The Most Massive Re-Pitch in
the History of Game Design and
Development at UNC Charlotte,
EVARS!
Game2Learn Crew: aka, AAAAASK!
Amanda Chaffin, Antoine Campbell, Acey Boyce,
Andrew Hicks, Andrea Nickel, Samantha
Finkelstein, and Katelyn Doran
Bunny Generals
• Bunny Generals
Backtracker
• Save the world by disarming the evil
mastermind’s evil space laser! Like
James Bond! Only… not really…
• Cooperative game for 2 players
• 2D game in XNA
• Educational content: backtracking
VS
Levels
• N Queens, maze navigation, permutation
generation / code breaking
• Heuristics
Good Things
Challenges
• Backtracking puzzles
lend themselves well
to the game context
• Existing code base to
work from
• Networking...?!
• Game design/mechanic:
Are players writing code
or what?
• Need a better title 
Bunny Arrayser
• Objective:
– Cure evil bunnies
– Learn Arrays
• Game play:
– Students declare arrays
– Fill arrays manually or with loops
– Currently 15-30 minutes gameplay
Educational Concepts
• CS1 concepts
– Arrays: 1 Dimensional and 2-D arrays
– Loops: ‘for loops’ and ‘nested for loops’
• Why arrays?
– Important concepts easily visualized
– Generally a ‘dry’ concept to learn
Project Challenges
• Current code base (mostly) unusable
– Built on older version of XNA
– Game must be organized and redev’ed
• Logging must be redesigned
• Some art/sound needs to be done again
• Basically, we have to rebuild the entire game
Antoine’s Color
• Ninjitsu Sea Pirates : The Curse of the
Linked List
Izzy Otter
and the Band of Bodacious Bug Bots
• Objectives
– Defeat bugs, fix machines
– Debug graphical “pseudo-code"
Izzy Otter
and the Band of Bodacious Bug Bots
• Gameplay
– Add, remove, and change parts
– Correspond to in-code elements
– Fix “broken” machines
Izzy Otter
and the Band of Bodacious Bug Bots
• Teaching Goals
– Improve debugging skills
– Teach common errors and how to avoid
– Solidify existing knowledge of code flow
Izzy Otter
and the Band of Bodacious Bug Bots
• Challenges:
– Graphics/Sound
– 2d Tile or Platformer Engine
– Limit or Parse student “code”
– Effective Visualization
Arc
Nemesis
• Objectives:
– Create a path between you and your Arc
Nemesis
– Have fun with goal based Graphitti Grapher
– Learn all about arcs, polar coordinates, and
Cartesian coordinates
Gameplay:
• Create paths using arcs in a series of
increasingly difficult puzzles
Challenges
• Working with unfamiliar code base
• Great deal of content generation
• Younger target audience
Noah’s ArkStraction
• Objective:
– Get the animals on the Ark in proper place
– Learn Bottom Up method of Abstraction
• Game Play:
Educational Concepts
• OOP Concepts
– Abstraction
• Polymorphism
• Inheritance
• Software Engineering
– Bottom Up Approach
– Top Down Approach
• Layered Analysis
– Domain Analysis
• Scope (barn yard)
– Legacy Analysis
• what systems it works
with (what cows eat)
Project Challenges
• Graphics/Sound
• Drag and Drop support in XNA
• Dev from scratch
– Not a lot of previous dev’ed code to use
– Logging structure
– Error Checking
Katie’s Color
• Diner Dash Mod
Search Tree Dungeon Crawler
+
Search Tree Dungeon Crawler
• Objectives:
– Make your way through dungeons modeled
after a binary tree
– Each dungeon must be crawled using a
different search algorithm
Search Tree Dungeon Crawler
• Teaching Goals:
– Binary Search Trees
– BFS
– DFS
– Greedy
– A*
Search Tree Dungeon Crawler
Search Tree Dungeon Crawler
• Challenges:
– Designing dungeons to show pros and cons
of each algorithm
– Providing enough direction and aid to lead
players down correct path
– Difficulty balance
– Designing effective dungeon crawling system
Iphone Ex. Game
Virtual Reality Exercise Game
How can VR positively affect exercise?
Immersive
environment
Increases
presence
Increases
motivation
Free range of
motion (6 DOF)
Increases
interaction
Increases end
result
Advanced
tracking
Realistic
feedback
Increases
motivation and end
result
Measurements
Idea!
+ 3D
Ta-dah!
Dodge
Jump
Tap
Swerve
Swat
Project challenges
Software: needs to be > 60 FPS. (simulator sickness)
Hardware: not encumbering user (wires tucked away. Backpack?)
Simple graphics = easy; realistic graphics = a lot of time
Working with possibly unfamiliar system
Project not-challenges
OSG Virtual Environment Engine:
Real-time engine for immersive virtual environments
Supports many 3D modeling formats (including Google SketchUp)
Handles graphics, audio, tracker communication, etc.
Backend stuff + collision detection + reading in from tracker = done.
Questions?
Thanks for bearing with us!
Game2Learn Crew: aka, AAAAASK!
Amanda Chaffin, Antoine Campbell,
Acey Boyce, Andrew Hicks, Andrea
Nickel, Samantha Finkelstein, and
Katelyn Doran