SYLLABUS: Video Game Design History
COURSE DESCRIPTION
Video games as a medium go back more than 50 years to mainframe computers. Even the central design of video games can be traced back to the first board and card games themselves.
To be a good game designer, it’s essential to have an understanding of the video game design industry’s fascinating history.
We’ve partnered with The Strong National Museum of Play to give you a unique look into the history of video games and the Industry. RIT has chosen to partner with The International Center for the History of Electronic Games (ICHEG) at The Strong and use their collections as the lens through which we’ll view this history. ICHEG is the largest and most comprehensive public assemblage of video games and related materials in the world. The staff are celebrated experts in the field and scholars of video games from around the world come to ICHEG to do research. You’ll gain amazing insight into the history of video games with a guided exploration of key artifacts from the collection of more than 100,000 electronic games and materials.
What you'll learn
- Where the first video games came from
- How video games connect to pinball
- Why the industry crashed in the 1980s
- When Virtual Reality (VR) first appeared in the industry
- How the games of the past chart a path to the future of gaming
PREREQUISITES
There are no required courses to complete before this course. This course has no prerequisites.
COURSE STAFF
GRADING & CERTIFICATION
If you are interested in earning a verified certificate, you'll need to complete the graded Boss Battle quiz at the end of each unit. You only receive one attempt per quiz question, so review the questions carefully before saving your answer. Verified students who complete the Boss Battle quizzes, with a cumulative 75% or higher average, will earn a verified certificate from edX, signifying successful completion of the course. There is no weekly deadline for each unit's quiz; as long as you complete all the quizzes by the course end date, you will be eligible for the certificate.
This might be a good option for you if you plan to use your completion of GAME101x for job applications, career advancement, or school applications. Also, by earning a verified certificate in this course, and in GAME102x, GAME103x, GAME104x, and GAME105x, you may apply for a certificate of the XSeries in Video Game Design.
WORKLOAD
While this is a self-paced course (you can enroll and complete it any time before April 28th, 2017), we've designed it to be completed within 5 weeks, when you devote 4-6 hours per week to the course. For your convenience, we've provided a suggested schedule to help you manage your time.
ACADEMIC POLICY
You must behave with academic honesty and respect your fellow students. Please abide by the edX Terms of Service & Honor Code.
COURSE MATERIALS & ACTIVITIES
To understand Game Design History, you need to read about and, ideally, play games. Unlike some edX courses, the video segments here primarily set the stage for readings and/or playing games. Quizzes may have questions that rely on you having done some reading or some playing to answer, versus only watching the introductory videos. For that reason, we’re pointing you to a lot of external references to help you learn and play.
The course is structured in eleven units of content:
- Unit 0: Welcome to the course!
- Unit 1: Early Tabletop Games: Pre-1700
- Unit 2: Early Tabletop Equipment
- Unit 3: Emergence of the Game Industry
- Unit 4: Evolution of Pinball
- Unit 5: Emergence of Mainframe Games
- Unit 6: Arcade Games
- Unit 7: Early Days of the Console
- Unit 8: PC Games
- Unit 9: Online Games
- Unit 10: Educational Games
- Unit 11: Interfaces and Displays
- End of Course Survey and Discussion
To help facilitate navigation within each unit, the course materials and activities are presented with the following headings:
ABOUT THIS VIDEO
Precedes each video lecture and provides a summary of topics covered.
CHECK YOUR UNDERSTANDING (UNGRADED QUIZ)
Contains ungraded knowledge check questions that follow each video lecture.
BOSS BATTLE (GRADED QUIZ)
Graded quizzes at the end of each unit that are required for verified certificates. These quizzes are open to all students.
ACTIVITIES AND DISCUSSION
Give you a chance to share your ideas and experiences with other students in the course. These are not required for a grade, but we encourage you to participate as much as possible.
WORD CLOUDS
Give you a chance to add your thoughts to the course environment. These are ungraded.
LEVEL-UP YOUR KNOWLEDGE
Virtual Reference Shelf:
These are wide and deep resources on the history, evolution, and design of games. You can use them to look up more information on the topics we discuss in the videos and in the readings you point to, but as you continue to learn about, and do game design, you’ll find these are helpful resources you can go to again and again. You’ll want to add these to your bookmark folders for sure.
Game Histories:
These will be specific to a game, designer, or company. Information in some may hold the answers to some of your quiz questions. Most will be text, but some will be video. Any quiz questions will rely only on the text for the answers, the videos are there for enrichment and/or pure entertainment only.
Deep Dives:
These will be in-depth articles, gameplay videos, documentaries, or books that we think someone who really wants to learn all the ins and outs of game design should get to as they learn and grow beyond what this course provides.
Just for Fun:
Some of the lighter side of the industry or the medium.
GAMEPLAY
These are games discussed in the units that you should play. Some may be tabletop games, but most will be video games. We’ll provide you with links to web versions of games, texts that describe the gameplay, and/or rule sets of the games as well. Finding some way to play a real or emulated version is always best, but the alternative games and texts will allow you to go through the course if you can’t.
Historically, videogames have not been a very accessible form of entertainment. Many tabletop games, such as dominoes, cards, or chess, have physically differentiated pieces and are played in a physical space. Over the centuries, those with atypical physiology have been able to play these with modified holders or pieces, or via the addition of Braille to equipment for those with visual impairments.
As a highly audiovisual medium, with content that is often rapid fire and requiring hair-trigger responses, some video games remain inaccessible. One of the two professors of this course is dysgraphic and has often been unable to play twitch games successfully, and at this point, both of us have reached an age where we cannot excel at them.
And yet, there are some early attempts to make video games accessible, and in the past decade or so, efforts inside and outside the industry have been made to make them more accessible. To that end, we have provided textural descriptions of gameplay to ensure that everyone can get to the core concepts and knowledge of the course when the gameplay we link to isn’t accessible to all. Additionally, we have content in the last unit of our course on alternative interfaces and controllers that addresses accessibility and video games as well.
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Each unit in this course will contain Discussion Questions that you are encouraged to answer. The Discussion Questions will be posted in their own topics and are also accessible by clicking the "Discussion" tab on the edX toolbar. It's perfectly fine to use the discussion questions as departure points for more elaborate conversations with your classmates. Course staff will occasionally monitor posts, however, because of the large number of students, and limited resources, we may not be able to answer all questions. We appreciate your understanding.
In addition to answering and talking with each other about the Discussion Questions, you can also use the Discussion Forums to communicate on other topics in the "Questions About this Course" forum. To do this, you should click on the "Discussion" button in the toolbar near the top of your screen. Add [Staff] at the beginning of a post to notify the course staff about any content-related or technical issues.
To see previous posts in the above categories, click on the "Show All Discussions" tab at the left of the "Discussions" screen, and choose the appropriate category. Please check to see if someone else has already asked your question before creating a new post.
For more detailed instructions on how to use edX course discussions, please refer to edX guide for students.
DISCUSSION CODE OF CONDUCT
We are committed to providing a friendly, safe, and welcoming environment for all students. This code of conduct outlines our expectations for discussion behavior, as well as the consequences for unacceptable behavior.
Be respectful
Please respect your fellow students. Insulting or abusive words will not be tolerated and will be removed.
Be constructive
A learning community is about learning with and through engagement with one another.
Be culturally aware
This is a global forum with participants from many different cultures and backgrounds. Be sensitive when discussing race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or controversial topics, since others may be more sensitive about them than you are.
Post appropriately
Content that violates the edX Terms of Service & Honor Code is not permitted. You may not post inappropriate (e.g. pornographic) or copyrighted content, advertise or promote outside products or organizations, or spam the forums with repeat content.
Consequences of Unacceptable Behavior
Unacceptable behavior will not be tolerated. Anyone asked to stop unacceptable behavior is expected to comply immediately.
If a participant engages in unacceptable behavior, the course staff may take any action they deem appropriate, up to and including expulsion from the course.
Please help us create a healthy learning environment by respecting these standards. We do not expect to see many of these issues because we trust students like you to keep our forum communities strong and healthy.