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Geek Culture / Power Point how can it be used in creation of a new game

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3d point in space
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Posted: 7th Jul 2014 19:02
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In considering the development of a new game you should incorporate the skills of using power point.

What does Power Point do:

1. It allows others to edit your work (non programmers).
2. it allows others to view the big picture of how you will design and develop your game.

Power Point allows a user to design a game using a method called story boarding. The use of a story board may seem like it will increase production time in a game, but in production a storyboard can be modified faster and more effectively.

Before my Masters Degree I did not know how to design an effective storyboard.

Developer of Space Chips, pianobasic, zipzapzoom, and vet pinball apps. Developed the tiled map engine seen on the showcase. Veteran for the military.
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Dark Java Dude 64
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Posted: 7th Jul 2014 20:18
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You mind providing us any more detail about this story boarding...??

Flash is falling out of... Flashion.
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Van B
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Posted: 7th Jul 2014 20:23
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I've used Office since day 1, and seriously I have no use for that program. Excel has it's uses though.

I am the one who knocks...
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The Next
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Posted: 7th Jul 2014 21:04
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I personally hate PowerPoint and avoid it at every opportunity.

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Chris Tate
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Posted: 7th Jul 2014 22:23
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Quote: "1. It allows others to edit your work (non programmers).
2. it allows others to view the big picture of how you will design and develop your game.
"


I am not sure why these attributes stem from PowerPoint use and not any other industry standard design tools; however, I do know that it is a good tool to create storyboards. PowerPoint and Microsoft Office in general can also be used to design 2D game levels, animations and your user interface if you know how to pull it off.

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3d point in space
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Posted: 7th Jul 2014 23:04 Edited at: 7th Jul 2014 23:15
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Well people that do not program like it.

Why do people that do not program like it.

1. Well they can edit the story board for one thing without programming

2. They can correct grammatical errors. Grammatical errors will kill your game even before it goes out in the market.

3. Every educated person knows how to use Power Point.

I can not show you example of the story boards I wrote for my university.

Doing some research though I see that

http://www.printablepaper.net/category/storyboard
provides great templates for storyboards.

I prefer Power Point because than you can have a greater amount of input from users that are not programmers. What ever tool you use it has to be easy for others to follow your work on the game as well as have them provide valuable input.

I am not trying to sell Power Point, but it is what professionals use in presenting there ideas for a game to get funding for it usually.

Developer of Space Chips, pianobasic, zipzapzoom, and vet pinball apps. Developed the tiled map engine seen on the showcase. Veteran for the military.
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Seppuku Arts
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Posted: 7th Jul 2014 23:35
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I would say there's better tools out there for non programmers to create a game, even using storyboarding, whilst Powerpoint is a great tool to storyboard, but it's not intended for the purpose of games. Though of course, any user will use the tool they're most comfortable with to achieve the results they desire, it's pointless going for something that allegedly superior when your workflow works better with other tools. People's minds are wired in different ways.

However, I can make a couple useful alternative suggestions:

http://www.clickteam.com/clickteam-fusion-2-5
https://www.scirra.com/construct2

Neither require programming knowledge. In fact, it was Clickteam's products that got me into game creation and therefore programming, I used to use their old software Klik N Play and The Games Factory quite a lot and loved them to pieces. They really are fantastic tools and suited me when I was around 11/12 when I had no concept of programming.

Of course, it was the desire to go 3D that I discovered Dark Basic and bite the bullet and learned to program and am glad that I did.

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Dark Java Dude 64
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Posted: 8th Jul 2014 01:58
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Quote: "Well people that do not program like it."
Good point.

I myself am a very visual person, and it's the main reason I've lost all interest in programming--it's just not visual enough for me. For a while, I have had ideas for a thing that would look familiar to seasoned programmers, and it would give you the power that programming does, but it would be entirely visual, and minimal or no typing would be required. If statements could be like boxes that accept input via a line (literally a graphical line) and other things could quite literally 'branch' visually out from the if statement. Loops would look just like loops, and it would be clear and visual how the program flows. Elements could be moved via mouse, etc.

So it would be just like programming, same paradigm even, just a totally visual analogy.

But yeah, OP's point of visual game creation is excellent. Power Point is a little odd, though...

Flash is falling out of... Flashion.
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easter bunny
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Posted: 8th Jul 2014 02:11 Edited at: 8th Jul 2014 02:13
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Quote: "I used to use their old software Klik N Play and The Games Factory quite a lot and loved them to pieces"

Me too!

Quote: "Of course, it was the desire to go 3D that I discovered Dark Basic and bite the bullet and learned to program and am glad that I did"

Me too again Although I learned QBasic first


For designing games, I normally just use a sheet of butcher paper. But obviously that won't work too well when you're working with a team


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"When you've finished 90% of your game, you only have 90% left"
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nonZero
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Posted: 8th Jul 2014 11:05
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Power Point is a ghastly piece of software, IMHO. I designed games when I was six or something, long before programming and I always dreamed of being the designer and bossing code monkeys around. Then I learned to fiddle, the rest is a long story, sufficed to say that during my near-dcade away from programming, I tried almost everything and you'll never get the level of control you want without, at absolute minimum, scripts. Full control and you need some coding. So I would suggest a point 'n click game maker with scripting over PP. Then at least you can put something of yourself into it unless you want a trashy generic game.
Also, sidelining the discussion a little, I believe LibreOffice has a Power Point equivalent that probably works better and LibreOffice is free on Linux, Windows and probably Mac, too. Food for thought.
If you're wanting to build a Text Adventure or Visual Novel, Ren'Py is great because you write it a little like movie script but you have the option of Python scripts, too. It's possible to make an turn-based RPG or Strategy Game with Ren'Py as well.

TL;DR: Power Point is a bad idea and you'll regret it, I'm 85% sure.

"If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything" -- Wise Man
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Van B
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Posted: 8th Jul 2014 12:05
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Well, there's Cryengine3, which is largely visual unless you want to get stuck into C++, there's Lua scripting as well - but it has flow graphs too, which might be a bit like the system DJD64 is imagining, kinda like Unreals shader pipeline stuff.

http://docs.cryengine.com/download/attachments/1048817/flowgraph.png?version=1&modificationDate=1301924884000&api=v2

I am the one who knocks...
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Dark Java Dude 64
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Posted: 8th Jul 2014 12:19
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Ah!!!!! That is indeed very similar to what I was imagining. I'm glad to see it exists.

Flash is falling out of... Flashion.
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The Zoq2
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Posted: 9th Jul 2014 01:29
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I think Unreal 4 also has some form of visual scripting feature, im not sure how much or little you can do with it though...

Say ONE stupid thing and it ends up as a forum signature forever. - Neuro Fuzzy
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Van B
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Posted: 9th Jul 2014 09:34
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Xcode has this sort of thing for linking form objects with other objects and functions - I thought the Unreal flow stuff was just for shaders, like linking environment renders with shader layers.

I am the one who knocks...
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BatVink
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Posted: 9th Jul 2014 19:31
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I wouldn't use PP for design, it's only for presentation. It only works in a linear fashion (unless you want to spend more time on presenting than thinking), which immediately restricts your design process to things we left behind in the twentieth century. For example you can't do something as simple as top-down development, never mind anything more complex.

A good place to start scratching together a design is a mind-mapping tool, such as Freemind. Once it becomes viable you can use more complex tools, but mind mapping is the extremely fast way to get ideas down in the first instance. And you should be using some kind of project management tool alongside. There are many other ways...but I'm very sorry, PP isn't one of them.

ten-net consulting limited
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