Archive for June, 2011

9 items.

Origins Game Fair – The Long Drive Home

by Douglas Bushong on June 30th, 2011
Origins Game Fair – The Long Drive Home

Origins was a relatively good show.  I received a few individual commission requests (hopefully they follow up soon), and I generally had a good time.

I had a lot of time to reflect on the drive home, and I learned a few lessons along the way:

  1. Get your prints and clearbags before the show.  Buying bags locally can get pretty pricy.
  2. Make sure you have enough prints of your popular pieces.
  3. You never know which pieces will be the most popular.
  4. The most sought-after piece will change from day to day.  Sometimes it will be the cynical piece, other times it will be the one you poured your heart into.
  5. Bring a tacklebox filled with all of the general tools that you may possibly need:
    • 3-5 different kinds of tape
    • wire
    • string
    • scissors
    • screws
    • washers
    • staplers
    • EVERY type of signing pen and regular pens
    • Pencils
    • tape measures
    • whatever else you can think of.
  6. Make sure the event organizers know how your name is spelled.  This allows them to spell your name correctly if you win an award.

Again, I had a great time, and I’m champing at the bit for Gen-Con.

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Origins Game Fair – My First Booth

by Douglas Bushong on June 27th, 2011
Origins Game Fair – My First Booth

I presented my work in the Origins Game Fair art show this year.  I had a single panel last year for the few pieces I was presenting, and I felt I had enough to warrant a full booth this year.

I made a lot of changes since last year.  First of all, I have a banner now.  I tried to get something simple: the name, the website, a brief title, and two characters (Kickle Cubicle and Emote-Guy).  I used a digital frame on the table to show some of my work from the site, and I spread out the stereo viewers to get people walking back and forth through the booth.

The stereo viewer seemed to go over well with the judges; my Dragon’s Lair image won the Best Amateur Fantasy Digital award.  When I go to Gen-Con, I plan to sell the stereo viewers with a 10-pack of pictures.  We’ll see how that goes.

I also made my first sales at this show.  It wasn’t much, but it’s a start.  Let me tell you, the first time money changes hands for a print of your work, it is the greatest feeling in the world.  To any young artist out there, come to shows like this and let people see your work.  It’s a real rush.

I loved my location along the wall, as it allowed me to get power to my booth.  I was located right between Chris Pritchard and Tony Steele.  I really couldn’t think of a better place to be for this show; on my side of the wall, Chris made for great conversation, and Tony and Kay really went out of their way to make things go smoothly.

I want to actually take a moment to talk up Tony and Kay Steele.  They are some of the coolest, kindest people I’ve ever met.  Every time I needed help at the booth, they were always there to help out.  I always feel good around them; they just make the convention experience that much more enjoyable.

They also make some amazing art!  When you get a chance, check out their site.

Steeleworks

I’ll likely add more to this post later.

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Instructional Design Job Description

by Douglas Bushong on June 23rd, 2011
Instructional Design Job Description

For my most recent EdTech 503 assignment, I was asked to develop a job description for a fictitious instructional designer position. Here are my thoughts on what this position should include, given a context similar to my own (private company, frequently changing goals). Following the description, I have included my own reflections on the nature of the instructional design job and its relationship to that of a teacher.

For today’s image, I’ve decided to include an alternate version of the Burn Zombie Burn image I posted earlier in the year.  Enjoy!

Instructional Designer

XYZ Corporation, a Fortune 500 company, is seeking an Instructional Designer to create training materials and course content for its technicians/engineers. The instructional designer must be able to produce clear and concise training programs for our business units. In order to achieve this goal, the designer will need to coordinate with subject matter experts (SME) to develop a fundamental understanding of XYZ corporation’s products and services.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

A candidate for this position should be able to:

  • Develop presentations, learning aids, and instructor guides for the company’s technical training team.
  • Review on-the-job training (OJT) manuals for updates and corrections.
  • Produce self-guided and instructor-lead computer based training (CBT) for theory-based courses.
  • Develop trade-skills training and evaluation tools (simulations, virtual tours, etc).
  • Provide training to technical trainers on the course design process, and identify additional needs those trainers may have.
  • Attend courses currently being presented, and determine how these courses can be improved.

This list is not exhaustive; additional skills and performance tasks may be required based on your specialization and the needs of the training department.

REQUIRED FOR SELECTION

  • 5 years of experience in instructional design, with a portfolio demonstrating outstanding design work. You will will be required to submit the URL to your online portfolio with your application.
  • BA/BS degree*
  • Knowledge of standard development tools, including MS Office, Adobe Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Camtasia, and Articulate.
  • Firm knowledge of HTML and CSS.
  • Ability to understand electrical, mechanical, and chemical terminology.
  • Ability to prioritize work based on changing needs of the training department.
  • Excellent oral and written communication skills. This job requires close interaction with instructors and SMEs, so clear and efficient communication is essential.

*BA/BS degree in instructional design, educational technology, or related field is preferred, but a degree in another field will be considered with a strong portfolio.

PREFERRED FOR SELECTION

  • 8 years of experience in instructional design.
  • MS in Instructional Design or Educational Technology.
  • Experience with video editing tools, such as Adobe Premiere, After Effects, and/or Sony Vegas.
  • Experience with Flash.
  • Experience with the Plateau Learning Management System.

Advanced training in mathematics, physics, chemistry, engineering, and/or safety is a plus.

Basis for Criteria

When determining the criteria for this position, I considered the job descriptions for the following positions:

Instructional Designer – Camber Corporation

Senior Instructional Designer – United Health Group

Instructional Designer – Serco, Inc.

Instructional Designer – Vertex, Inc.

Instructional Designer – Barnes & Noble

In addition to the instructional design positions, I looked over various positions in other areas of design, including graphic design, game design, and architecture.

Reflections – General

Instructional Designer vs Teachers

It is often a useful mental tool for instructional designers to think of themselves as screenwriters; in doing so, they are able to step back from the content and look more broadly at the context.

The relationship between instructional designers and teachers is similar to the relationship between screenwriters and actors. The writer establishes the pace of the storyline, the setting, the dialogue, and the plot points. The actor then internalizes this information, provides personal context, and delivers the message to the audience. Likewise, the instructional designer establishes the pace for the course content, the instructional aids, the format, and the learning points. The teacher then internalizes this information, provides personal context, and delivers the message to the students.

Specialized knowledge

Most of the instructional designer positions required a certain degree of specialized knowledge. The companies have already invested a large sum of money in standard software suites, and it makes more sense to try to find designers capable of using the software than to have a variety of different software to accommodate each designer. There’s also a hidden background element here: XYZ Corporation would like to produce more video-based instructional materials for remote technicians, so they are also hoping for someone that already has the desired video editing skill set.

In addition, most descriptions showed a preference for specialized knowledge in the field that the designer would be designing for (e.g., hospitals preferred designers with some background in the medical industry). I knew that I wanted to make XYZ Corporation an engineering firm, so I decided to put preferences in place for designers with engineering-related backgrounds.

Instructional Designer vs. Other Designers

One thing that jumped out at me that clearly differentiated instructional design from other areas of design was the portfolio. In the fields of graphic design, game design, and architecture, I frequently saw portfolio requirements included in the job description. I found it interesting that most of the instructional design positions, however, contained no such requirement. Based on my experience, I believe that (1) a portfolio is important, and (2) it should be included in the job description to prevent the applicant from being blind-sided when it comes up in an interview.

Reflections – Instructor Questions

What are teachers expected to do that instructional designers are not?

Teachers are expected to teach. When a teacher successfully finishes his/her job, the product that emerges is a knowledgeable student.

Teachers are expected to build relationships with the students, and to understand the specific needs of each class. They are expected to adjust the pace of the course and the details of the course content on the fly to meet the group’s specific needs. They are often expected to have some degree of subject matter expertise on the subject that they are teaching. Teachers must engage the students, and must get their message across properly the first time; they do not have the luxury of going back and making constant revisions during class. With that in mind, they must have a good depth of knowledge.

What are instructional designers expected to do that teachers are not?

Instructional Designers are expected to produce content. When an instructional designer has finishes his/her job, the product that emerges is a well-designed course.

They are expected to have proficiency in a broad spectrum of technologies and tools. While the teachers need to know how to use tools that present the material, the designer must be able to use all of those tools and more to be able to construct the material. Also, while a deep level of subject matter expertise is not required, designers must assimilate and translate large amounts of information for a short period of time. This requires designers to have the ability to temporarily establish a small degree subject matter expertise in a large number of areas. With that in mind, they must have a good breadth of knowledge.

What are the three major differences between a teacher and an instructional designer?

In my experience as both a trainer and as an instructional designer, the three major differences have been:

1) Instructional designers convert knowledge to content; teachers convert content to knowledge.

As stated above, designers produce content, while teachers produce people. As a designer, my medium is the printed word; once I have all of the knowledge pulled together in one place, can convert it to a content package that is usable by the teachers.
When I was a teacher, my medium was the spoken work; I had to present content in a meaningful way to my students. If the course was well designed, this was relatively easy. If not, I had to make up for any deficiencies in the content, and report back to the designer.

2) Instructional designers condense; teachers expand.

An instructional designer must be a nexus of knowledge. Unless the instructional designer is an expert on a given subject, he/she usually needs to reach out to teachers, textbooks, the web, subject matter experts, for knowledge. He/she must then distill all of these separate pieces of information into a coherent instructional products. Teachers then “unpack” this generalized information and apply it to the specific situation of the students. Through personalization, teachers add meaning to the content.

3) Instructional design is a batch process; teaching is a continuous process.

Design is a low-repetition job; when a well-designed course is completed, the designer can move on to a different project. Though the design principles often remain the same, the knowledge required tends to change from project to project.
The teacher, on the other hand, generally has a core set of courses to teach. These courses are taught repeatedly over time. This can be difficult, as the teacher has to deal with the repetition of teaching the same material over and over again.

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Player Psychographics, Part 2: Psychographic Creep

by Douglas Bushong on June 20th, 2011
Player Psychographics, Part 2: Psychographic Creep

Mark Rosewater has said that the greatest threat to the future of Magic design is complexity creep.  In order to maintain interest among players that grok the game already, the design team must continuously produce new and interesting interactions.  This often demands more complex cards.  If they do not tread lightly, however, essential new players will be intimidated by the overall complexity of the game and avoid it.

In my last entry I talked about psychographics; today, I want to talk about the problem with setting psychographics in stone.  I’d also like to dispute one of the answers from the great designer search 2 multiple choice test.

Johnny vs Spike

To start I’d like to review the definitions of Johnny and Spike.  From Mark Rosewater’s Article, Timmy, Johnny, and Spike (emphasis added by me):

Johnny is the creative gamer to whom Magic is a form of self-expression. Johnny likes to win, but he wants to win with style. It s very important to Johnny that he win on his own terms. As such, it s important to Johnny that he s using his own deck. Playing Magic is an opportunity for Johnny to show off his creativity.

Johnny likes a challenge.  Johnny enjoys winning with cards that no one else wants to use0 . He likes making decks that win in innovative ways. What sets Johnny apart from the other profiles is that Johnny enjoys deckbuilding as much as (or more than) he enjoys playing. Johnny loves the cool interactions of the cards. He loves combo decks.  Johnny is happiest when he s exploring uncharted territory.

Spike is the competitive player. Spike plays to win. Spike enjoys winning.  To accomplish this, Spike will play whatever the best deck is.0  Spike will copy decks off the Internet. Spike will borrow other players  decks. To Spike, the thrill of Magic is the adrenalin rush of competition. Spike enjoys the stimulation of outplaying the opponent and the glory of victory.

I will take the liberty of adding one point to the definition of Spike and trust that the design team will agree: Spike is more interested in the utility than the novelty of a card.

Keep this in mind going forward, and see if you can identify the design dilemma that these two players create.  In the meantime, allow me to draw an analogy between Magic and a common household item: the lightbulb.

THE LIGHT BULB

Thomas Edison is generally credited with the invention of the light bulb.  Yes, others had developed ideas and working prototypes before him, but Edison was the first to find the right combination of components to make it commercially viable.  At the time it was a novelty that represented uncharted territory in engineering.  Without the infrastructure of electrical power distribution, however, it was not much better than a candle.  To put this into Magic terms, Edison produced a Johnny device.

Though many improvements have been made over the years, the incandescent bulb is mostly the same today as it was then.  The key difference is that today it is used for its utility, and not its novelty.  As people learned the benefits of household electricity and saw the effectiveness of the bulb, the use of electricity spread and became the new norm.  Today, the light bulb is used because it is generally the best source of light.  Today, it is a Spike device.

This shift from Johnny to Spike is a real world example of what I call psychographic creep.

Spiking Johnny’s Cards

To bring this analogy into Magic terms, I’ll ask you to consider the following creature card:

Potent Necromancer
BBB
1/1
Creature – Zombie Wizard
When CARDNAME is on the battlefield, skip your draw phase.  If you would discard a card, exile that card instead.
Pay 1 life: remove the top card of your library from the game.  At the beginning of your end step, place all cards removed in this way in your hand.

Now, this card is somewhat complex.  It has alot of abilities, and its value might not seem apparent to the new player.  It certainly makes for potentially quirky interactions.  In 1996, this would have definitely been considered a Johnny card.

But the year is not 1996, and this card is not a Johnny card.  Today’s Magic players have the benefit of hindsight.  Any player that has ever seen Necropotence in play would immediately see its pure utility; many would even point out that it is better than Necropotence, as black has an easier time getting rid of its own creatures than it does its own enchantments. Regardless of – or perhaps because of – its broken nature, the design team should recognize this card (and cards like it) for the Spike card that it is.

Invisible Creep

Based on the last Great Designer Search Test, however, I worry that they would not.  I wrote last year that I believed the answer to question 46 of the GDS2 multiple choice test was wrong.  For your convenience, here was the question:

46) Which of the following cards is least a Johnny card?
a) Clone
b) Devastating Summons
c) Fauna Shaman
d) Mortician Beetle
e) Near-Death Experience

According to the answer key, B was the correct answer.  Based on the psychographic creep I described above, I chose a different answer:

C – Fauna Shaman.

I based my choice on knowledge of the game’s history and nature of the decks that were being played.

Fauna Shaman is a creature-based remake of Survival of the Fittest.  At the time that the test was given, variations of the Survival of the Fittest deck permeated the legacy format.  If Survival of the Fittest had never been printed, one could possibly argue that Fauna Shaman is a Johnny card.  Survival of the Fittest was  printed, though, and its banning in Legacy just a few weeks after the GDS2 test is evidence that the Magic community understands all too well its utility as a Spike card.

Hindsight is 20/20

Yes, at a glance, it would definitely appear that Devastating Summons is a pure Spike card, but Magic has a history and that history must be respected.  At this point in Magic’s history, it will take much more creativity to exploit Devastating Summons in the same way that players already know how to exploit Fauna Shaman.

Of course, if useful Johnny cards become Spike cards once they are grokked, how can R&D keep making Johnny cards?

It is for this reason that I call psychographic creep a subset of complexity creep, and a dangerous one at that. Ideas for old Spike cards can be used again and again, as evidenced by the number of cheap 3 damage spells and counterspells in the game.  Ideas for Johnny cards, on the other hand, can be used only once or twice before they are understood.  In time, those Johnny cards that have a lot of utility become Spike cards (think Survival of the Fittest and Necropotence), and those with little utility sit on the fringes waiting for another card to come along and break them (think Illusions of Grandeur) or a rules change to make them overpowered (Flash) or worthless (Brand).  The need to make new Johnny cards is the backdoor through which complexity creep will sneak into our game.

When Wizards designs new Magic cards, they can’t do so in a bubble.  Many of the Johnny cards of yesteryear are Spike cards today.  If the design team sees Fauna Shaman as anything other than a pure Spike card, then they are ignoring the current play environment and the reason why Survival of the Fittest was added to the recent banned list.

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Player Psychographics, Part 1: What is a Psychographic?

by Douglas Bushong on June 16th, 2011
Player Psychographics, Part 1: What is a Psychographic?

In order to understand how to design games that your players will enjoy, you have to understand what your players are looking for in a  game.  To do this, you will need some kind of understanding of player psychographics.

You’ve probably heard the term “demographic.”  A demographic is a characteristic of the population based on an external, often  quantitative value.  Common demographics include sex, race, age, income, education, and so on.  When we talk about  player psychographics, we are talking about those things that are going on inside the players’ minds.  Psychographic variables, on the other hand, are any attributes relating to personality, values, attitudes, interests, or lifestyles.

Recall that games should give a player a continuous sense of frustration, followed by some kind of reward for overcoming the  frustration.  By defining player psychographics, you are categorizing players based on the type of frustration and rewards that they  enjoy.  Here are some examples.

  • In a first person shooter, some players may want a more erratic experience that keeps them on the edge of their seats, while others  prefer games that require precise timing and calm response to erratic conditions.
  • In a real time strategy, some players like to stress test their ability to manage multiple pieces of information at the same time;  some prefer a game that caters to a blitz strategy, while a third group might prefer a game that tests their ability to defend a  stable position and win by attrition.
  • In role playing games, some players may prefer a strong story driven experience, while others only seek to min-max their stats to get  desireable dice roles.  Some prefer a deep storyline and an impressive ending, while others are satisfied by a simple victory  animation.

As you think about the games that you play, consider how you would describe your wants and needs in a game.  What psychographics are you a part of?  More important, as a designer, which psychographics will you design for?

In an article called “Timmy, Johnny, and Spike,” Magic lead designer Mark Rosewater gives a brilliant explanation of the player  psychographics of Magic players.  By understanding the motivations of the players, the Magic design team is able tweak their designs  to meet those needs.

If you want to be a game designer, or ANY product designer for that matter, take the time to learn about your customer psychographics.   Meet their needs by understanding what products they will enjoy, and they will meet your needs with their money.

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Ear Cleaning

by Douglas Bushong on June 13th, 2011
Ear Cleaning

This was the first assignment for my Pedagogy of Sound class this semester.  It is an ear cleaning (taking time to concentrate on the sounds around you) and a review of a video by Julian Treasure.

Enjoy!

Ear Cleaning

This is an activity that I actually do on a regular basis, and one that I even play as a game with my children. It is a lot of fun for me. I’ve never called it “ear cleaning,” though; it was just something I picked up from watching the old film “Kung Fu” in high school.

This was the applicable scene. It’s probably my favorite from the film.

I did the activity multiple times.

  • The first was on my front porch during a rain storm. I could initially hear the rain as it came in waves on the roof of the porch, followed by the rustling of the wind through the trees. As I fell a layer deeper, I could hear the splash of drops in the puddle at the bottom of the drain spout. As I fell more and more into the sound, I almost stopped as it became more and moer overwhelming. Fortunately, the pleasant disruption of occasional thunder acted as a “reset button” by giving me something to focus my attention on momentarily.
  • The second time I played it as a game with my 4-year-old daughter, right before bedtime. We closed our eyes together and started listening. As I heard things, I would ask her if she could hear them, too. I heard the tick-tock of the clock. As I feel deeper into it, I could hear my own breath. When I asked her if she could hear her own breath, too, I heard her accentuate her breathing with a great sigh and whisper “yes.” I could hear her hands moving, and the slight sounds of my wife putting dishes away. Finally, I heard a whisper, “Daddy, I don’t want to play this anymore. I’m going to sleep.”
  • The third time was a few minutes ago. I could hear the fans on my computer. As I worked a layer deeper, I could hear my own breath, with the occassional sound of my stomach digesting the Reese’s Pieces ate earlier. In time I could hear my breathing, and the blankets rustling as my wife rolled over in bed.

Typically, when I do this activity, it always ends in the same way: keeping track of so many sounds became too chaotic to handle, and I have to quit.

It’s still fun, though.

Julian Treasure’s Videos


I really like his use of sounds during the talk. The thing that I am likely to remember the most from these lectures include…

  1. …the statement that he made about how birdsong has been generally associated with “safety” from generation to generation.
  2. …his commentary about the effects of music. I’ve time-stamped various portions of my life with the music that I have listened to, a phenomenon that I blogged about a while ago.
  3. …the terminology; I want to further research the differentiation between reductive and expansive listening.
  4. …his explanation of schizophonia; it’s the story of my life! Ever since high school, I’ve listened to talk shows or music while walking/driving/etc. My life has been a voluntary barrage of information.

That said, I think the density of these talks and the language he chose to use were somewhat problematic. When a statement like “birdsong is good for you” is made without justification or evidence, even if it is true, it eats into the efficacy of the argument. That’s an unusual statement about reality; it should have scientific backing. Both discussions possessed it to some degree, but I think the second discussion REALLY felt like a pitch surrounded by mysticism and not fact.

Nonetheless, the talks were enjoyable.

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Summer School

by Douglas Bushong on June 9th, 2011
Summer School

As many of you know, I went back to school last year to study educational technology.  I went full time in the Spring, and for some reason I didn’t feel that was enough punishment, so I opted to load up full time in the summer semester, too.  On the bright side, ramping up like this will allow me to dial it back during the fall.

For the next couple of months, most of my posts are either going to be (1) posts that I wrote a long time ago but never posted, or (2) assignments from my summer courses.  I’ll get back to my regular programming around mid-August.

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Pokemon Surgery

by Douglas Bushong on June 6th, 2011
Pokemon Surgery

I had to do surgery on a few dolls over the weekend.

First, the stitches holding the hands of my son’s Pikachu doll to its body came loose.  It probably wouldn’t have been a big deal, but we didn’t want him swinging it around by the hand and pull the arm off.  After applying a band-aid to the doll for a few days, I stitched the hand down to hold it in place when they weren’t around.  As far as they know, Pikachu is all healed up.

Not long afterward my daughter came to me with a Yoshi doll that had a hole along one of the seams.  After going online and reading through various sewing forums, I figured out how to sew the seams so that the stitches would be on the inside of the doll.  This allowed me to make a largely unnoticeable repair.

I’m really happy that my children have dolls based on video game characters; they seem to be much more active with these dolls than they are with those based on TV shows.  Of course, the consequence of this is more field repairs from Daddy, but I don’t mind; this is just one more way that games are teaching me new and enjoyable things, like sewing.

In my last two images, I decided to experiment a little with the cell shading potential of DAZ Studio.  Ever since I saw some of Charles Urbach’s work where he illustrated (what appears to be) a cell-shaded character against a realistic background, I’ve been trying to emulate the look.  I have a long way to go before I will be able to make it work, but I figured it couldn’t hurt to play around with the blog images.

Let me know what you think.

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Marvel Super Hero Squad

by Douglas Bushong on June 2nd, 2011
Marvel Super Hero Squad

I’ve been needing a new bathroom game on the PSP for some time now, so I decided to give Marvel Super Hero Squad a try.

Marvel Super Hero Squad is a cartoony styled third person beat-em-up game where you help various Marvel superheroes find fractals of an infinity sword that Doctor Doom wishes to possess.  As you help each hero face his own personal demons, you help save the world from the residents of (I kid you not) Villainville.

Super Hero Squad is an oversimplified comic story that caters to, if not condescends, small children.  There’s no real depth to the story other than “the bad guys are trying to take something, so we have to beat them up to stop it from happening.  Each of the characters is a caricature of a caricature; the most ridiculous of these is probably the Silver Surfer, who sounds like Jeff Spicoli from Fast Times at Ridgemont High.  “Hahaa! He said ‘gnarly, dude.’ It’s funny because he’s a surfer.  Get it?”  Ugh.

That said, i can forgive the patronizing nature of the story if the game is fun.  Unfortunately, this is where Super Hero Squad really fails.  The beat-em-up nature of the game gets old and repetitive after the first few missions, and the controls are simply awful.

This is the first game I can remember playing on the PSP that actually gave me motion sickness.  The automatic camera was terrible at shifting directions during combat, and it made it really difficult to keep my movements straight.  I quite literally thought I was going to vomit, and I had to frequently take breaks to keep my food down.  Given the lack of shoulder button use in this game, I can’t see why they didn’t provide manual camera control.

I may give Dungeons and Dragons Tactics a try in a few weeks, but I’ve decided to take a break from the faster paced adventure games on my mobile device for now.  I’ll just go back to playing chess on the smart phone.  Anything to get away from Super Hero Squad.

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