Experimental Gameplay Workshop

2004 Call for Participation

I. Introduction

 

The Experimental Gameplay Workshop is a forum for the discussion of innovative game designs. We meet once a year.  The next meeting will occur at the 2004 Game Developers Conference in San Jose, California.  Developers who are pushing the boundaries of traditional gameplay are encouraged to submit their work using the entry form in Section VI.  The deadline for submissions is Friday January 16, 2004.

 

 

II. Purpose

 

The goals of the Experimental Gameplay Workshop are to:

  • Provide a forum where developers can showcase non-traditional work;

  • Evangelize the idea of gameplay experimentation;

  • Build a community of experimental game developers;

  • Advance computer game design as a craft and art form.

 

III. Philosophy

 

The game industry provides little support for experimentation in game design. Experimentation involves taking risks, which implies frequent failure; today's game industry is extremely risk-averse. The Workshop does not see this tendency of the mainstream industry as a negative thing; rather, it is natural and to be expected. The Workshop seeks ways to augment this mainstream system.

Other recognized art forms, including music, film, and literature, have developed publishing systems that exhibit strong risk aversion; but they also have established mechanisms for encouraging and exploiting experimental works, and for bringing these new ideas into the mainstream creative process over time. These mechanisms prevent an art form from iterating endlessly on proven successes and stagnating creatively.

The Experimental Gameplay Workshop provides a platform for designers to showcase their risky new work and discuss it with peers. By explicitly acknowledging the existence of a community of experimental game designers, we help to legitimize and popularize gameplay-oriented research and development.

 

IV. What is, and is not, Experimental Gameplay?

 

The boundaries of gameplay experimentalism are hard to delineate precisely.  We give examples in the hope of illuminating the submission guidelines, but these examples should not be considered too carefully.  Don't hesitate to contact the workshop organizers with questions.

 

 

Things We Consider to be Experimental Gameplay

 

  •  Innovative user interfaces that use natural language processing, image recognition, gestural control, new hardware devices, and the like.

  • Generative games, where the gameplay or world is dynamically created based on choices the player makes.

  • Gameplay based on the emotions of (and interactions between) non-player-characters, where the player influences the characters to achieve some goal.

  • Interactive storytelling, where the plot or dialog of the game changes in a fine-grained manner (in contrast with more typical discrete "branching points").

  • Subtle emergent gameplay, where game systems interact to provide evolving situations. Physics-based gameplay might be an example of this, or complex interpersonal interactions between characters, like alliances and feuds between groups.

  • Novel sorts of multiplayer interactions, whether online, at the same machine, with wireless devices, using image recognition, or something else entirely.

  • Systems for allowing players to solve problems in the gameworld by expressing themselves and their personalities, rather than having a single predetermined solution. Such problems could be low-level (like how to open a door), or high-level (like how to get two characters to go on a date).

 

Things That Would Be Inappropriate for the Workshop

 

  • New, strange, or "edgy" background stories, settings, character designs, artwork, audio, or plots that do not affect the core gameplay in a major way.

  • New hybrids of already-existing genres, unless the resulting gameplay is unexpectedly more than the sum of the parts.

  • Games targeted for currently under-served audiences, like games for girls, seniors, or 37-year-old Antarcticans, but where the gameplay itself is not experimental.

  • Experimental business models or distribution mechanisms that do not affect gameplay.

  • Purely technical innovation that does not affect the gameplay in a basic way.

 

The above guidelines are a bit vague -- this is purposeful, as new and experimental things will by definition fall outside existing preconceptions.

Here are two examples of games from the 2003 workshop that illustrate what we're about:

Mojibribbon (Masaya Matsuura) uses an analog stick to simulate the flowing feel of calligraphic writing. Each level consists of a rap written in calligraphy, which the player must "write" with the stick in the appropriate rhythm. Ink is a controlled resource, so the player must be careful in his use of the analog stick. A voice synthesizer reads the rap as it is played. Players can compose their own raps and exhange them via e-mail.

Galstaff (Jonathan Blow) implements a "mouse gesture" system that the player uses in order to cast spells, in the spirit of games like Black & White and Arx Fatalis. But unlike previous games, Galstaff pays attention to the details of the shape you draw (the lengths of various lines, the amount of curvature, the size of one loop relative to another) to control parameters of the spell. The idea is to give the player some nuance in control, and to enable more player expression in minute-to-minute gameplay.


You may wish to look over the other games from previous workshops; click here for the 2003 workshop, or here for the 2002 workshop.

 

We recognize that not all experiments are successful; designers learn from failure as well as success. There is no requirement that submitted gameplay experiments be "fun" ("fun" being one definition of "successful gameplay"), but they should be interesting.

 

There are no constraints on game budgets, team size, on whether the game has a publisher or has been published already, or on the target platform.  Submissions do not have to be finished games, but having a playable demo is important. It is possible that a submission could be accepted without a running game to demonstrate the gameplay concept, but this would be an exceptional case.

 

Proposals are accepted at the sole discretion of the judges.

 

 

V. What Your Participation Entails

 

You will be asked to give a presentation about your game, between 10 and 15 minutes long.  This should be an "action-packed" high density presentation, including a demo of your game, with some slides for introduction.

 

Some games will be picked for an additional longer-term discussion session, about 20 additional minutes.  This time will be devoted to peer discussion and question-and-answer regarding your game design.  You should be ready to answer questions about the various aspects of your game.

 

You should be able to attend the Game Developers Conference 2004, where the workshop is being held. However, if you cannot attend, we can make arrangements to present your game in your absence.

 

 

VI. Participation Entry Form

 

To describe your game, please fill out this section and email it to the address below. We will respond with great haste and discuss.

 

Send completed questionnaire to workshop@number-none.com by Friday January 16, 2004.

 

 

1. Name of Game

 

2. Description of Game (300 words or less).

 

3. Explanation of how the core gameplay is experimental (30 words or less).

 

4. Current phase of completion / Expected phase of completion at workshop time. Please be descriptive of the level of functionality present in the game; don't simply give a time-based or percentage-done indicator.

 

5. Give more detail on the gameplay experiment you are performing (take as much space as you need here).  Why is this experiment important?  What does it bring to games that is not already ubiquitous?

 

6. How will you know whether the experiment is a success?  What problems do you expect may arise?  If they do arise, what does that mean for future incarnations of this gameplay mechanic?

 

7. URL for Additional Info (downloads / info files / movies / etc.)

 

8. Special Notes: Does your presentation require any unusual equipment or preparations?  Is there anything you feel needs to be said that was not covered in this entry form?

 

 

Questions or comments? Contact us at: workshop@number-none.com