Tutorial Levels Annotated Bibliography

As Level Designer for Disco Is Dead, I want to ensure that I can create the best tutorial possible for teaching players not only our game, but also our controller. For my individual treatment plan I will be doing research into tutorial levels. Here are some useful sources I’ve already taken a look at:

Berbece, Nicolae. “This Is a Talk About Tutorials, Press “A” to Skip.” GDC Vault. Those Awesome Guys, Aug. 2016. Web. 13 Oct. 2016. http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1023845/This-is-a-Talk-About.

This GDC talk outlines poor examples of tutorials in the gaming industry, such as commonly used features such as walls of texts, annoying pop-ups and controller schemes. Nicolae Berbece encourages teaching the player through experiences rather than demonstration. He also discusses particular considerations for tutorials in VR games due its intuitive nature.

 

Jones-Rodway, Neil, and Aldric Sun. “Teaching Players: Tutorial and Opening Mission Design for COMPANY OF HEROES.” GDC Vault. Relic Entertainment, 2008. Web. 13 Oct. 2016. http://www.gdcvault.com/play/278/Teaching-Players-Tutorial-and-Opening. (Slides)

Jones-Rodway, Neil, and Aldric Sun. “Teaching Players: Tutorial and Opening Mission Design for COMPANY OF HEROES.” GDC Vault. Relic Entertainment, 2008. Web. 13 Oct. 2016. http://www.gdcvault.com/play/436/Teaching-Players-Tutorial-and-Opening. (Audio)

This GDC Talk by Neil Jones-Rodway and Aldric Sun of Relic Entertainment talks about the design process for the tutorial and opening mission for Company of Heroes. Their process includes breaking the game down into teachable concepts and methods, and designing a tutorial to convey those concepts to the player, followed by an opening mission that reiterates the same concepts within the actual game. Their presentation also outlines development tips – including not leaving the tutorial to the last minute, and allocating the same amount of care and attention to it as the rest of the game.

 

Ray, Sheri Graner. “Tutorials: Learning To Play.” Gamasutra. N.p., 06 Oct. 2010. Web. 13 Oct. 2016. http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/134531/tutorials_learning_to_play.php.

This article discusses why game tutorials are hated by most players and looks at ways to design tutorials that will satisfy a broader audience more effectively. She outlines the three primary learning styles: visual, aural and kinetic and the lesser discussed knowledge acquisition styles – explorative acquisition and modeling acquisition. Ray discusses how most tutorials have been designed for explorative learners, using World of Warcraft as an example. The secret to developing tutorials that accommodates both types of users is incorporating “skip” buttons – so the explorative player can move on, while the modeling player can take their time to learn without taking risks.