Museum of Mechanics - Fishing
The Museum of Mechanics - Fishing project is an educational game created to showcase the ways fishing has been portrayed in gaming, and how fishing mechanics have evolved throughout gaming history.
This was a joint independent study conducted over 2 years, at UC Santa Cruz's Games and Playable Media Masters program.
Project Background
The project goal was to create a digital museum where players could play and experience fishing mechanics across games history. It was spearheaded by former Program Director Michael "MJ" John (Toys for Bob) and inspired by Johnnemann Nordhagen's Museum of Mechanics - Lockpicking.
My Contributions
I joined the project at its inception as a User Experience researcher and designer. I worked on this project for a total of 9 months, totaling 3 academic quarters. As part of the first class of students on this project, my work served as the foundation that following students built upon. This included:
Conducting initial research into fishing mechanic history
Logging initial fishing mechanic research via google sheets
Creating a system to distinguish logged fishing mechanics
Creating a wireframe for how research would be displayed in game
Conducting a close analysis into Black Bass Fishing to list necessary mechanics for recreation
Leading a group heuristic analysis into The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time to analyze and catalogue its fishing mechanics
My Impact & What I learned
My Impact
My research narrowed our team’s focus and led to us picking 3 games to recreate as exhibits for the museum, one for each game category based on my rubric.
The study I helped also greatly expedited our research into The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, reducing expectid research time from 2 weeks to just 2 days.
What I learned:
The importance of self advocacy and clarity when explaining ideas
How to navigate the friction that arises when new teams form
Skills to present ideas and designs clearly when communicating across teams
How to use OBS, Parsec, and Zoom for live play sessions and collaboration across time zones
Playtest footage analysis
The importance of backups when recording playtest footage
How to utilize the time management skills I learned on previous projects
Samples of my work conducted on this project, along with links to full documents are included in the following sections
Close Analysis & Technical Design Doc
Design Doc creation & heuristic research
Black Bass Fishing was the “Core” fishing game we decided to recreate for the museum, categorized due to its game loop focusing completely on fishing. I conducted a close study of its mechanics and systems so the team had a simple, easy to understand list of the features they would be recreating To do this I:
Played through an online version of Black Bass Fishing
Recorded key game mechanics via google sheets
Compared my findings with two other researchers, who did the same independently
Merged all our findings into a design doc
Once completed I created atechnial design doc and shared it with the engineering team, so they could refer to it if they had any future issues or questions during the recreation of Black Bass Fishing
A sample of this design doc, along with a link to the doc itself, is included in this section.
Black Bass Fishing - Design Doc
A brief showcase of the structure and rules of the Technical Design Document
Research Rubric Creation
A system created to organize recorded fishing games
Early on in the project I realized we were cataloging fishing games by console and release year, but we didn't have a criteria for sorting the fishing mechanics themselves. I brought this up to the project lead and created this metric for sorting our data. To do this I:
Analyzed logged games for common gameplay elements, mechanics, and fishing methods
Once completed I pitched my rubric to the team, which resulted in the sorting of the hundreds of fishing games we researched into 3 simple categories (Core, Side, and Micro Fishing Games) based on common systems and mechanics found in multiple games
My findings were instrumental in narrowing down our final project's scope, as we decided on recreating one Core, Side and Micro game for the rest of the project.
A sample of this rubric, along with a link to the doc itself, is included in this section.
Museum of Mechanics - Research Rubric
A small section of the research rubric I created early in production
Fishing Mechanic Spreadsheet
My fishing spreadsheet contributions
This was research conducted in the early weeks of the project to create a browsable catalogue of fishing mechanics and fishing games across gaming history. To accomplished this I:
Researched fishing systems from the Nintendo Wii, PC, and Multiple VR consoles
Searched through online guides, Lets Plays, and published reviews to note common gameplay mechanics and features
Added my findings to the shared spreadsheet
My research helped paint the initial picture of fishing games across gaming history. This and the above metric I created, were instrumental in narrowing the focus of the original project, and led us to deciding the final games we wanted to recreate.
A sample of my contributions to the spreadsheet, along with a link to a full copy are included in this section.
CG Spreadsheet Contributions - Sample
A section of my contributions to the fishing mechanic spreadsheet
Golden Path
A player story for experiencing the museum
Once we were more certain about the game's design and key features, I wrote a small "Golden Path" for how the average user would explore the Museum. For this, I:
Tracked down and organized design ideas scattered across several meeting notes
Had several meetings with the project lead to verify my designs were correct
This doc resulted in reduced team confusion, clarified several details of the project that were still nebulous, and helped unify the design vision in its early stages. It was instrumental in helping us get our bearings before we started researching and recreating specific games.
A sample of this document, along with a link to the doc itself, is included in this section.
MoM Golden Path
A small section of the golden path document I created for the Museum.
Museum Display - Wireframe
A mockup of how research would be presened in game
Another doc created early in the project. This doc was meant to convey how we would present this data in the game, specifically as a wireframe of an exhibit plaque. To this end I:
Researched museum plaques to learn how museums usually convey information
Created a mockup based on my research
I focused on giving context to the specific fishing mechanic's history by highlighting the core game loop, the development studio, any key engineers, and the game's influence on fishing game mechanic history.
The sample of the wireframe, along with a link to the full document, is included in this section.
Museum Plaque Wireframe - Sample
An wireframe displaying how information would be displayed in the museum.