Coming along

I've been very busy lately, so I haven't updated much.

I've updated the reference model, as well as selected and finished a feature for the third step in the process, which has three defined phases:

Diverging
In this phase the designer uses creative techniques to break beyond his own patterns and structures.

Converging
In this phase the reference model allows the designer to relate his ideas to games in general, to fill in blanks and to adapt what he has into an actual game.

Development
Since the process focuses on programmers that are also experienced in game design, the last step is made especially for software prototyping. It is basically a library that can be linked to the existing game, which will allow the immediate tweaking of game variables. Wouldn't it be great, for instance, to edit the height that you can jump without having to go back and recompile?

Anything's possible, but currently the library is dependent on DirectX 9 and Windows because I haven't the time to make it cross-platform. Maybe later ;)

Here's a video of the feature in action. I'll also upload some gameplay specific examples later, but since I already had particle emitters this was the easiest one to do right away.



You can also download the video here

Another great source of information I've come across, to support the validity of the process I'm using and in fact to inspire the choice and combination of creative techniques employed, is cognitive psychology. If you're interested in creativity I suggest take a look at his website.

I've also come across the doctoral dissertation of Matti Kalevi Perttula, who did research on creativity for engineering design. This can be found here, and I especially suggest reading the third chapter, Related Studies, for the in depth history on existing research it offers.