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Content:

1. Game Mechanics
2. Brainstorm Game Mechanics
3. Assessment 2
4. Feedback

Game Mechanics

Game mechanics are at the core of a game and decisive for game play. Good engaging game mechanics will make a game fun to play  or challenging and as well rewarding.

Game mechanics can be found in board games (Chess, Backgammon, Jenga) and for board games we often refer to core mechanics. Examples are:

• Role Playing (Charades)
• Capture & Eliminate (Chess)
• Pattern Recognition (Chess, Rush Hour)
• Memory (Memory)
• Dice Rolling (Monopoly)
• Find the extensive list below at: BoardGameGeek.com

Acting	Action / Movement Programming
Action Point Allowance System	Area Control / Area Influence
Area Enclosure	Area Movement
Area-Impulse	Auction / Bidding
Betting / Wagering	Campaign / Battle Card Driven
Card Drafting	Chit-Pull System
Co-operative Play	Commodity Speculation
Crayon Rail System	Deck / Pool Building
Dice Rolling	Grid Movement
Hand Management	Hex-and-Counter
Line Drawing	Memory
Modular Board	Paper-and-Pencil
Partnerships	Pattern Building
Pattern Recognition	Pick-up and Deliver
Player Elimination	Point to Point Movement
Press Your Luck	Rock-Paper-Scissors
Role Playing	Roll / Spin and Move
Route / Network Building	Secret Unit Deployment
Set Collection	Simulation
Simultaneous Action Selection	Singing
Stock Holding	Storytelling
Take That	Tile Placement
Time Track	Trading
Trick-taking	Variable Phase Order
Variable Player Powers	Voting
Worker Placement

Video games use game mechanics as well, but besides the core mechanics they are more related to aspect of digital technology.

Find an extensive list of game mechanics at Wikipedia.

We can and should list game mechanics to be able to select what game mechanics we like, but at the end of the day we need to be able to apply game mechanics to a game. This need to happen in the context of the game’s overall purpose. We will read this post: Game Mechanics and Gamification by Andrzej Marczewski on Gamasutra together to get a better idea about how to apply game mechanics.

Brainstorm Game Mechanics

We will do a brainstorm in class for potential game mechanics for the ABC learning game for children (assessment).

Look at this list of Motivators and Supporters (as found on Gamasutra’s post Game Mechanics and Gamification – link is above):

Motivators	Possible Supporters
Autonomy	Customisation Choice Freedom
Mastery	Levels Challenges
Purpose	Giving / Altruism Narrative Greater Meaning
Status	Leaderboards Achievements
Social Connections	Suggest similar users Cooperative “play”
Rewards	Points Badges Achievements
Peer Pressure	Peer review / feedback / grading systems Boasting / Bragging system Competitive “play”
Avoidance	Lose Points Lose Status Game Over
Scarcity	Exclusive / Unique Rewards Reward Schedules
Fun!	Real Games Quiz’s Competitions

Use 3 motivators from the list above and brainstorm game mechanics for the e-game for your assignment (prep-children recognising letters of the alphabet).

List the factors:

• Desired Behaviour (eg blow away sand to reveal a letter – find the same letter in a list of letters and click on it)
• Motivation (Mastery: Learning the letters of the alphabet; Status: receiving a badge, star, completing a level)
• Supporters (for mastery: being able to read; for status: having your score displayed, completing a series – eg a series of green frogs)

Assessment 2

Assessment 2 – E-Game

Feedback

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