Brainstorming with Context

Ethen Dent
Sep 24, 2021
3 min read

Updated: Jun 13, 2022

Introductions

Approaching the end of the initial week, I looked into how brainstorming could be inspired by context. This exercise took form of brainstorming for a new videogame concept utilising news headlines to provide inspiration.

I came across an article on the BBC News website about an undelivered 75 year old postcard that had been found via an online auction.

I proceeded to use this news article as the foundation for the game concept.

[Image of the postcard from BBC News]

BBC News Inspired Game

"How we redelivered a baby's postcard - 75 years on".

Time Period	2020, current COVID era
Place	Start = town/village. End = urban city.
Protagonist	An elder man who has been a hermit/hoarder for a long period of time, diagnosed with Cancer
Antagonist	Local authorities, thugs.
Friends	Local strangers, old friends of the elder.
Problem	To deliver the postcard.
Conflict	Does the elder have the desire to finish delivering the postcard?
Climax	Deliver the postcard(?)
Resolution	Walks home (does the elder achieve his goals?)
Obstacles	All antagonists
Character Arc	Cynical, old man transitions to a more receptive personality.

Potential art styles that the game could adopt:

Untitled Goose Game (for its simplistic style)
Risk of Rain 2 (for its beautiful environments and painted textures)
Valheim (for its beautiful environments)
The Witcher 3 (for its unexplained details in characters)
Oddworld (for the painted backgrounds)
The Ascent (for the camera perspective)
Destiny 2 (for the skyboxes and landscapes)

Reflection Segment

"Inspiration is in the world around us. Today's session insinuates that. Writer's block is really annoying sometimes, especially with deadlines. Utilizing the news brainstorming tangent that was discussed today, I have found it useful to initiate the building blocks of an idea."

"Although it may be difficult to translate to other creative mediums, you can still recognize the utility of looking out and absorbing content and elements. The list of components that were used as the building blocks of the concept could translate into other mediums. Understanding your business and the components that it will consist of can be listed in the same way (as the news task) and help branch to other tangents as well. For example, you could argue that instead of listing protagonists / antagonists and plot points, you could instead list; animated characters, product placements, storytelling, scenery, etc."

"Looking at various art styles across multiple video-game genres allowed me to identify positives and negatives with each style. Risk of Rain 2 is a game that visually enthrals me. The colours are so exaggerated and vibrant. Simple model geometry, painted textures; I find the game so visually appealing. It was the desired art style that I would like if I were to pursue a video-game idea. The only issue is, is that none of it had any connotations or emotional value to the game. It just looked pretty. That's not necessarily a bad thing. A piece of art could be just that and not have to connote to anything else. "

Citations

BBC News,2021.'How we re-delivered a baby's postcard -75 years on'.[online] Available at:<https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-58585540>[Accessed 27 October 2021].  

Untitled Goose Game Wallpaper [online] Available at: https://www.epicgames.com/store/en-US/p/untitled-goose-game  

Untitled Goose Game Screenshot [online] Available at: https://www.polygon.com/guides/2019/9/24/20880640/untitled-goose-game-garden-to-do-list-walkthrough  

Risk of Rain wallpapers [online] Available at: https://imgur.com/gallery/tDmL2sC  

Risk of Rain colour Palletes [online] Available at: https://color.adobe.com/create/color-wheel  

Risk of Rain(other) Screenshots. Pictures captured in-game via El Gato Capture HD  

The Ascent. All pictures captured in-game via El Gato Capture HD