We get asked this a lot with Pixel Press….why draw, why not do it all in the app, drag-and-drop design style?
From our experience (and some other industry experts that have shared their own failures with us), giving users the power of a drag and drop experience means they don’t put the care and effort into creating something truly fun – instead they tend to quickly combine elements together that look interest, but don’t take the time to think through the end result. A better way is to put the user in a planning mindset first, which is the concept Pixel Press is built around.
Have you ever heard the saying “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”? We think that statement is fitting for why we like drawing over drag-and-drop design video game design.
Still not sold? Here are a few of our favorite reasons why we think drawing with good ol’ paper and pencil is the way to go.
It’s accessible.
The issue with existing game creators is they have a high cognitive curve. Pixel Press starts with drawing, and that makes sense without ever even seeing it. It works just like “Tennis” worked for the Wii. “If I can draw it, how hard can it be?”
It’s Lego like.
Adults and kids alike love legos because it puts them in a place where their imagination can run wild. Minecraft has been successful for this exact reason. Drawing a level is like building blocks, and that experience can’t be captured as well in a drag-and-drop designer experience.
It’s a get-away.
We all need to get away from the tech from time to time, and that’s even more important for kids. Pixel Press let’s you play with your mobile device, without actually using your mobile device. For parents, this is a very big deal. For kids, it’s great because mom controls their tablet time tightly.
It’s nostalgic.
For adults, (and not just men) drawing video games is a not-so-distant memory. The idea of being able to capture what was once just a dream, and make it real is a big deal. For adults who are now parents, the opportunity and excitement to share this experience with their children is even bigger.
It’s magical.
The idea of being able to draw something and then play it is flat out magical. We’ve experienced kids, parents, and grandparents all take part and watch this experience and the result is pure amazement. Creating something purely digitally does not produce the same result.
It’s art.
Drawing your level has a pretty awesome by-product – a drawing that can be shared in the household, saved, and admired for years to come. Who knows, maybe one day it might even be worth something when someone grows up to be a famous video game designer?
It’s how things start.
Ever read the book “The Back of the Napkin” – Dan Roam is famous for this book and says “Visual thinking frees your mind to solve problems in unique and effective ways.” Thinking about things visually is how most creatives start, and that usually involves paper and a pen.
It’s abstract.
Not sold on the above or never heard of the book? Thinking about things abstractly first let’s you eventually get to the details. Pixel Press only starts with drawing, but it’s so much more – testing, designing and finally playing. Drawing keeps you in the right frame of mind at the early stage of the process.
It’s how the pro’s do it.
Still not sold? Well ask most video game designers. One of the first steps in game creation is level design, and that almost always starts with a sketch. We’ve had numerous video game professionals tell us they are most excited about Pixel Press for it’s prototyping and concepting potential.
It’s important.
As a society, we’re over-saturated when it comes to technology, but digital entertainment experiences like television and video games are not going away, we love our games too much. If we’re going to play, we should be challenged intellectually, and we shouldn’t be kept from doing that by the fear of writing code. Pixel Press, using drawing to break down the barrier, let’s more people in.
It encourages quality.
We’ve heard time and time again from people we have talked to that digital building tools often result in low-quality results because the tools are too easy to create bad experiences, and don’t encourage well-planned designs. Pixel Press makes the process accessible, but takes the user through the proper steps (sketch, test, design) that will yield quality results. In the end, this means a better community experience.
It’s novel.
When it comes down to it, the drawing piece does have a strong novelty value, just like the guitar controller did for Guitar Hero and the Wii Remote did for Nintendo. The drawing concept is intriguing and will bring users to the platform.
Still not convinced? Try it first, but in the end it’s not the only way.
We know some people just don’t want to draw – we think we can convince many of them otherwise – but realize that it’s not for everyone. We fully plan to engage users for feedback on our assumptions, build them tools early on to digitally correct drawing mistakes, and in all likelihood offer those same tools to create a drawing from the start on the device. We’ll shift how the system works to meet consumer demand.
