Intercultural Design | Evaluating and promoting importance of gaming culture through designs
Melvin Yung Khun Yew | 0357241 | Bachelor of Design (Hons) in Creative
Media
GCD61304 Intercultural Design
Cultural Sensitivity in Design
Our group has made a proposal for a study on a cultural phenomenon or particular subculture perceived as sensitive. This proposal aims to target the gamer culture worldwide which involves billions of people worldwide. One interesting fact is, that gamer culture is not only the video games we normally perceive when discussing games in the community but also covers board games (or so-called tabletop games).
However, we're going to focus more on digital games, thus generating ideas for gaming culture promotion into daily life.
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| Image by rawpixel.com on Freepik |
These are the jump links to each part of this portfolio
Lecture
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| From online lecture meeting |
In the lecture, I learned about the standard design system which includes the breakdown and expansion of the design. This system is important for a clear goal when designing a product or artefact. To create a successful outcome, we need to introduce certain norms and values in the product, creating idealogy resonance with the clients.
Instructions
Mohd Asrizal Razali, my module coordinator and lecturer, gave our class a quick brief on the module information about the upcoming assignments, marked as an open-ended assignment with continuous progression to form a limitless product/design.
MIB - Module Information Booklet
Task 1: Proposal
Starting this group project, I teamed up with other students from fashion technology design courses and creative media design. After distributing the work among the groupmates, we quickly decided on the topic of this assignment (Gaming culture) that we would research. As I had already done some Internet research on how gaming culture is related to cultural sensitivity (as I thought this was an individual task), I suggested the team use this research direction and they soon agreed.
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| My group members |
From our research and understanding, the gaming culture has its area of sensitivity, which includes the representation of different cultures and races in the game, localization and ongoing toxicity due to gamers' behaviour.
To further prove the research, I searched the Internet and found examples of the effects of game developers not implementing cultural sensitivity into their games.
Based on the research, I soon formed a list of problem statements based on the current issues in the gaming culture, some especially in Japan.
Tackling on the localization issues, I came across the popular products in the gaming culture, which are gaming supplements that state they can ultimately improve gaming performance. I noticed that most popular gaming supplements such as G Fuel, Gamer Supps, etc are only written and printed in English. Given that Japan is also one of the biggest gaming communities, I'm surprised to find that there are only a few gaming supplement products (local products) sold in Japan that are written in the local language for easier comprehension.
Gaming supplements
An interesting idea came across my mind, what if I redesign and localize the popular game supplements globally that's G Fuel and Gamer Supps to suit the local Japanese market? In that way, it's easier for Japanese gamers to enjoy the global product and benefit from the products while they can read and understand the content of the product to further avoid the concerns among the locals?
Developing on the ideas, I intended to include the positive gamer terms/jargon in the packaging designs to foster a positive gaming community which targets the toxicity behaviour in gaming culture. Even though it seems like a small and subtle effort to solve those issues, it's a small step towards achieving optimistic gaming communities.
For more information on our progress by the others, please view the presentation slides down below:
Task 2: Field study
Progressing through our preliminary ideas, it's time to start gathering the necessary data and materials that aid us in the upcoming final project. The researches assist us in understanding the real-world examples and how they will connect with our eventual outcomes.
After a momentous thought process on the research, I came up with 4 different types of data collection methods that more or less serve their purpose. Those methods are later agreed upon by my group members.
After a momentous thought process on the research, I came up with 4 different types of data collection methods that more or less serve their purpose. Those methods are later agreed upon by my group members.
- Field study
- Online visual research
- Professional/Experienced interview
- Google Form survey
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| Our data collection methods |
Field study
I conducted a field study on the Japanese mart, Daiso in Malaysia mall where I can have a close-up look on the packaging design straight from Japan. This study allows me to scrutinize the careful design considerations of the Japanese towards the consumer.
Online visual research
Giving instructions to my groupmates to search for particular examples that share the same similarity with our final outcomes, we came together to note down insights we had observed in the slides. From the different brand collaborations with various categories such as food, drink mix and electronics, we've seen how the companies incorporate the game elements into their products. Furthermore, we can't leave out the most important part, game research which we carefully observed and acknowledged the game character designs and level designs with different cultural elements.
Experienced gamer interview
I heard of our lecturer, Dr Charles been a passionate gamer who enjoys his free time gaming with different game genres. Thus, I came up with the idea to interview him with some questions and ask for his sincere opinions on the current gaming trend.
Video evidence (Uncut version)
Google Form survey
We would like to hear more from our university students' perspectives on the gaming culture worldwide, thus creating a short but packed Google Form survey that allows us to understand various points of view by different people from the same generations. Through the results of our fellow voluntary students, we've recorded different replies but a handful of categories of answers.
For more information on our progress, please view the presentation slides down below:
Task 3: Final project
Here comes the time when we need to produce visual design outcomes that relate to our interpretation of the cultural sensitivity theme. Originally at this point, we're planning to just make a whole new game character design and place it on our packaging design. After a thoughtful feedback session with Dr Charles, we decided to scrap that idea and come up with a brand-new scheme: make a web mini-game. This change of direction actually suits more to our topic on gaming culture, more since a simple game character design doesn't link with the gaming culture, but rather may seem presented for different cultures such as the anime culture.
Eventually, we came to an agreement among us to focus more on the game production and the packaging design as a supporting element to promote our game.
Game design
In charge of the game development department, initially, I thought making simple games would be quite easy as I'm using a beginner-friendly game production software called GDevelop 5.
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| GDevelop logo |
The reality is quite the opposite as soon as I came across adding more event codings to my games, and the fine adjustments I need to commit to reduce and create a smooth gameplay experience.
With the help of my groupmates Zi Yue and Annisa, provided me with the sprites for the game character and enemy designs, allowing me to have a base model to animate and fine-tune the visuals later using the Adobe Photoshop puppet wrap function.
More sketches and progress are shown in our final project presentation slides. Please refer to the slides down below.
Final game trailer video:
Click here to play, for mobile devices please switch to landscape screen orientation for best experience.
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| QR code for the game |
Packaging Design
With the initial idea of allowing the consumer to interact with our game and be introduced to the gaming culture, we included a QR code that links to our instant web-available mini-game that can be played seamlessly across different devices. I contacted my group's packaging design department to include this clever idea in their designs.
For more information on our progress, please view the presentation slides down below:
Feedback
Dr Charles:
You need to think of how to relate your final product to your gaming culture apart from focusing on cultural sensitivity. Make your final outcome more coherent and support each other.
My reflections
- What have I learned in this module?
To keep this short, many things! From planning and directing my group (even though I'm not a leader) to learning how to create a game for the final outcome, I've experienced many forms of work to do, as of Taylor's graduate capabilities (TGC) I have been improving on lifelong learning, thinking and problem-solving skills, interpersonal skills and communication skills. Through the assignments, I was able to ponder and make an analysis of the sensitivity of each culture in the world. - What did I enjoy the most?
Creative ideas come up in my mind when I'm completing the assignments, especially in the final task. There was a sense of accomplishment when I finished my game development after going through multiple obstacles (unsaved progress and bugs). The progress of learning new things, such as learning how to code for the game mechanism to work properly and including a coherent Japanese style design at the same time. - What did I not enjoy the most?
I can't seem to pull myself from the fact that the grouping rules require different students from different design courses that focus on entirely different things. For this case, I have several design students who take on fashion design. I felt that their potential was wasted as it seemed that their skills could not be expressed effectively under our group's gaming culture theme. The final outcome of our group that makes a game and packaging design is discouraging them from focusing on their fashion perspective and putting put to use on this assignment. These issues piled up and caused me to take on many tasks myself in this whole project to bring the expectations up to par.
I regret not conducting a physical face-to-face meeting with my group members, thus I believe this is why the final design by my other groupmates can't reach certain standards that allow effective communication and exact visualization of the outcomes of our research and ideas due to the limited understanding of the topic. But there are times when other people can't cope with the schedules, as they have their own life to live. So it's quite a bummer that we can't have perfect teamwork in this assignment. - What have I learnt about myself through this module?
I may be suited to be a lone wolf if I can't rely on the group's capability to deliver a good outcome. :<
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