First few weeks at GAME

I have now studied game design at Uppsala University for three weeks, last week and this week I have been feeling like we're really getting started. We've had our first assignment in communications class and I personally found it very difficult to find a subject and writing a bit more scientifically about something artistic. I decided to write my popular science article about Concept Art which turned out quite well and received good critique from my group. The critiquing of other people's articles is also something challenging as you really need to read it thoroughly and think about what they have done well and to help them improve.
I have heard people saying it is boring and unnecessary but I do not agree. I believe that this course could really be useful, if not for the rest of the time in school for the rest of my life. You can always learn something and when you meet someone you should try to find what you can learn from them.

Game analysis class also seems interesting so far. Our first assignment was to go home and play Pacman and then analyze it and break it down into objects, properties, behaviour and relationships. The game looked very simple at first but when I started analyzing I just found more and more. So we all went to school with these long lists and we discussed it in our groups and finally one of our mentors reduced it to half. Perhaps we were all trying to do the analysis really thoroughly so we just overcomplicated it.
I did find it interesting that our mentors seemed to disagree upon one thing we discussed, whether the ghosts are one object with different behaviours or different objects because they have different behaviours. We came to the conclusion that it was one object with different behaviours when one of our mentors came and asked about it and corrected us, saying that when it comes to game designing they are separate objects. When we went through it all in the end another mentor corrected us back, saying that when it comes to game designing they are only one. I think that is probably the gap between artists and coders that this course aims to bridge.

I seriously have to stop now because it is getting way to long but I do have a lot more that I have been thinking about, but that will have to wait for another time.