Serious Game Proposal

I love the chaos in Jason Nelson's work. I have struggled with ideas for this project. I'm passionate about healthy living, whole living and am really interested in the concept of time, how much we use of it, how quickly it goes, how slow it can feel, how we are constantly moving, etc. I think living in America gives us this distorted ideal that we must be accomplishing, we must be busy and coincidentally - we must be stressed. I want to explore these notions of time in my game. I want time to effect my game a lot, the goal (as simplified can be in life) will be getting to a point of relaxation in the mess of images, concerns and daily activities. It will be finding a clearing in a way, from all the chaos. However, I want the player to feel like their never finished. Once that moment of bliss is achieved, instead of reveling in it, the game will move forward into more chaos. I picture lots of images, repurposed images seen daily as well as serene, original images and backgrounds I create on photoshop. These calmer images may be pictures as well. The start of the game will be sunrise, the end sunset (essentially to illustrate how much the player has missed in a day). I'll be taking pictures of both a sunrise and sunset.

Because it took me awhile to collect my thoughts, I don't have as much done visually as I would have hopped but I have been looking at Game Salad tutorials. I'm currently collecting images to repurpose.

I do want there to be a color scheme for everything though, even the images that are supposed to work you up and waste your time. I don't want there to be a strong contrast because I feel like, in life, the things you are told you should spend time on (although you don't want to, although those things won't fulfill you) start to blend in with the things you actually care about doing.

I'm thinking aquas, light greens, light blues, things that are supposed to induce a calm feeling but in the mix of flashing images and maybe loud music, the colors become stressful. However, when the player reaches a state of bliss and calm music is playing, the colors become homey and sweet.

For next week, I plan on mixing the tracks I plan to play throughout the game (one of chaos and one of serenity). I also plan to get a good start in laying the groundwork for all the booleans and for certain clicks, depending on which image you click on (one that is stressful or one that is calming) that will lead you to another screen asking you to do the same. The screens will sort of be random in that which one you click on may lead to serenity and may lead to chaos.

Here's a couple images I've been messing around with to create chaos:

Reading Critical Play Ch. 7-8

The part of Chapter 7 that really drew me in was the discussion of women's role in games. Whether it be playing them, imagining them or creating them, the text referred to the white male still dominating the state of play. I am wondering how this has changed in the last several years. I think it would be ideal to start putting a face on who created the game in the commercial aspects of PR, in magazines, promotion, etc. Although we normally wouldn't directly point to who made the game, if it is a rarity, it would be interesting to see the backstory behind some of the women who are making it in "a man's world."Why did they create the game? Was gender part of the story? We should be documenting trends, especially changing ones. If women are or are not a big part of constructing this gaming world, we should be documenting it. Same goes with a racial minority, etc.