Game Design and Production - BA (Hons)

Abertay University

Please note: If you are a Direct Entrant (new student) to this year of study and have not previously taken module ABE101, then you MUST take ABE201 as your Term 2 microcredential module. If you have previously taken ABE101, then you are NOT permitted to take ABE201 in Term 2. Starting university brings new opportunities and challenges, and every student’s journey is different. This microcredential helps you settle into life at Abertay and build the habits that lead to success. You’ll hear from current students sharing their own tips, and reflect on the areas you most want to develop. You’ll get to know Abertay’s systems, explore what makes a successful student and practise core skills such as time management, referencing, academic writing style and using support services. By the end, you’ll have the tools and strategies you need to thrive at university. Indicative content - Navigating Abertay Systems: Get to know the key systems you’ll use at Abertay—such as MyLearningSpace, MS Teams, OASIS and MyAbertay—and learn how to use them effectively. - Expectations of University and You: Explore what’s expected of you as a student and what you can expect from the university. Topics include the code of conduct, independent and blended learning, how courses are structured, health and safety, and the Abertay attributes. - Abertay Discovery Tool: Complete the Discovery Tool to identify your strengths and areas for development across five themes: studying at university, academic skills, digital skills, careers and employability, and wellbeing. - Fundamentals of University: Learn how modules work, how assessments are set, and how to use assignment briefs and feedback to improve your work. - Understanding, Searching and Evaluating Information: Develop strategies for finding and assessing reliable information, building your confidence in research and study skills. - Successful Student Behaviours: Practise the habits that help you succeed: managing time, avoiding procrastination, effective note-taking, preparing for classes, developing a growth mindset, and making use of student support services. - Referencing: Understand academic integrity and why referencing matters. Learn how to avoid plagiarism, create in-text citations and reference lists, and use digital tools to manage your sources. - Sounding Academic: Discover what lecturers mean by “academic style” and how to use the right language in your writing. Learn the rules of academic writing, how to paraphrase effectively, and how expectations differ between school/college and university. You’ll also explore how assessments, marking and feedback work.

This module provides the opportunity to work collaboratively within a multidisciplinary team to design and develop an interactive media'based project. You will apply your creative and technical skills to contribute to the production of project elements, while also developing professional abilities in pitching, presenting and communicating effectively within a team setting. Alongside practical development, you will research and test technical pipelines, produce project documentation and planning materials, and critically reflect on your contribution. The module culminates in the creation of a final interactive piece, demonstrating both individual expertise and collective achievement. Indicative Content - Contextual Overview: Examine how games have been designed across prominent genres, styles and techniques. - Concept and Communication: Develop skills in conceptualising and communicating ideas, scoping requirements, and giving and receiving critique. - Design Process: Establish effective design processes, propose solutions, iterate and document progress. - Core Design: Build up the concept through graphics, features, setting, story, objectives and levels. - The Development Team: Understand roles and responsibilities, scheduling, milestones and inclusive team practices. - Rules and Mechanics: Implement choices, interactivity, strategies, motivation and reward, while balancing gameplay. - Look and Feel: Define style, ambience, colour, mood, sound effects and music to shape player experience. - Cultural and Commercial Awareness: Design with awareness of audience, markets, genres and platforms. - Production: Apply production processes to manage scope, coordinate with team members and deliver a project. - Publishing and Showcasing: Explore opportunities for publishing, create pitch and advertising materials, and develop strategies to promote your work.

In this module, you will develop an in'depth understanding of the production process and the challenges of managing a creative team. You will explore the processes and methodologies that support effective team management in the creative industries, while also considering the legal, ethical, commercial and technological frameworks that shape professional practice. By engaging with real'world issues, you will learn how to balance creativity with productivity, manage risks, and operate professionally within industry constraints. Indicative Content - Managing Risk and Uncertainty: Identifying and managing risk in resources, processes and legal aspects. Quality assurance as part of production: planning, QA teams, outsourcing, costing, testing, alpha/beta/gold master stages. - Production Control: The project reporting mechanisms, planning, management, organisation, staffing, directing, controlling, project initiation, plans, budget, resources, inventories, termination, project management tools. - Controlling Software Production: Programmers, code, data, version control, tools, software reviews, the mythical man'month, the principles of software engineering. - Controlling Asset Production: Analogue artworks, digital artwork conversion and creation, static imagery, time'based imagery, FMV, character design, look’n’feel. Importance of audio sound effects, ambient noise, music creation, capture, editing, conversion, storage, size, reproduction, immersion. - Human Factors: Building self'esteem, confidence, intra' and inter'team relationships, domain expertise, discontent, resolving conflict, managing performance. - Handling Criticism: Internal and external mechanisms for evaluation, the media cycle and handling reviews. - Team Dynamics: How teams operate and develop, relationships, stakeholders, reporting agreements, diversity as strength, goal'setting, identifying strengths and weaknesses. - Case Studies: How games and interactive media companies are managed. Variety of company structures and teams, value of analysis and post'mortems. Using games'related and non'games industry examples. - Leadership: Management styles, defining roles, responsibilities and skills of good managers, assertiveness, rapport, influence, leadership, management strategies.

In this module, you will work collaboratively as part of a multidisciplinary team to design and develop an interactive media project. Each student will take on a professional role aligned with their area of study, contributing specialist skills to the team. You will engage directly with clients and stakeholders, participate in pitching and presentations, and research and test technical pipelines to support production. Alongside this, you will create project documentation and planning materials, and contribute to the iterative design and development of a final interactive prototype that demonstrates both creative and technical achievement. Indicative Content - Team Organisation and Management: Attend and participate in team meetings, keep minutes, assign roles and responsibilities, identify and resolve team problems, apply conflict resolution approaches, engage in team building, break down features into implementation tasks, and use industry'standard project management software to track progress in an iterative process. - Communication and Professionalism: Communicate effectively and respectfully within the team, with tutors, clients, mentors and other stakeholders in a professional manner. - Development Methodologies: Understand and apply appropriate development methodologies, such as agile and SCRUM, tailored to project requirements and team balance. - Research and Concept Development: Research similar products and competitors, analyse the product marketplace (platforms, user profiles, costs, regional differences), conduct visual and audio research, and iteratively develop design concepts in response to a brief. - Technologies and Pipelines: Research software and hardware technologies, develop a technical plan for game development, and design, test and document production pipelines. - Style and Branding: Develop a brand identity for the team and project, define and document visual and audio style, and produce marketing and promotional materials. - Pitching and Presentation: Create and deliver project pitches in response to briefs, present to clients, tutors and stakeholders, and respond to feedback by revising project design. - Prototype Development, Testing and Iteration: Use appropriate tools, engines and hardware to deliver a working digital prototype, conduct regular user testing, and apply findings to iterative design with a focus on user experience. - Release Management: Manage the development process using source control, defect tracking and build processes. - Project Delivery: Explore methods of product delivery including market cycles, digital distribution and publisher'developer relationships, and deliver a complete prototype with press kit and competition'ready publisher pitch deck.

This module requires you to engage critically with historical and contemporary issues within the games industry. You should expect to discuss: the local, national, and global marketplace for games; insights and issues related to the creation, distribution, and consumption of interactive media; and demonstrate critical analysis of existing literature on the games industry. Indicative Content - The Games Industry: Overview of a range of creative applications of games across social and cultural sectors, identifying key sources of information. - Local, Regional, and Global Outlooks: Overview of the culture and impact of the games industry locally, regionally and globally. - People, Players and Populations: An insight into current market research into games and their players, with discussion on how this data influences development, users and creators. - Stereotypes and Representation: Overview of the current climate of games and the game industry, the importance of representation, and the impact of perpetuated stereotypes in society and culture. - Academic Writing and Analysis: How to understand research, and methods for constructing and supporting analytic arguments. - Games and Theory: Discussion of how theory, including but going beyond game studies, can enhance and inform conceptual, empirical and practice-led projects. - Game Production Studies and Platform Studies: Introduction to the increasing body of scholarship around changes in the games industry, and specific practices for studios and publishers. - Game Histories: Methods for thinking through the history of analogue and digital games, along with how design and cultural techniques persist into present games.

This module challenges you to engage with game development beyond the limits of pure entertainment, to develop the ability to apply your skills to developing interactive media outcomes for cultural, societal and/or civic purposes. You'll engage with serious and critical play and design, responding to client briefs to develop your professional skillset and contextual understanding of the field of game design. Indicative Content - Games and Play: Examine the intrinsic link between play and games whilst examining the differences in approach and perspective when designing for video games versus designing a playful experience or for play. - Technology and Play: Examine the impact of technology (or the lack there of) on the design of games and play. Cutting edge technologies will be examined, alongside reflection on past trends and the play technologies that are not digital. Students may also reflect on the design of experiences for emerging or imagined technology. - Communicating through Play: Examine approaches to express concepts and ideas through gameplay, moving beyond narrative to examine expressive game mechanics and procedural rhetoric. - Playing with Skills: Learn to undertake needs analysis of project briefs and to assess their own expertise and gaps in relation to the needs of a project. They will be supported to develop a programme for expertise and knowledge development to address skills gaps through practice. - Playing with Audiences: Examine the issues that limit inclusion of diverse audiences in play experiences and the design approaches that can ensure accessibility, inclusion and equity. - Society and Play: Develop your understanding of the creation of games and playful media that seeks to influence, support or criticise societal issues including those which seek to promote health, disrupt societal norms and support education. - Lived Experience and Play: The use of real-life experience within video game design will be explored to understand the methods for integrating such experience, its interpretation into game play and the influence of interactivity on player reception of lived experiences in games. - Community, Culture and Play: The spaces within which people play and how play creates bonds between players will be examined alongside the design approaches that can be used to support/promote/discourage social play. You'll examine games influence on culture and vice versa to understand their impact on common practices, behaviour, language etc. Games that actively seek to shape/disrupt/comment upon culture will also be analysed in relation to both their production and reception. - Performance and Play: Study the performative nature of games to understand links between games and the performing arts in commercial, independent and research settings and the design opportunities presented by real time technologies in live performance spaces. - Environment and Play: Examine the relationship between games and their environment, whether this be looking at site specific, site responsive, or mixed reality experiences or games that engage with environmental themes and issues.

This module tasks you with developing the contextual, theoretical, and practical foundation for an independent research project. You'll evaluate existing texts and practice in support of your development of a project proposal that outlines your research questions and process. Indicative Content - Understanding research: You'll learn how research is designed, including: development of a research topic and research questions, the importance of analysing existing literature and knowledge, and understanding how research methods lead to new knowledge that is of value to your discipline, field, and other beneficiaries. - Research in- and for- games: You'll learn about examples of research in the context of games, including both academic games research and how research is vital to professional game design and production. - Practice review: Through analysis of the wider context of the proposed project, you'll consider the state of the art in your field and aim to situate your practice in relation to existing games, art, and media - Literature review: You'll learn how to approach a review of literature and other authoritative sources relevant to your research questions and topic. - Research methods: You'll learn about common research methods applied in game design and production inquiry, and how methods of research link directly to research questions. - Practice-based research: You'll consider how research can be conducted through game design and production practice, and learn the importance of concept development, experimentation, and documentation. You'll be encouraged and supported to frame and understand your research as a form of practice-based inquiry. - Quantitative and qualitative research for games: Games research often connects to social research methods borrowed from other disciplines, for instance research that involves engaging with users, players, audiences, or other stakeholders. You will learn about quantitative and qualitative approaches to research, how and when to align these approaches with a practical approach to inquiry, and key considerations if considering a research design that involves data collection. - Research ethics and data management: You'll consider ethics in games research and professional practice, learn how to assess and manage risks, and develop an understanding of how to collect and manage data in line with legal responsibilities. - Research project management: You'll learn how to prepare an effective plan for the delivery of a major project, including clarifying the aim and objectives, outlining the major activities, listing potential deliverables, and accounting for project time and resources. - Research proposal: Bringing together all the learning from the module, you will be supported to prepare and communicate your plan for research through development of a research proposal.

Design, develop, and deliver an extensive independent research project, underpinned by relevant critical theories, concepts, and practices within your discipline. This module approaches research as an active process of inquiry that leads to the production of insights relevant to your creative and professional field. At the end of the module, you will present a creative honours project in a form agreed with your supervisor. This will be accompanied by a dissertation that communicates your research and that presents a critical analysis of the final honours project. Indicative Content - Creative research: Discussing and participating in creative research. Learning about examples of applied research by games & arts practitioners, and producing and communicating independent creative research through engagement in on-campus activities. - Independent study and project management: Demonstrating the ability to operate as an independent creative practitioner. Demonstrating the ability to manage a major project, setting milestones, managing time and resources, and identifying and mitigating risk - Supervision and self-assessment: Working with your supervisor according to a defined schedule and making maximum use of supervision time to seek guidance and feedback on progress. Committing to regular self-assessment of the quality of work and the progress being made. Demonstrating an ability to effectively and realistically critique your work in relation to your own expectations. - Peer feedback and community of practice: Embracing opportunities for peer feedback through regular sharing of projects in the form of peer critiques, demo sessions, or play parties. Capturing and responding to feedback to enhance the quality of your work. Operating within a wider community of like-minded practitioners in games & arts. Striving to carry out project work in collaborative creative spaces and labs, to maximise opportunities for networking, sharing, and mutual support. - Personal and professional development: Identifying areas of personal and professional development, and planning to address these through the execution of the creative project. Delivering a project that will support you as you take steps towards employment or entrepreneurship in the creative industries. - Critical reading and research context: Carrying out independent, critical reading of key theoretical texts, research articles, and other texts relevant to the subject, discipline, or profession. Understanding and incorporating the wider research context and rationale into your argument, considering artistic and professional practice. - Analysis and synthesis: Demonstrating rigour in the deconstruction and scrutiny of sources, data, and practice, and constructing a substantiated argument drawing upon your analysis. - Writing and communication skills: Formalising the structure of your proposed written argument, aligning your research questions with existing knowledge, theory, and selected research methods. Demonstrating the ability to iteratively develop clear, precise and substantiated academic writing, and to utilise your writing skills to effectively communicate the findings of your research to an intended academic, artistic, or professional audience. - Presentation: Deliver a final project, presented in a manner that demonstrates professionalism and an understanding of expectations within your field of practice. Demonstrate the ability to deliver presentations on project development and conclusions.