Games Design Document (GDD)

Year 9 Games design document  Task 16.5.13

The Game Design Document (GDD) it the blueprint from which a computer or video game is to be built.  As such, every single detail necessary to build the game must be addressed in the document (or support documents). 

If it’s not in the document, then it probably won’t be in the game.

The purpose of a game design document is to unambiguously describe the game's selling points, target audience, gameplay, art, level design, story, characters, UI (user interaction), assets, etc.

In short, every game part requiring development should be included by the developer in enough detail for the developers to put it into place.

The majority of video games should require an inclusion or variation of the following sections:

•   Story

•   Characters

•   Level/environment design

•   Gameplay

•   Art

•   Sound and Music, User Interface, Game Controls

You are going to compile a GDD for an imaginary game of your own.

On the shared area is a GDD for a game called

‘Flint O’Connor and the Jewel of Halin’.

This describes the outline for one level of the game.

Overview:

This is like a quick description of the world the game is set in, the genre.

How the main character got here. What are the obstacles that will impede him are.

Gameplay:

How does the character defeat his enemies, reach specific points on the level? Does your game involve close quarter fights in order to reach goals? Solving puzzles? Does the player collect power-ups which help him to reach his objective? Can the character collect weapons? How do they work?

(See blog on Super Mario)

Characters:

Hero

Who is the main character? What makes him interesting?

Enemies

Easy enemies. They are different insects in our example game.

Medium enemies. They are wild cats in our example game.

Hard enemies. Something bigger, faster, stronger, hardest to defeat.

Flowchart:

Describes the geography of the game and whom the main character will encounter. Illustrate this using rectangles. (See the example GDD).

Map Overview:

The geography and crucial architecture of the game seen from above. (Plan view).

The document you need to create should be similar to this in layout although with less detail.

You should describe the following:

Overview	Text only
Gameplay	Text only
Characters	Text	Design
Skills and Procedures	Text
Flowchart	Text	Diagram
Map Overview		Design

Games Genre

Video game genres are used to categorise video games depending on their type of interaction rather than visual or narrative (story) differences. 

A video game genre depends on it's gameplay challenges. 
They can be listed by their setting or game-world content, not like other works of fiction such as films or books.
For example, an action game is still an action game, regardless of whether it takes place in a fantasy world or outer space. 
However, each video game genre still has certain elements that are there all the time. Most video games feature obstacles to overcome, so video game genres can be defined where obstacles are completed in similar ways.

Computer game design is always changing and developing. You can therefore expect the list given here to soon become out of date. 
As with nearly all varieties of genre, to a certain extent, a games genre will be open to personal interpretation. 
In film and TV, the audience looks for the iconography to decide what genre the text falls into. With gaming, defining the genre can be a little more complicated.

Moreover, it is important to be able to "think of each individual game as belonging to several genres at once."Genres and categories of games can help the organisations that are in place to protect certain groups (like under 18's) to develop classification.

Following is a listing of commonly used video game genres with brief descriptions and examples of each. This list is by no means complete there are even more genres and sub genres.

Contents:


1 Action1.1 Ball and paddleThe predecessor of all console game genres, a ball-and-paddle game was the first game implemented on a homeconsole (Pong). Later renditions have included Breakout, which was a driving influence behind the Apple II computer. 



1.2 Beat 'em up and hack and slash1.3 Fighting gameEmphasize one-on-one combat between two characters, one of which may be computercontrolled. This genre first appeared in 1976 with the release of Sega's Heavyweight Boxing and later became aphenomenon, particularly in the arcades, with the release of Street Fighter II



1.4 Maze game1.5 Pinball game1.6 Platform game1.7 Shooter1.7.1 First-person shootercommonly known as FPSs, emphasize shooting and combat from the perspective of the character controlled by the player. This perspective is meant to give the player the feeling of "being there", and allows the player to focus on aiming. Most FPSs are very fast-paced and require quick reflexes on high difficulty levels.Doom was the first major breakthrough in graphics; it used a number of clever techniques to make the game run fast enough to play on consumer-grade machines. Since the release of Doom, most FPS games now have a multi player feature to allow competition between multiple players. 



Games such as Team Fortress, Halo, Killzone,Metroid Prime, Unreal Tournament, Quake, Half-Life, Call of Duty, TimeSplitters and Battlefield are in the everexpanding first-person shooter genre.1.7.2 MMO FPS(Massively multiplayer online first person shooter)combines first-person shooter gameplay with a virtual world in which a large number of players can interact overthe Internet. hundreds of players can battle each other on the same server in an MMOFPS. An example of a MMOFPS is PlanetSide 2.



1.7.3 Light gun shooter1.7.4 Shoot 'em up (SHMUP)1.7.5 Tactical shooter1.7.6 Rail shooter1.7.7 Third-person shooter

2 Action-adventurecombine elements of their two component genres, typically featuring long-term obstacles that must be overcomeusing a tool or item as leverage (which is collected earlier), as well as many smaller obstacles almost constantlyin the way, action-adventure games are often confusingly called "adventure games" by gamers.2.1 Stealth gameare a somewhat recent sub-genre, sometimes referred to as "sneakers" or "creepers" to contrast with the action oriented "shooter" sub-genre.2.2 Survival horrorGames focus on fear and attempt to scare the player via traditional horror fiction elements such as atmospherics, death, the undead, blood and gore.3 Adventurewere some of the earliest games created, beginning with the text adventure Colossal Cave Adventure in the 1970s. That game was originally titled simply "Adventure," and is the namesake of the genre. Over time,graphics have been introduced to the genre and the interface has evolved. The genre peaked in popularity with the 1993 release of Myst, the best-selling PC game of all time up to that point. The simple point and click interface, detailed worlds and casual pace made it accessible, and its sense of artistic surrealism caused news outlets such as Wired Magazine, The New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle to declare that thegaming industry had matured.



3.1 Real-time 3D adventures3.2 Text adventures3.3 Graphic adventures3.4 Visual novels4 Role-playingdraw their gameplay from traditional role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons. Most cast the player in the role of one or more "adventurers" who specialize in specific skill sets (such as melee combat or casting magic spells) while progressing through a predetermined storyline. Many involve maneuvering these character(s) through an overworld, usually populated with monsters, that allows access to more important game locations, such as towns, dungeons, and castles.



4.1 Western RPGs and Japanese RPGs (JRPGs)4.2 Use of fantasy in RPGs4.3 Sandbox RPGs4.4 Action RPGs4.5 MMORPGs4.6 Rogue RPGs4.7 Tactical RPGs5 Simulationvideo games is a diverse super-category of games, generally designed to closely simulate aspects of a real or fictional reality.



5.1 Construction and management simulation5.2 Life simulationThis includes popular examples of virtual pets such as Tamagotchi, the Petz series, and Nintendogs.5.3 Vehicle simulationgames are a genre of video games which attempt to provide the player with a realistic interpretation of operatingvarious kinds of vehicles.

Flightgear:

6 StrategyVideo games focus on gameplay requiring careful and skillful thinking and planning in order to achieve victory. Inmost strategy video games "the player is given a godlike view of the game world, indirectly controlling the unitsunder his command.6.1 4X game6.2 Artillery game

Scorched 3d is an artillery game:



6.3 Real-time strategy (RTS)6.4 Real-time tactics6.5 Tower defense6.6 Turn-based strategy6.7 Turn-based tactics6.8 Wargame

7 Other notable genres7.1 Arcade game7.2 Music game7.3 Party game7.4 Programming game7.5 Puzzle game7.6 Sports game7.7 Trivia game7.8 Board game / Card game

8 Video game genres by purpose8.1 Adult video game8.2 Advergame8.3 Art game8.4 Casual game8.5 Christian game8.6 Educational game8.7 Electronic sports8.8 Exergame8.9 Serious game