MHz 68000 4MHz Z80, 1MB Rom, 64KB Ram
• Released 1989
• NEC TurboGrafx-16
• 16MHz 65802
• Game Boy
• Tetris

41
Early 90s

• Super NES (16 bit), 1990
• 3.58Mhz 65C816, 128KB Ram
• Game Gear
• Software
• Street Fighter 2
• First decent fighting game
• Super Mario Bros. 3
• Sonic the Hedgehog
• Mortal Kombat 1992

42
Mid 90s

• Sega CD (1992)
• PC CDROM (1994)
• Software
• NBA Jam (1993)
• Earned 1 billion in arcades
• First franchise
• Virtua Fighter (1995)

43
Mid 90s

• Playstation (1995)
• 33 MHz R3900 32bit CPU
• 24 bit framebuffer
• Sega Saturn (1995)
• Two 28.8MHz 32bit Hitachi SH2s
• 24 bit framebuffer
• Hardware textures
• Nintendo 64 (1996)
• 93MHz R4300 64bit CPU

44
Mid 90s

• Networked Games
• Ultima Online, Everquest, etc

45
Late 90s

• Sega Dreamcast (1999)
• 200MHz 128bit NEC PowerVR
• Playstation2 (2000)
• 294MHz R12000 CPU,
• 3.2GB/sec memory b/w, 6.2GFlops peak
• XBox (2001)
• 733MHz Celeron
• nVidia GeForce4
• 6.4GB/sec memory b/w, maybe 1TFlops peak
• GameCube (2001)
• 485MHz PowerPC
• Flipper (ATI) Graphics (on-chip DRAM)

46
Late 90s

• Software
• Very strong 3D!
• Decent sports games
• Soul Caliber, Shenmue
• PC Software
• Graphics no longer 100 of the challenge
• Consumer demand for 3D causes cheap 3D graphics!

47
2000s

• Cell phone games
• DoCoMo phones 2001
• Java J2ME, BREW 2002

48
Game Genres

• Name some!

49
Genres

• Action
• 1st Person Shooter
• Adventure
• Fighting
• Puzzle
• Racing
• Role-Playing

• Simulations
• Sports
• Strategy
• Music
• Dance
• Artificial Life
• Quiz Show

Computer Game Design Development
50
2D Action Games

• Shoot the horde of aliens
• Shoot the horde of aliens
• Shoot the horde of aliens
• Shoot the horde of aliens
• Shoot the horde of aliens
• Space Invaders, Galaga, Defender/Stargate,
• Mario Bros

51
1st Person Shooter

• 3D Shoot the horde of aliens
• 3D Shoot the horde of aliens
• 3D Shoot the horde of aliens
• 3D Shoot the horde of aliens
• 3D Shoot the horde of aliens
• Wolfenstein, Doom, Quake, Half-Life, Max Payne

52
Adventure

• Follow the trail
• Solve puzzles
• Nice scenery
• Inventory
• Learning
• Examples Zelda, Metroid, Myst, Shenmue

53
Fighting

• Pluses
• KILL!!!
• Short games
• Stress reliever, flow experience
• Minuses
• Arcane knowledge
• Limited virtual space
• Clone factor

54
Puzzle

• Solving the puzzle is the primary goal
• Gives feelings of mastery

55
Racing

• First past the post
• Fairly strong simulation element
• Fine motor control

56
Role-Playing

• 3rd person adventure
• Strong story component (potentially)
• Learn the virtual world/environment
• Players are free to act within the worlds
  constraints
• Diablo, MMORPGs (EverQuest, UltimaOnline)

57
Simulations

• Flight Sim
• SimAnt, SimCity, Railroad Tycoon, Roller Coaster
  Tycoon, ...
• Focus on details
• Training could be the goal

58
Sports

• Armchair coach
• Abstract war
• Abstract team fighting games

59
Strategy

• Same components as Sim games
• Historical simulation
• Puzzles may play a part
• A light story element
• No twitch in turn-based strategy

60
Music

• Name that Tune
• Repeat a piece of music that the game plays for
  you
• Play along musically

61
Dance

• Dance Dance Revolution
• Dance kiosk type games (popular in Korea!)

62
Artificial Life

• Tamagotchi, Creatures, Black White