ATLS 4519 / 5519

Course Description

A hands-on game design studio where students will develop games within extreme technical constraints to better understand how those boundaries help us create better games.

In this self-directed studio, you’ll learn to efficiently use tiny screens and limited processors for maximum fun, create beautiful art with small color palettes, and tell compelling narratives with nothing but unformatted text. Students will learn to develop games with Bitsy, Twine, Pico-8 and Arduboy, and complete analog game design challenges that will force them to achieve specific goals within strict limitations. Intrepid students can dive even deeper to develop games for classic 8-bit consoles and fabricate their own cartridges to play them on original hardware.

Course Objectives

Students who successfully complete this course will:

Critical Thinking & Theory / History:

• Examine at the history of game development, specifically the ways that technical limitations have shaped and spurred creativity

Design/Creative:

• Design original games
• Create custom game assets, including sprites, backgrounds, sounds and typography

Technical:

• Program digital games using Lua and C++
• Explore the creation and fabrication of physical computing interfaces for game design