Why Travel more as a Game Designer?

• Graphic artist, Musician, Programmer, Scenarist, Quality controller, you design games.
• Board, Cards, Code, Graphics, Themes, you design games.

Why Travel?
If you are creating a World, you ought to know this One.

Here’s where you could start:

• Work with limitations
• Create your World with Mind Maps
• Compose a travel Diary
• Buying Memories

• Landmarks, the Soul of a Nation
• Restaurants & Cafes, for you & your players
• Create a Continent
• Parks – The Game’s Hub
• Artistic Awareness – What’s Fun?

Learning to work with limitations

• Limited Material & Tools
  • You don’t need a desk to be productive.
  • No internet is the best way to come up with new designs & Ideas.
  • A 200 pages moleskin journal is enough.
• Limited Time
  • Having less time to create your next project will force better result.
  • Less time means less time to hesitate.
  • Think crucial features through & implement.
• Focus on 1 project or have multiple one?
  • How long is your trip?
  • You’re visiting Italy for a week , can you get a Book out of it?
  • How many settings are you visiting? 1 piece = 1 setting?
  • Should you create a Pamphlet for this City, this Country?

Your essentials:

• A small notebook + Post-it (to create categories)
• Multiple 4-colors pens (for Mind mapping)
• A Camera (for photo references)
• Your phone (Interviews, post on social & check you mails)
• Your laptop (Books & Graphic design)
• A 512GB Flash drive (if you can’t trust Clouds)

Create your World with Mind Maps

• Mind maps are by far the easiest way to collect & process data.
• Wherever you are interviewing someone or taking notes about a specific setting, that will serve as the Game Hub, it is the way to go.
• After practicing for 4 years you could put 500 pages books onto 4 sheets of paper without losing any substantial information.
  • This way you could already write the game’s manual.
• The Process:
  • Take a piece of paper horizontally, separate it in 4 equal sections with 2 diagonals.
  • Trace 4 circles/ovals/squares/the shape your prefer with 4 different colors, (a 4-color Bic is the easy way to go).
  • Choose 4 topics you want to study.
  • Or the main 4 parts of your next project.
  • As you use it more & more you’ll realize you’ll need more than 4 topics.
  • In the early stages it’s more convenient to synthesize.
  • A Game has 4 main elements: Story, Graphics, Music & Programming.

Compose a Vibrant Game Manual

• You notebook has 4 sections: Story, Graphics, Music & Programming.
• Of course this is a basic overlay as every topic in intertwined with all the others.
• And Gameplay is developed through each of them.
• Keep a Programming section even if you’re not developing a video game.
  • There will always be some Algorithmic in every game.
  • Developing a quick Player-Behavior schema is always a good idea in order to determine how the game may end.
• Use Post-it to separate your 4 sections (and eventual subsections).

• While visiting take visual notes, sketch the important settings to anchor them into your world dynamics.
• Sketch cartoon versions of the people around to define your characters physical archetypes.
• Color is the way to go.
• Make this booklet for you.
• Exaggerate, dramatize, so that other people will want to read it.
• Design clean logigrammes as easy to read procedures.
  • Most of the rules should come directly from the game design, but this journal is for you to have fun.

Buying Memories

Landmarks, the Soul of a Nation

• If you are building a world this is the place to start.
• Make a list of x landmarks to visit, 1 per day.

• Make a list of the questions you are going to ask/ask yourself.
• What type of Landmark is this?
  • Tower?
  • Library/Museum?
  • Transportation system?
  • Gardens?
• What does the Monument looks like, from the outside?
• From the inside?
• Observe people around you, are they happy to be there?
• Are they tourists or locals?
• Asking for the Landmark’s history is the best way to know the place.
• Ask for a Guided tour to fill the blanks & you’re ready to go.

• Create Context for the player.
• Where does you game take place?
• Do you have a clear idea on how you’ll build your settings?
  • What is the atmosphere?
  • What are the resources?
  • Who are the inhabitants?
  • How’s the wildlife?
• Are you building a full scale adventure game or a 1-room survival?
• Will you focus on Exploration, Sagas, Epics?
• Or more intimate and smaller scales games?

Restaurants & Cafes, for you & your players

• An Inn by the lake?
• Is this a survival-horror?
• A point n’ click mystery?
• A mix of the former 2?
• Does it have comedic elements?
• Dramatic elements?
• Surely, all of this would work very well.
• If you can make the setting more alive, more human.

• How do you make it?
• Observation.
• How’s in the interior design?
  • How’s the furniture?
  • The structure of the building?
  • Why does this Inn need a small library?
  • What are those noise coming from the kitchen nobody else seems to hear?
• Who are the people? Both customers & employees.
  • What do they wear?
  • How do they act?
  • Why does this man keep put his hat on & off?
  • What did this woman hid in her purse?

• You could completely reinvent Clue.
• Try to mix it with Monopoly in create mechanics such as Clue transactions, or common clue pot.
• Think about penalties such as a room that will serve for temporary custody and/or interrogation.
• Imagine a how quick game could develop.
  • Mystery.
  • Clues.
  • Hypothesis.
  • Revelation.
• Imagine 3 quick characters.
  • Solver (goal + skills/accessories).
  • Leader (goal + skills/accessories).
  • Conscience (goal + skills/accessories).
• Imagine the tools you’ll have access to.
  • Cards, dices, boards, notepads, life-counters, coins/tokens.

• Try this in multiple locations, not just inns.

Create a Continent or more

• Your journey begins before you quit home.
• Plan your schedule beforehand to optimize your travel time.
• You can get access to valuable places and people to collect unique information.
• And start.

• Traveling by land is cheaper.
• It’s also generally easier if you don’t need a visa or have to learn a new language every time you move.
  • Though it could be a missed opportunity.

• Speak with the inhabitants.
• Collect rules of local games you couldn’t find in books.
• Ask for local versions of a popular games.
• Ask why they didn’t like the rule they replace.
• Ask why they never read the rulebook.

• Would recreate the US?
• What’s the most popular game in every state?
• In every city?
• Take a landmark/landscape you like and just add some Thematic contrast.
• Make a game with the Architecture.
• It doesn’t have to be a Sim game…

• Same thing if you’re living in Europe.
• The Latin culture in the west, the Germanic culture in the north & the Slavic one in the east.
• Start your trip in Lisbon and then all the way to Minsk.
• As you go around mix & match cultures, monuments, plants, wildlife and so on.
• That’s the way to create new unique environments & characters.

Parks – The Game’s Hub

• Parks are the ideal location to rest & focus at the same time.

• Find inspiration in grassland?
• Is there a cafe around?
• Do you have a favorite dish?
• An evergreen treat?
• Then, treat yourself.
• That’s part of the creation process.
• You need to refuel this jauge called motivation.
• By thinking about new projects?
• By imagining your next composition on that little piece of napkin.
• Or just by resting…

As usual, look around:

• Observe the people to identify character traits.
• Listen, for dialogues & game mechanics.
• Watch at the Setting & Environment and describe it.
  • Write down good design choices around you

Look for the mixes of Green & Blue.

• Today was a journey, tomorrow will be too.
• What are the after effects of this journey?
• What have you learned today?
• What will you do tomorrow?

Have you ever wondered why we feel at ease in Parks?

Artistic Awareness – What’s Fun?