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Video Game Part I - Software Design and Methodology List three characteristics o

ID: 3914880 • Letter: V

Question

Video Game

Part  I  - Software Design and Methodology

List three characteristics of a game that makes it a good game and at the same time makes it ideal for education/gamification?

2.1) What is top-down software development methodology?  

2.2) Is the waterfall method a top-down software development methodology?  

2.3) Is top-down methodology a good fit for video game development?  

2.4) Explain why or why not  for your answer in 2.3?

Describe 3 ways of obtaining requirements that you would use to develop video games and explain why you would use them?

The goal of a game is what you have to do to win. In what way is the goal of the maze game the opposite of the goal of the car racer and the scrolling shooter?

Explanation / Answer

For the purpose of making a game, we can say that the following characteristics could be considered as being important in order to be able to make the game functional as well as good for a wider range of applications such as educational:-

1. Core functionality and underlying mechanics.

2. Logic of gameplay and clear understanding of the goal of the game to every player.

3. Visually definable characteristics which would make the game enjoyable.

2. The top down methodology in a software environment represents the approach where the complex functions of the design are factored first and then the underlying smaller structures that constitute it is derived from the complex structure itself. This is why it is necessarily called top down design methodology.

3. Yes, the process of development of a game does follow the design practices of top down methodology of programming. The coders even before the art team is ready with the art assets to be integrated into the game. They utilize primitive structures and placeholder items in order to today design the core functionality of the game first. This then becomes their guiding principle where they can essentially start deriving the smaller functions of the gameplay mechanics such as the health system, the score system and the underlying physics properties which then defines what the gameplay element would appear to the target audience.

4. Three requirement to design a game could be easily characterized as being the core gameplay mechanics and the derived structures from it, visual assets such as the player character and virtual scoreboard, inventory etc. And a game design architecture such as a game engine. There are libraries one can use if one does not want to follow the path of programming in a game engine in which case, the choice of the programming language and the target architecture of the device and the software on the end user's utilization also creates necessary factors for us to taken into consideration.

5. The goal of a maze game is to allow the player to reach the required destination in a set amount of time. This works with the principle of cause and effect where the need to consider the time limit derives the actions that the player chooses in order to complete the goals of the game. On the other hand, games such as a car racer and a side scrolling shooter has distinctive differences such as the presence of more than one fundamental goal, the element of competition plus the vast differences in the gameplay mechanism exist as well.