Our Game Pitch Presentation: LUCID

So here is my first attempt at pitching/ getting the idea of my game across to my class, everyone seemed to like the idea but wanted me to be able to describe what it would be like more, for example by comparing it to other games.

 Was going to be called Lucidity but I was informed that was already a game name. Above art is not my work.

Below represent the feel and tone of the environments I would like to achieve.

Below represent what the spirits would look like when tainted evil (left) and pure (right).

Game Research - Far Cry 3

Here are some game play images from Far cry 3 after the protagonist has just ingested some hallucinogenic mushrooms. The game attempts to portray what it would be like to hallucinate, allowing the player to experience something that would never happen in everyday life. That's what I want my game to do, I want the players to experience things that wouldn't happen anywhere other than in dreams (or hallucinations). For the demo I wont be able to but for the actual game I would like to use the effects used in this clip, such as the changing of colours and the way it goes from real time to slow-mo but you stay the same speed.

In the top image, plates and pots are just slowly rising against gravity and then exploding at will, this reminds me of the scene in Inception where the dream starts to break and everything in the market starts to explode. Here they also use the effect of playing with speed/time to give a dreamy surreal effect.

Game Analysis (Nature Treks, Alz, Ether One)

Nature Treks:

❏Audience: Those looking for an interactive experience, that promotes relaxation, mood stability and aids sleep.

❏Genre: A non competitive first person adventure.

❏Platform: Found as an online game

❏Themes: Calm, Colours,Tranquility, beautiful rich forest environment

❏Relationship to your game / reason for playing: I wanted to see how good an online first person could look and feel. The lighting effects looked interesting.

In this game you adventure through a beautiful calming forest environment, the only goal is

to collect these coloured lights which fill up your petal wheel. When you collect a colour, a

wave of coloured mist creeps through the environment, this is something I would like to

achieve in my game. 

ALZ

❏Audience: Those looking for more of an emotional response/ experience

❏Genre: Side-scrolling Experiential Adventure Game 

❏Platform: Flash Player

❏Themes: Dementia, specifically Alzheimers & what its like for those who suffer from it. 

❏Relationship to your game / reason for playing: To look how other game designers show a change in perception, different perceptions. To see how they show what its like to go about your day with gaps in your memory.

❏Where/ When is it set? In every day life eg at home, the park, town.

❏Are you interested in your surrounding? Yes, they are essential to the game. You walk through and press space on distinguishable objects such as black box's which are in constant glitch. You bump into the box a couple of times. The game is mostly all a teal character apart from your pink head and specific objects that glitch to pink, such as a tree and mannequin  and the black box. Near the end you glitch through all the places you have been quickly and appear back at the start, at home. Where the Black box glitches to pink and then to the shape of your wife. The realisation that this thing you have been seeing throughout the game not knowing why or what its there for, is your wife is heartbreaking. Here are the last few lines of the game, which give you the realisation of what is going on, and how hard it must be for not only those who suffer from it but there loved ones too.

"Honey we can get through this"

"A large... something, not sure what its for"

"I will always be here for you" 

"What was it for"

"We'll go to the doctors today for another scan"

"Why is it even here"

"Please don't go out by yourself again"

"It seems familiar somehow"

"I Love You Dear"

❏What others said about it

"A message that is immensely powerful as it is immensely creative"

"It doesn't take over the top work to send a powerful message"

I went on to find another game about dementia, called Ether One. The idea is that you're a

'Restorer', who uses a special chair to enter the mind of a dementia patient called Jean and

cut the problem out at its source. I looked in to this a bit but it did not interest me that much apart from the initial plot which I mentioned, once inside the persons head its more of an adventure and puzzle based game from what i can tell.

Contextual Studies: Affordances, Signifiers, and Constraints

Affordance: A situation where an objects sensory characteristics intuitively imply its functionality and use. In traditional design they are things built to be naturally, almost physiologically intuited e.g. the handle of a teacup which you pick up by the handle despite never being taught it's the place your supposed to hold.
In gaming, designers use affordances in an attempt to make aspects of the game intuitive eg in controls and mechanics. This is why controllers have changed so much over time in attempt to create something that feels very natural. Affordance is used anywhere where form implies function, for example using shapes we have associations with such as alien guns in games have some resemblance of human guns so we know what they are. Another example is in controllers for racing games the bumpers match the controls to a car. Types of Affordance:

Navigational Affordance: How do you get the player go where you want? By making it the natural place to go, by implying with path, doorway etc.

Environmental Affordance: green rectangles & silver circles mean nothing on there own, but when put next to a cash machine, then they become money and coins in the mind of the player.

Systemic Affordance: Spearmen Beat Horseman, Horsemen beat Footmen, Footmen beat Spearmen. This way of designing offers the player an affordance so they can intuit how they can play.




Signifiers: Communicates where an action should take place.
Constraints: Limits possible actions for users

lean development

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Design Questions

This time in Game Analysis, instead of playing and analysing game we played George gave us questions from actual Design interviews and tests in the industry and we had to answer them:

When designing games, you will often need to create numerical values to represents aspects of characters & objects i.e:

Strength - Affects melee damage and amount you can carry

Max speed - The maximum speed the car can go when not impeded.

Q1: With each of the following examples, think of 3 statistics that you would feel are important and what they are for.

❏Astronaut 

Oxygen Consumption: 0% = Death, must return to the satellite occasionally to refill. 

Jet Power: Affects speed and direction, If you use the last of your fuel on going outward then you'll never return to the satellite and thus die.

Safety Rope Length: How far from the satellite you are able to trave.

❏Table

Enchantment Level: How fast you can move as a table.

Size: Area of surface equates to how much you can carry.

Wood type: Affects the weight of the objects you can carry (Bolster, Pine, Teak Oak).

❏Sugar Glider

Lift: Affects the distance you can glide.

Tail Length: Affects agility, so how quickly you can manoeuvre the Sugar Glider.

Health: Lost when crashing into obstacles or enemies, death occurs at 0%.

❏Rafflesia Arnoldii

Flower Size: Affects the size of the fly you can consume.

Odour Strength: Affects level of attraction, how many & how close insects fly.

Fertility: Affects how quickly you can grow.

Q2: First person shooters (FPS) are a large part of the games market and generally keep

player retention through competitive play.

- Think of 2 themes for FPS mechanics that do not involve guns, violence or killing.

- Research 2 games that also do this.

My Dream: MyDream is a first person action adventure, but not with senseless violence. MyDream is strongly committed to providing an enriching and positive environment for players of all ages. In places there is a gun/ telekinetic device which allows you to shape the world in which you live, e.g make caves or hills. 

Unfinished Swan: In this you are chasing a swan through a 3d environment which appears only white, like a blank page. Its a first person shooter in which you throw projectile paint blobs in order to see the way path through the level. 

Q3: What is ‘rubber-banding’ in competitive games?

Rubber banding is to give a winning player a disadvantage and a losing player an

advantage to level the playing field and give everyone a fair chance at winning the game.

Racing games use this very often.

-What Games use it?

Most MarioKarts, in my case Mariokart 64

-How do they use it?

In Mario Kart 64 when a players is losing they have a much higher chance of collecting the

lightening power, in which you can turn all the other opponents small and thus slow them

down. Or you may gain star power which is invulnerability or infinite mushroom which is

infinite boosts. You are unlikely to collect these when winning where you collect the worse

items such as a single banana. 

Dreamtime: Aboriginal Culture

Animism is the worldview that non-human entities (animals, plants, and inanimate objects or phenomena) possess a spiritual essence. In the Animist framework of Australian Aboriginal mythology, Dreamtime is a place beyond time and space in which the past, present, and future exist wholly as one. Tribespeople could enter this alternate universe through dreams or various states of altered consciousness, as well as death, Dreamtime being considered the final destination before reincarnation.

"Dreaming" is also used to refer to an individual's or group's set of beliefs. For instance, an Indigenous Australian might say that he or she has Kangaroo Dreaming, or Shark Dreaming, or Honey Ant Dreaming, or any combination of Dreaming's pertinent to their country. This is because in "Dreamtime" an individual's entire ancestry exists as one, culminating in the idea that all worldly knowledge is accumulated through one's ancestors. Many Indigenous Australians also refer to the Creation time as "The Dreaming". The Dreamtime laid down the patterns of life for the Aboriginal people.

It pervades and informs all spiritual and physical aspects of an indigenous Australian's life. This eternal part existed before the life of the individual begins, and continues to exist when the life of the individual ends. Both before and after life, it is believed that this spirit-child exists in the Dreaming and is only initiated into life by being born through a mother. When the mother felt the child move in the womb for the first time, it was thought that this was the work of the spirit of the land in which the mother then stood. Upon birth, the child is considered to be a special custodian of that part of his country and is taught the stories and songlines of that place. As Wolf (1994: p. 14) states: "A black 'fella' may regard his totem or the place from which his spirit came as his Dreaming. He may also regard tribal law as his Dreaming."

It was believed that before humans, animals and plants came into being, their 'souls' existed; they knew they would become physical, but they didn't know when. And when that time came, all but one of the 'souls' became plants or animals, with the last one becoming human and acting as a custodian or guardian to the natural world around them.

Traditional Australian indigenous peoples embrace all phenomena and life as part of a vast and complex system-network of relationships which can be traced directly back to the ancestral Totemic Spirit Beings of The Dreaming. This structure of relations, including food taboos, had the result of maintaining the biological diversity of the indigenous environment. It may have helped prevent overhunting of particular species.

The Creation was believed to be the work of culture heroes who traveled across a formless land, creating sacred sites and significant places of interest in their travels. In this way songlines were established, some of which could travel right across Australia, through as many as six to ten different language groupings. The songs and dances of a particular songline were kept alive and frequently performed at large gatherings, organised in good seasons.

In one version (there are many Aboriginal cultures), Altjira was a spirit of the Dreamtime; he created the Earth and then retired as the Dreamtime vanished, with the coming of Europeans. Alternative names for Altjira in other Australian languages include Alchera (Arrernte), Alcheringa, Mura-mura (Dieri), and Tjukurpa (Pitjantjatjara). (All of the above found from wikipedia )

How is Narrative Design Accomplished? Game Review: Every Day the Same Dream & The Stanley Parable

In the book Professional Techniques for Video Game Writing, Jay Posey explains the role of narrative designer by saying:

 "… if narrative is 'the story the game tells' Narrative Design is the creation of that story and the design of the mechanics through which the story is told. That is, Narrative Design encompasses not only the story itself but also how the story is communicated to players and how other game features support and immerse the player within the game world."

Posey says narrative designers are the combination of a writer and a designer. An that the difference between how a designer and a narrative designer would look at a save-game feature; the designer has to make sure it functions properly, while the narrative designer must make sure the way it is presented to the player is cohesive with the game itself.

The most common ways to implement narrative design are displayed in the classics most people are used to. Things like audio, well-written character dialogue, journals, narrators, loading screens, and side-kicks go a long way to convey story to the player without breaking immersion — this, of course, being the main goal to think about in narrative design.

Environmental Storytelling

There are many different ways to amp up the level of narrative design within a game. One way is called "environmental storytelling." This is the most subtle way to provide back story without actually using dialogue or any other written word. Amnesia is a perfect example of environmental storytelling. You are not given much to go on in the beginning of the game, so you must observe your surroundings to gather more information about the situation at hand.

(taken from http://www.gamnesia.com/articles/narrative-design-in-video-games#.VEU_oildXIV)

Whilst researching into narrative in gaming I came across a pretty simple game called save the date, where you have to pick from a list of possible thing so do/say which more often than not lead to the date metaphorically dyeing or quite literally eg choosing to go to a thai restaurant leads to the date dyeing of an allergic reaction. You must keep the correct ones in memory to get further and further. "Save the date successfully demonstrates how cross-session memory can be used to enrich the narrative experience by reflecting the player’s growing knowledge" that is taken from a review I watched on it.

Every Day The Same Dream:

Is a short, 2D flash side scroller that was made in 6 days for the Experimental Gameplay Project the creator, Paolo Pedercini, claims it is "a short existential game about alienation and refusal of labor." You play as a regular office worker going through everyday life, I have played it and it was quite a bleak surreal experience. If you go go onto go through a normal day e.g. get dressed, talk to wife, drive to work, sit at the desk then the day automatically restarts. It reminds me of a more depressing monochrome version of the film groundhog day (without all the romance), you continue to restart the day and each time try and do or not do everyday things in different orders in order to break out of the endless cycle. The only thing that does change is an old woman in the elevator who offers the cryptic message: "5 more steps and you will be a new person." Eventually you have done all the steps and continue on to the office as usual to find it empty, only to watch an identical character to jump of the roof, here the game ends.

I find the end quite morbid, and feels that it suggests the only way for the character to break out of the daily routine he is trapped in, is to throw himself of his work building. When we finish the game are we winning? If that person you watch jump is yourself, does suicide count as winning as it does break out of the mundane routine. "Some find the label "game" unfit for this work, offering "interactive experience" as a more accurate definition" I understand this statement, it goes to show how much game designers are starting to push the boundaries of what a game is and means. I enjoyed the monochrome visual style of the game, it was simple yet effective, it emphasises the mundane life you as the character are trying to escape. (can be played here: http://www.molleindustria.org/everydaythesamedream/everydaythesamedream.html )

The Stanley Parable:

Is somewhat a mix of the two above games; Everyday the same dream and Save the Date, in terms of it being about an escape from the mundanity of everyday life and the idea of multiple narratives being possible. I haven't been able to play it but the review below about The Stanley Parable by IGN's Keza MacDonald really caught my attention i have highlighted a few lines that really interest me. The Stanley Parable is an experimental narrative-driven first person game, It is an exploration of choice, freedom, storytelling and reality.

DOES CHOICE MEAN ANYTHING?

The Stanley Parable is an experiment with interactive narrative, another attempt to find a new form of storytelling unique to video games. It’s funny, self-referential, surprising, and sometimes uncomfortable to play, a tale told not through one linear story but instead through many different branching paths that twists the illusion of control that video games work so hard to give us.

The Stanley Parable starts in a standard cubicle in an artfully bland looking office, cursor blinking on the screen of a beige monitor. You are Stanley, an obedient salaryman who spends his days obediently typing commands in a grey cubicle. One day, all of his coworkers disappear, leaving him to explore the office alone in the company of an avuncular narrator.

This narrator is not like most, he teases, mocks, gets bored or angry with you, whispers conspiratorially with you and – most importantly – tells you what to do to advance the story as you explore an office that’s terrifying in its dullness, from the uniform carpeting to the marketing platitudes on the whiteboards and generic nature paintings, almost everything stamped with a number.

My immediate instinct was to disobey the voice in my head, but however you try to subvert it, The Stanley Parable is ready with yet another prepared scenario, another chunk of witty script, at once mocking and rewarding you for attempting to deviate from the set path – although, and this is the crucial point, everything is a set path in The Stanley Parable, and it mocks the illusion of choice. You think that you’re manipulating the outcome, but really it’s always the narrator manipulating you.

I suppose the point of The Stanley Parable, if you feel compelled to find a point to it, is probably to see all of its various endings and permutations, which spiral out from basic choices – like taking the door on the left, or the door on the right – into alternate plot lines with further branching events, fanning outwards to unpredictable conclusions. The text “the end is never the end” loops across the screen when you find one of these endings, and you are returned to Stanley’s cubicle to start again.

What’s impressive is how limited environments and apparently limited choices lead to so many different outcomes. Occasionally you’ll make the exact same decisions and something different will happen, as the narrator changes track. In about an hour I found seven different endings, and as soon as I watched someone else play, they found another two that I’d never seen before.

“

Sometimes The Stanley Parable feels like an exploration of the peculiar madness of boredom.

My first Stanley Parable experience was a Kafkaesque bureaucratic nightmare where every attempt I made to exercise my power of choice led me deeper to an increasingly rigid, inescapable series of commands that I had no choice but to follow, culminating in my death. Many of its permutations trap you in infinite loops, forced to listen to the narrator pontificate until he deigns to give you another command. The narrator’s total control over what you can do and when you can do it sometimes makes him feel like a jailer; other times he’s a friend, a companion, a gentle jocular guide.

It’s an intensely strange experience for somebody intimately familiar with video games and their rules. You think you can break them, but the narrator is always a few steps ahead of you, and ultimately you’re left questioning what the point of choice is at all in a system where every permutation is laid out for you and some omniscient narrator seems able to predict your every move. The only way to The Stanley Parable’s ironic “best” ending is to follow the narrator’s directions and do as you’re told like a good little droid, at which point a cruelly arch achievement pops up congratulating you for “beating the game”.

Based on its premise, I thought The Stanley Parable might be a celebration of choice, of the power that we have to break out of our life’s constraints by simply acting differently, but that’s exactly the notion that The Stanley Parable attacks. I found it very uncomfortable to play at times, like I was trapped in it – it’s the closest a game has ever come to replicating that feeling of being stuck in a repetitive dream.

THE VERDICT

Sometimes The Stanley Parable feels like an exploration of the peculiar madness of boredom. Other times it’s something else entirely: a joke at the player’s expense, a commentary on choice and consequence, a parody, a bureaucratic nightmare. All its different plot lines and personalities overlap and combine to create something that’s intriguingly opaque, but always entertaining, and genuinely funny. Whatever it is, it’s worth playing.

Extra Credits - The Illusion of Choice - How Games Balance Freedom and Scope ( worth a watch)

Colour Theme Mood Board

These Images are of concept art for Alice: Madness Returns, Epic Mickey, and Gravity Rush, they show the kind of blends and tones of colours that I would like to achieve in my game. Also I like the way the monsters look, its the kind of look I want. For the monsters to not be to defined, have a fluidity about them as if there made out of ink, or are a symbiot like Marvels character Venom. 

Looking Into Rogue Legacy

Unfortunately I haven't been able to play this game called Rogue Legacy which is probably for the best as its meant to be very addictive and I have lots of work to do, however I have researched and heard about it of my Tutor. As I am planning on doing a first person game I was not expecting to be inspired by a 2D side scroller, such as this, but this is not your usual side scroller.  
(from Wiki) The goal of Rogue Legacy is to explore a randomly generated dungeon, defeat four bosses in each of the four unique environments of the dungeon, and then defeat the final boss. Characters have the default ability to jump and slash with their sword, along with secondary abilities, such as magic attacks, which use mana.

Whenever a character dies as a result of losing all of their HP, control will transfer over to one of three randomly generated heirs, each with their own unique characteristics and abilities. Such genetic peculiarities include color-blindness (in which the game is presented in black and white), ADHD (in which the player moves faster) and dwarfism (in which the character is short and can fit into small gaps).

Gold found while exploring the castle is passed onto that character's heir and can be used to improve the abilities of any successive heirs. Spending gold on the manor, which appears after a new heir is chosen, can increase stats, such as health and mana, and unlock and upgrade new classes that may be carried by one of the heirs. These include mages, which can use more advanced spells, warriors, who have higher strength, and assassins, who can use various stealth techniques and perform critical hits.

Well the way its not an ordinary side scroller is the fact that when you die, you get to choose from three randomly generated heirs of which may have beneficial and negative traits. The gold collected before death is passed on to the heir and can be used to increase stats.

The great Picasso said "good artists copy but great artists steal", because every artist is influenced by the works that have preceded them. So when I say i plan to steal the initial idea don't judge. I plan to use the idea that after dying in the game you are replaced with a character but who has different and abilities. 

I like the idea that in Lucidity, when you are beaten in battle you come back to the last checkpoint but have a different set of abilities that our randomly generated that may or may not help you get past the obstacle this time, as in dreams I often have different powers which I imagine in order to pass obstacles. Ill have it so there are a few unique abilities you can only have through random generation after death and a number of which you collect and can always equip. The idea of the colour blindness in a game as well interest me, maybe sometime the colours would all change when coming back to life, by using filters. Perhaps I could have mixed traits in which you have a negative such as asthma (as i often find it hard to breath when dreaming to intensely) mixed with a more positive trait than usual such as anti-gravity for you or your enemies. 

Other Games Style Mood Board

Again here I have been looking at other games to get across the kind of feel I want my game to get across. Obviously Alice in Wonderland is one of the most famous dreamworlds created, So I looked into some of the environments featured in Alice: Madness Returns which is set in the topsy-turvy world of Wonderland. Although the environments wouldn't exist in our world, such as the floating rocks everything seems to tangible and real, things seem to clear for it actually to be a dream. But maybe that is what I want a dreamworld so vivid your not sure if you are awake.

The third image down is from the game Shadow of the Colossus, In which the environments are wide open plains that take a while to cross. I like the idea of vast plains, in which you can lose your sense of direction. I really like the art style for this game especially the creatures.

The last image is from a game my friend suggested to me but is a game called Datura, which in depressingly is very similar to what I pictured in my head. I may have to experiment more to find something original I can do to make my dream environments unique dream like and my own.

Enviroment, Colour and Tone Mood Board

Here I started to look at other games (as well as looking at concept art for the dream works film The Croods which is on the right hand side). The top left two are from the well renown India game Journey, which is amazing as a piece of art in itself as well as a game. The images are in game shots, which just show how epic it is. The character design is iconic, and these shots shown show how I would like areas of my game to be lighted like. 

The third image down is from a 2D side scroller called Limbo, where you travel through surreal environment and must pass the many dangers. The art style is really cool you can see how its sepia and black, and the character and enemy again have the glowing eyes that I plan on doing in my game. I really enjoy the blur effects on the environment and how out of focus it is. 

The last image I believe is from FarCry, but just show an action shot of the character travelling through a really creepy forest that has no leaves, reminds me of in snow white in the dark forest where the branches are like hands reaching out. I would go for this if maybe I wanted to go for a more nightmarish area of the game.

Enviroment, Colour & Tone Moodboard

For my game I really want to capture the dreamy tones of the pictures below. I really like the colour schemes, the majority being cool blues and greens with dots and places of warmer colours. Again like the last mood board I am infatuated by the quite simple creatures with the glowing eyes. I want lots of mists and ambiance, and perhaps for the depth of field to change with the foreground being in focus and anything behind being blurred by mists and lighting. 

Environment/ Feeling Mood Board

I found these images on Pintrest unfortunately I couldn't locate the name of the artist. What I like most about these pictures is the use of scale in the environment to achieve dramatic effect. I like the creatures glowing eyes in the mist in the blue misted forest I am definitely going to look into that type of look for my nightmare creatures. I really like the mood of the bottom right picture where the knight approaches the huddle of suspicious silhouettes. I think it would be a cool to mechanic to have in my game, to have a group like that which seem calm but once you reach a certain distance they become hostile and attack. 

I LOVE THESE! Yao Yao

I found these whilst exploring the depths of Pintrest, and they are awesome! They are by an Artist called Yao Yao, I love how every environment is unique and magical both in colour scheme and design, as well as how vast many of them seem to be stretching on to the horizon. I feel that they are dreamy in that they like a dream land they seem to have no borders, I would love for my game to achieve this kind of feel however I feel that it is to close to the art and design of the game Journey, which I must look into. Im not to sure if Yao Yao was inspired by Journey or if he did these paintings before its creation, either way environment wise his are still very unique.

Final Game Idea: First Draft

Game Title Ideas?
Dream Journal, Escaping Subconscious, Lucid, Lucidity,
Im going to go for Lucidity, so ...

Lucidity (First Person)

Make your way through the surreal dreamscapes of your mind & take control of your subconscious. Achieve this buy collecting Lucidity particles. Fight creatures of the night and gain powers to help you on your way. Scared of heights? Then why let gravity get you down with the power of flight.
Adventure your way through a world of your own, and rid your world of nightmares.
This is your world, Become King...
Use your Imagination & willpower to adapt to any obstacle you find on the astral plane.

As you play through the game the enemies and environments become harder.

How I came to this Idea
After thinking of meaningful games to do with Narcolepsy, I struggled to create a suitable game that could let the player experience what its actually like to be a Narcoleptic. There are some things games just cant get across, well not yet. I started to think that realistically your average gamer would not want to play a game that allows you to experience Narcolepsy, it may be educational and perhaps help people relate to Narcoleptics but it wouldn't be an enjoyable experience that they would want to come back too.
I would like my game to be something the player would like to come back to and get lost in. Then I started asking myself what part of Narcolepsy would normal people like to experience? I thought about hallucinations, although interesting they are more scary than anything else.
There aren't any true positive of being a narcoleptic but there is a double edged sword, (and my game will show the positive edge) as what is partly to blame for the excessive daytime sleepiness is that we spend a large time of time asleep in R.E.M. where we dream more vividly and for longer than people who have normal sleep cycles. I have not actually met any other Narcoleptics as it is quite an unusual condition but I am under the belief that the majority like me are able to Lucid dream, as we spend so much of our time dreaming I think its only natural to learn how to control it.

So Im hoping for my game to get across the experience not so much of being Narcoleptic but of being a Lucid Dreamer.
Heres some Wikipedia if your unsure what Lucid Dreaming is, (it is a vague term as there our different kinds but heres the gist):
A lucid dream is any dream in which one is aware that one is dreaming. In a lucid dream, the dreamer has greater chances to exert some degree of control over their participation within the dream or be able to manipulate their imaginary experiences in the dream environment. Lucid dreams can be realistic and vivid. It is shown that there are higher amounts of beta-1 frequency band (13–19 Hz) brain wave activity experienced by lucid dreamers, hence there is an increased amount of activity in the parietal lobes making lucid dreaming a conscious process. 

Train (or How I Dumped Electricity and Learned to Love Design)

In our group we watched an hour long GDC presentation by Brenda (Romero) Brathwaite called: Train ( How I Dumped Electricity and Learned to Love Design)

I found this hard work to listen to, and unfortunately (due to narcolepsy) missed the majority of it. To start with I didn't really understand what it was all about due to my drowsiness  but after reading up on it on http://venturebeat.com/2013/05/11/brenda-romero-train-board-game-holocaust/ I really appreciated it much more. I had never given much thought to how much of a deep meaning a game could to get across, especially a board game. It interested me to hear of all the different reactions that the game evoked in people. Train explores complicity, she say “People blindly follow rules, Will they blindly follow rules that come out of a Nazi typewriter?”. This presentation really changed the way that I look at games, and how that they can be in there own way like a piece of fine art, the meaning is in the mechanics.

Narcolepsy Themed Game (Exploring Deeper Meanings within Games)

After watching the video on Brenda Romero's train, Mark suggested we try designing a game with deeper meaning perhaps based on social or global issues or something that has a special meaning for us. I started looking at global issues such as global isolation but any ideas I had were pretty poor. I started to look at disorders after such as Dyslexia as its something that I could relate to more, I had some Ideas for some puzzle based games but none I was enthusiastic about. 

Then I started to think about games that would put the players through the experience of a Narcoleptic. I am Narcoleptic and know that very few people manage to take it seriously when I explain to them what it is, some say they wish they had it, so that they could get to sleep easy or use it as an excuse. I understand there is a comical side to Narcolepsy but for those with more severe cases you must imagine that its as if they are trapped in there own body. Narcolepsy has a sistering condition called Catalepsy which is where one loses the control of their muscles either randomly or more often when triggered by strong emotions such as fright, excitation or in my case laughter.

For those who don't know what it is Narcolepsy is heres some knowledge : (from Wikipedia) There are two main characteristics of narcolepsy: excessive daytime sleepiness and abnormal REM sleep. The first, excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS), occurs even after adequate night time sleep. A person with narcolepsy is likely to become drowsy or fall asleep, often at inappropriate times and places, or just be very tired throughout the day. Narcoleptics are not able to experience the amount of restorative deep sleep that healthy people experience – they are not "over-sleeping". In fact, narcoleptics live their entire lives in a constant state of extreme sleep deprivation. Daytime naps may occur with little warning and may be physically irresistible. Vivid dreams may be experienced on a constant or regular basis, even during very brief naps. A second prominent symptom of narcolepsy is abnormal REM sleep. Narcoleptics are unique in that they enter into the REM phase of sleep in the beginnings of sleep, even when sleeping during the day. 

• Associated features include: sleep paralysis; disrupted major sleep episode; Vivid dreams, hypnagogic hallucinations; automatic behaviours, complaints of excessive sleepiness or sudden muscle weakness

Initial Narcolepsy Game (based on EDS)

My Initial idea was to have a game in which you would play a school boy as Narcolepsy develops during puberty/ teenage-hood and this is the time when it can be most stressful and freighting especially if you have not been diagnosed. The screen would show you facing the front of the class, the screen would then black out. (Annoyingly I never notice falling asleep or if I do its already to late) In game you would wake in a dream world, you would have to make your way through the level in order to wake up. You would have objectives in each the dream & real world, Stimuli such as scary or funny would cause catalepsy in which the screen would shake and blur, you would have to tap rapidly to try and re-gain control of your muscles to try and stay in the real world longer.

Second Narcolepsy Idea (based on hypnagogic hallucinations)

This idea is for the players to experience the hallucinatory symptoms of Narcolepsy. You would wake up in bed unable to move (sleep paralysis) surrounded by strange creatures among a normal bedroom environment. Convince yourself there not real by getting to the bathroom to wash your face ( This is what I did). Problem is you never make it to the bathroom, each time its in sight at the end of the corridor something takes you a different route. Then you would wake up in the bed again, like a dream within a dream and try get down the again. Unfortunately this idea was pretty vague and I couldn't think of how to make it into a playable working game, with clear goals and objective.  

More Map Research

Here are a few maps that I found in my research that I found really interesting

Reconstruction of Homer's view of the world / from Landström, B., 1964

14th century Korean star map

World without water. Dutch, 1690.

A Korean map from the 1800s, entitled “Map of Heaven and Earth

a map of Pangaea - the Earth 240 million years ago

Europe as a Queen - Munster's map of Europe in the shape of a Queen. During the late 16th Century, a few map makers created these now highly prized map images, wherein countries and continents were given human or animal forms. Among the earliest examples is this map of Europe.  A nice example in full color, from a German edition of Munster's Cosmographia, first published in 1545, but continuously expanded thereafter until the 1620s.