“The judo rule: Turn your weaknesses into your strengths. If you cannot escape the limitations of the small screen, use them to your advantage! Think of ways to turn the screen size into an integral part of gameplay — part of the game’s challenge that the player must learn to overcome. Make the small screen [...]
Yiibu has made available a wonderful little presentation about the design of mobile games.
“Design for play, quiet contemplation, exploration, discovery, suspense, laughter, friendship, joy…(remember boredom, stress, fatigue, personalization, control, play—everyone’s personal time is different)”
Link: Creating ‘Casual’ Games, Content and Applications for the (Mobile) Long Tail (yiibu.com, PDF, via)
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Posted 25 December 2006
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Also tagged: cellphone, design, experiencedesign, game, games, mobile, personalization, pervasive, phone, phones, presentation, research, userneeds
Some guidelines for the design of handheld games.
“There are two major things you have to keep in mind concerning the interface and user-experience, first one is that most players will be picking up your game in short breaks. They need to be able to quickly start it, and quickly put it away without losing “everything”. [...]
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Posted 06 November 2006
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Also tagged: cellphone, complexity, design, game, games, handheld, interruption, lifestyle, mobile, mobility, ui, userexperience, userinterface, userneeds, ux
A post-mortem of the creation of the mobile game “Tower Bloxx”.
“As we discussed earlier, the original idea came from a mock-up image which was later turned into a prototype, which led to our core mechanics. After production started, we also needed something to fill the long-term gameplay demand, so we had several ideas of how [...]
Summary of the 11 game controller that have taken gameplay to new levels. Along with the most annoying interstitial ads I’ve ever seen.
“The Zapper shipped with the original Nintendo Entertainment System, bundled with seminal light-gun game Duck Hunt as its early companion. But it was games such as Hogan’s Alley, Gumshoe, and Operation Wolf that [...]
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Posted 16 June 2006
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Also tagged: console, controller, design, handheld, id, industrialdesign, interactiondesign, ixd, mobile, userexperience, ux
John Siracusa takes an illustrative look at the (lack of) evolution of handheld game controllers.
“But let’s take a step back. These are handheld game machines. You hold them in your hand. How many years will it take before someone realizes that sharp-edged rectangular solids are not ideal for gripping? Again, I recognize the constraints here. [...]
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Posted 26 March 2006
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Also tagged: controller, design, handheld, hci, input, interactiondesign, ixd, lifestyle, mobile, mobility, review, ui, usability, userexperience, ux
“There’s a lot to [the mobile version of] Time Crisis, it’s long,” said Rubin. “And that is appealing more to the hardcore audience anyway. We think for the next couple years, mobile phones will be a viable platform even for hardcore gamers, even if they’re not necessarily playing ‘hardcore’ games on it. They’re carrying their [...]
Russell Beattie asked whether the mobile games industry is on the verge of collapse, thanks to a flooded market. The fantastic collection of screenshots (see link below) really shows that most games producers are thinking about mobile games for Gamers, rather than games for people. I would love to see some great social games on [...]
Published by Gabriel White.