So! This project I did with my friend Caden, go check out his blog!

In this blog post, I will be working towards answering the driving question, “How are thematic and mathematical elements used in game design?” I hope that this blog post will help you understand my answer more!

This project was fun and different, it tested our creative skills (somehow, I don’t have much), along with our collaboration skills. In this project, we were asked to make a board games based off of tectonic plates, my team and I decided to make snakes and ladders, but with tectonic plates. We call it *drumroll please!*… “Quakes and Waves”! So creative, I know. It’s pretty self explanatory to be honest. We were also asked to include probability along with the game rules. And that leads me to the first milestone!

Milestone 1: Game Rules First Draft

So this is also pretty self explanatory, we just made a first draft for the game rules haha.

Milestone 2: Science Vocabulary Choices

We would get a list of Tectonic Plate vocabularies, define, and decide which ones we would put in our games! If I’m being honest, most of them never made it in our game!

Milestone 3: Probability Quiz

Another one that’s self explanatory! So we did a probability quiz on Khan Academy!

Milestone 4: Final Game Rules

So this one, we just did a final draft for the game rules, along with the final probability equations.

Rules

-board game.

-snakes and ladders  pretty much.

-Roll both dice and move the numbers on the die added together.

-If you encounter a square that has a tsunami 🌊 on it move forward the amount of the number in the middle. Another way to determine how many steps you need to take, is you’ll see 2 droplets of water, that’s where you stop.

-If you hit an earthquake square you drop to the square where the crack ends.

-If you roll a double thats higher than 3, the tectonic plate movement happens, which means you move to the highest numbered square of the row. If you get a double that is three or lower, you move to the lowest numbered square in the row.

-if you roll two numbers that add up to 6 (for example, 1 and 5, 2 and 4, 3 and 3), you must bring in the coloured die. The red side activates the volcanic eruption, and you have to miss your turn. The green side mean you can have 2 turns.

-First person to square 90 wins!

Probability

• To roll a 2 is a 1/6.
• To roll a 3 is a 1/6.
• To roll a 4 is a 1/6.
• To roll a 5 is a 1/6.
• To roll a 6 is a 1/6.
• To roll a 1 and a 6 is, 1/6 x 1/6 = 1/36.
• To roll a double is 1/36.
• To hit a earthquake is a 5/90 chance.
• To hit a tsunami is a 4/90 chance.
• If you are playing with 3 other people, the chance of winning is a 1/4 chance.
• If you are playing with 2 other people, the chance of winning is a 1/3 chance.
• If you are playing with 1 other person, the chance of winning is a 1/2 chance.
• To roll a double higher than 3 is a 1/18 chance.
• To roll a double lower than 3 is a 1/18 chance.

Milestone 5: Complete Game

Once again, pretty self explanatory, all we did was finish the game!

Milestone 6: Game Day

So last week, we went around playing each other games! It was really fun, (unlike my group) everyone was really creative! I was kind of jealous lol.

And now the answer to the question! “How are thematic and mathematical elements used in game design?”

Well! Without a topic, you won’t really have a game, or at least an interesting one, and when it comes to probability, you would need it to have a chance at winning or loosing, rolling a number from 1-6 on a dice, or getting a Queen in a deck of cards, most things in a game needs probability, otherwise you wouldn’t have a “chance”!

Thanks for tapping in, but I’m gonna tap out! See you in my next maker post!!