Posted on April 17, 2017
eXperience Plan To Do
If you are interested in participating in eXperience Play (XP) remotely, I’m going to provide a to-do list of items each week. These to-do lists will include a variety of tasks such as playing games, reflecting, blogging, and portions of game development. If you complete all five to-do lists, you will produce an educational text-based game in five weeks. This post corresponds with the second session of XP.
Part 1 – Game Development
1. Watch this video:
Think about the scope of the game you want to build and know that you do not have to make a perfect game on your first try. You are learning and experimenting!
2. Outline the story/choices of your game (from the idea you were brainstorming last week).
3. Create a storyboard to visually organize the outline of your game. Hold onto this storyboard for next week. Here’s an examples of how the connections in your storyboard may look:
Please note that I’m not concerned with an “official” way to storyboard or plan your game. XP participants have developed flow charts on whiteboards, used notecards to represent each “scene” of their text-based game, setup spreadsheets to map out choices, and created digital flow charts using software like CmapTools. Use whatever tools you need/want while planning your game. If you have questions about this or want to engage with us, feel free to reach out to us.
Here’s another example of the planning taking place in XP:
Had fun storyboarding the "typology game" I am designing for #eXperiencePlay at OU. Aiming for something nonlinear. pic.twitter.com/mqeW5LkFll
— Mark Norris (@stipulative) September 20, 2016
Part 2 – Professional Development
4. Write a blog post about your experience planning your game using the following prompt:
- Write an overview of the process you followed while planning your game. Document what tools you used (whiteboard, notecards, software, other, etc.) and include screenshots of your planning artifacts (complete or in-progress).
- Reflect and write about how this outlining and storyboarding exercise helped you while planning your game. Alternatively, applying this activity to the classroom, how can outlining and storyboarding a concept or project aid a student?
- Research & define “Digital Storytelling” in your own words. Describe your outlining and storyboarding exercise in the context of your definition of “Digital Storytelling.”
Please have your plan/storyboard for your text-based game ready by next session. Feel free to share your storyboard with me via Twitter or email or reach out with any questions.