Game design students face industry judges in prototype pitch competition
In Dungeonomics, you are responsible for managing the day-to-day operations of a dungeon. Responsibilities include hiring and firing monster employees, and warding off heroes who come to steal the dungeon’s loot.
Dungeonomics is a tycoon-based, student-concepted video game that doesn’t exist yet. It’s one of seven game prototypes that students in MSCH-G400, Game Production II, and MSCH-G410, Game Design II, presented Friday at the game design program’s pitch night, modeled after the ABC reality show Shark Tank.
Game industry experts Michael Austin, chief creative officer and chief technical officer at Hidden Path Entertainment; Tim Fowers, independent tabletop game designer; and Paul Stephanouk, senior creative director at EA Mobile, listened to the student teams’ pitches. In conjunction with game design faculty, they decided which projects will move on to be developed in next semester’s MSCH-G450: Game Workshop I: Prototype, the first of three sequential courses during which students will create and publish their own games. Students on the canceled game teams will join the other teams to continue working.
Professor of practice Mike Sellers started the night with a brief introduction of the panel and a quick explanation of the process.
“Getting games canceled is important for students to learn, because it happens so often in the real world,” Sellers said.
Teams consisted of two to six students. The pitches included a board game, traditional video games and a virtual reality game.
The team Chaotic Good collaborated on Towerscape, the first presentation of the night. Towerscape is a virtual reality tower defense game whose art is heavily influenced by the movie Toy Story. The team members said the game aims to tap into audiences’ child-like wonder and let them engage in fantastical game play.
“We’ve upgraded our towers to have several unique tower interactions,” said junior Devin Good. The students were required to discuss the market competition and why their game was unique.
In Boarding Action, the only mobile game of the night, a great war ravages the universe. It’s up to the heroes of the game to fight on ships to save the common folk from the authoritarian government.
Hatch-a-Plan is the punny name for a dragon egg hunting, stealth roguelike game. According to the team, Hatch-a-Plan is unique because it has procedurally selected levels, which means each run-though will be an original experience.
Rollusus, said its team, is “a fast-paced, ability-driven ball combat.” The group earned high praise for the game art, which featured saturated hues and visuals inspired by the most recent Alice in Wonderland film.
Dreamscape was the most narrative-driven game presented. The heroes of the game must defeat monsters that personify specific fears, such as separation and inferiority. The main avatars of the game are a group of children, each with his or her own specific fear.
Bug Bowl was one of the more ambitious games, because the team aspires for it to be an online, multi-player game. Players must choose one of three insect avatars with its own unique strengths and try to obtain flags.
Sophomore Blake Anderson and senior Steven Self presented the only tabletop game, dubbed Perseverance. The game is a territory takeover game with drawing cards to initiate the action. Although the panel warned the duo the game might be too complicated, Anderson disagreed.
“I’m happiest when I have to spend 10 hours playing through and learning a game before I can actually play it,” he said, earning laughs from the panel.
Students win scholarships to attend San Francisco game conference
Halfway through the presentations, Sellers took a quick break to announce the winners of the Level Up scholarship. The scholarship awards six students with $1,500 to attend the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco in March.
The winners are:
- Joseph Adams, senior
- Hunter Bobeck, junior
- Devin Good, junior
- Jay Humphrey, senior
- Alex Silvertooth, senior
- Joshua Smith, senior