MEDP 345
Web Design Projects

Tuesdays, 5:30 – 8:30pm 432 code 3978
Course prereq: MEDP 331 (Web Production II) or permission of the instructor. Please contact Professor Flanagan 3 hrs, 3 cr

A project-based class designed to give students the experience of solving practical problems in web production and to add to the advanced student’s web design portfolio with a comprehensive project. Students will work independently and in teams on a large-scale collaborative gaming project that addresses real world social problems or issues.

Course Theme Fall 2005:

Sites for Change

There will be three-four teams in the course working in this practicum-style environment to plan, design, and create online games for social impact. Students will design, document, prototype, test, and implement the interactive games during the course. All aspects of planning, production, and testing will be explored. As a team based course we will follow a professional software development company work model with an emphasis on creativity, quality work, and activist design. Outside consultants will be brought in for review.

Course is open by permission of instructor to any student who has enough technical and/or artistic and/education or sociology-focused expertise to contribute.

Course Syllabus

WIKI: http://colab.hunter.cuny.edu/wikis/webprojects/

Reading One:
Frasca, Gonzalo. "Videogames of the Oppressed: critical thinking, education, tolerance and other trivial issues."   First Person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game . Pat Harrington and Noah Wardrip-Fruin (Eds.) MIT Press, 2004.

Reading Two:
Woods, Stewart. "Loading the Dice: The Challenge of Serious Videogames." Game Studies ,Vol 4, No 1 November 2004 http://www.gamestudies.org/0401/woods/

Reading Three:
Zimmerman, Eric. "Play as Research: The Iterative Design Process." Design Research: Methods and Perspectives. Ed. Brenda Laurel. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2003, pp. 176-184.

Read for Ben Stokes' Visit:
Development Education Journal, "Games and Global Education" http://www.netaid.org/go/games

Reading Four:
Fajardo, Rafael. Pixels, Politics, and Play: Digital Video Games as Social Commentary Intelligent Agent 3, no 2 http://www.intelligentagent.com/archive/Vol3_No2_gaming_fajardo.html

Reading Five:
Norman, Donald. Excerpt, The Design of Everyday Things. And Part II. New York: Basic Books, 1983.

Reading Six:
Galloway, Alex. "Social Realism in Gaming."   Game Studies , Vol 4, No1 November 2004 http://www.gamestudies.org/0401/galloway/

Reading Seven:
Leonard, David J. "High Tech Blackface -- Race, Sports Video Games and Becoming the Other." Intelligent Agent , Vol 4 No 4, http://www.intelligentagent.com/archive/Vol4_No4_gaming_leonard.htm

Reading Eight:
Kennedy, Helen W. "Lara Croft: Feminist Icon or Cyberbimbo? On the Limits of Textual Analysis. " Game Studies , Vol 2, No 2   December 2002 http://www.gamestudies.org/0202/kennedy/

Reading Nine:
Fogg, B. J. "Conceptual Designs: The Fastest Way to Capture and Share your Idea." Design Research: Methods and Perspectives. Ed. Brenda Laurel. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2003, pp. 200-211.

Reading Ten:
Frasca, Gonzalo. "Sim Sin City: some thoughts about Grand Theft Auto 3." Game Studies , Vol 3 No 2. http://ludology.org/staticpages/index.php?page=20030129004146960

Reading Eleven:
Flanagan, Mary. "Next Level: Women's Digital Activism through Gaming." Digital Media Revisited. Andrew Morrison, Gunnar Liestøl & Terje Rasmussen (Eds.) Cambridge: MIT Press, 2003, pp 359 - 388. http://www.maryflanagan.com/articles/DigitalMediaRevisted.pdf

Reading Twelve:
Plowman, Tim. "Ethnography and Critical Design Practice." Design Research: Methods and Perspectives. Ed. Brenda Laurel. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2003, pp. 30-38.