IGDA Nanocon Notes - HvZ

Humans vs Zombies - How to Train your Dragon

Speakers: Joe Sklover and Chris Weed (Game creators)

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"We don't regret anything we've done." - "We f-ing love it."

Follow your own path:

1.      You have to really love it

2.      Be strong in the hard parts

Confessions of the Creators:

1.      Hate the gun culture

a.       permeates everywhere

b.      has been a hassle of the game being banned some-places

2.      It all started with an excuse to use a bunch of Nerf guns

a.       Toys R Us was closing and having a sale

b.      That night had everyone getting shot

c.       Morning after, it seemed everyone forgot about their Nerf guns

Post Nerf Night:

1.      What excuse can we use to shoot friends with foam?

2.      What if we had to sneak-up on people?

3.      What if you were on a team with your roommate?

Rules of the first game (Let's Assassinate Your Friends!):

1. On a team with your roommate
2. Use Nerf guns
3. Only a certain number of lives
4. Only score if you shoot someone if they don't know you are there

Patches after day 1 disputes:

Even if you see someone, you have 2 seconds to be shot.

People ended-up paying much more attention to the rules.

Players got very invested.

Final Patch:

If you know someone is there, 3 fingers on your head makes you invulnerable to being shot

Result:

Everyone was having 3 fingers on their head

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What worked?  Didn't?

        1. What if you added zombies to it?

a.       Resulted in HvZ rules later that night

        2. There is no perfect rule-set

a.       Too subjective

        3. Don't make it such an exclusive community

People seemed to want to be involved in a game

        1. Let's make a game that is a little bit bigger!

        2. The rules were 7 pages long

a.       most of it was explination

b.      'Cry' rule: something, sometime, will upset you - take it in stride

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MODERATING EARLY GAMES                    

HvZ Game 3:

        1. People felt like veterans

        2. Vets started to play their own way

        3. Non-mod friends should be used to place mission items

        4. 1st safety rule:

a.       a human ran into their car to escape from zombies

b.      zombie jumped on the hood

c.       human started driving!

        5. 2nd rule:

a.       high-speed chase of zombie and human!

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MISSIONS

How to play HvZ

        1. Play to win

a.       Human:

                                                               i.      don't be seen

                                                             ii.      don't be heard

b.      Zombie:

                                                               i.      can't blame the stalker

        2. Play to have fun

a.       Arguably the way to win

Missions offered to reward game participation

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SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION

Team bought Night Finders for the administration

Had all players outside the meeting room to cheer after the meeting

Town-hall meeting of +200 persons to help address 3 complaints

The only person that couldn't be helped had PTSD :(

Showed that the game has a responsibility to the community

School admin would warn (advertise) for the game before its start

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COMMUNITY AND GROWTH

When it's your project, it's easy to be defensive of it (other schools wanted to play)

Creators would just give advice and simple software resources

                "open-sourced the game"

                now have innumerable amount of iterations

                                new rules

                                planned missions

                                slight mechanic changes

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GNARWHAL STUDIOS INC

After graduation, what are we to do with our lives?

        1. Could have taken more control of the game

a.       "We don't want to be a vendor"

       2. Decided to let people work with the creators

a.       Collect all information

b.      Give the information

c.       "Become the hub"

Started Gnarwhal Studios Inc.

        1. Spread the game

        2. Support inclusiveness

        3. Keep it free

        4. Protect player-base from exploitation

HvZ can act as a platform to make

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CONCLUSION

"The thug life ain't easy."

We aren't classically successful, but we are happy.

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Questions

Was the first game really intense?

                Ya, but people still went to class.

What emergent narratives have you seen?

                In a ‘meta’ sense, people become friends with who they play with.

                People take on the roles of acting like friends, and it exists!

                Intercommunity support between HvZ locations.

How did no-formal game design training apply?

                There was a little read after the fact.

                It's awesome to see games taken more and more seriously.

                Games have been around since the dawn of society-theory wasn't needed then.

                Don't need theory, but it helps - be spontaneous and have fun with it!

Bullying?

                Verbal abuse from non-player characters.

                It's a good skill in life not to care about that.

                'Commando' humans can be bullies in-game.

                Some places trade freshman as resources.

Have ethics broken-down in some games?

                Team picking early-on.

                In the end, the best strategy is to work together.

Ideal number of players for HvZ?

                With enough intuition and experience, it can work for any number.

                No 'real' optimal player number.