Quest Log Entry — Prototyper’s End-of-Semester Reflection

What a semester this has been.

If I flip back through the pages of my Quest Log, it feels like I’ve been on a long campaign—one full of puzzles, branching paths, boss battles disguised as design challenges, and more than a few unexpected level-ups. When this course began, I wasn’t entirely sure what it meant to design a game for learning. I knew games could teach. I knew they could motivate. But understanding how they are crafted to do so? That was a different kind of journey.

Throughout these 16 weeks, I not only designed, redesigned, and prototyped—I also documented my process, reflected on my choices, and learned to see games through the eyes of both a designer and an educator. Looking back now, I can see just how many skills, concepts, and frameworks I picked up along the way.

🧠 What I Learned This Semester

This course taught me that meaningful games don’t happen by accident—they’re constructed through intentional mechanics, feedback loops, identity roles, and embedded learning opportunities. Some of my biggest takeaways:

Mechanics matter more than I realized. The MDA framework helped me understand how small mechanical changes ripple through dynamics and shape the entire learning experience.
Scaffolding is essential. Plass et al. showed me that cognitive support, progressive difficulty, and clear feedback are not optional—they’re core to learning.
Player identity transforms learning. Designing experiences where the learner becomes an investigator, survivor, policymaker, or explorer changes how they interpret the material.
And perhaps most importantly:
Games teach best when they let players do, not just read or watch.

This course flipped my perspective. Game design isn’t about creating something “fun” and then adding learning on top—it’s about building learning into the mechanics themselves.

🏆 Project I’m Most Proud Of

Circuit Breaker is still the project where everything came together for me.

From:

defining the core loop
building out rule-based interactions
testing prototypes
refining hazards and states
and finally translating the idea into a gamified lesson plan

…it became the project where I felt the greatest ownership and growth.

But my Roots of Change redesign is a close second. That assignment made me feel like a true instructional game designer—identifying weaknesses, proposing strategic solutions, and grounding them in theory.

🚀 The Project I’d Take Into Early Development

I would absolutely take Circuit Breaker (my Construct 3 project from earlier in the semester) into a deeper development cycle.

Why?

Because it’s the project where I saw the clearest potential for:

rapid iteration
visual feedback
teachable failure states
and an engaging core loop

Even with its early rough edges, it had a spark—something that felt like it could genuinely grow into a full serious game with enough refinement. If I were to keep designing beyond this course, that’s the prototype I’d pick back up first.

📘 Where I Still Want to Improve

Even though I learned a lot, I can see several areas where I still need growth:

Balancing complexity and clarity. I sometimes over-design or try to fix too many things at once.
Rapid prototyping. I’d like to get faster at building throwaway prototypes instead of conceptualizing everything on paper first.
Playtesting literacy. The ability to observe, interpret, and iterate based on player feedback is a skill I want to strengthen.

Game design is iterative, messy, and deeply human—I'm still learning to embrace that process fully.

💬 Three Pieces of Advice for My Future Self

If I could send three messages to a future version of me starting another game design journey, they would be:

1. Build small, test early, fail forward.

Don’t wait for perfection before letting someone interact with your design. Learning comes from the iteration, not the theory.

2. Anchor every mechanic to a learning goal.

If a feature doesn’t support the objective, it’s fluff. Be intentional.

3. Remember the player’s experience is the curriculum.

Immersion, agency, and identity shape learning more than any wall of text ever will.

🗺️ Journey Index — The Path I Traveled

Here are all the quests, reflections, comparisons, critiques, and builds that shaped my learning this semester:

Early Explorations

Mid-Semester Growth

Deep Dive Into Prototyping

Final Arc

“Final Assignment: The Roots of Change Mission”

Every entry is its own step in the evolution of my design skills—each one building toward this final reflection.

🎉 Quest Complete — For Now

Reaching the end of this semester feels like finishing the final quest in a long campaign. I’ve gained new skills, new perspectives, and a deeper appreciation for what games can do as tools for learning.

This class didn’t just teach me about games.
It taught me how to design learning through systems, stories, and play.

And that is a skill I’ll carry forward—into future projects, future classrooms, and future worlds I create.

Level Up: Semester Complete.
On to the next adventure.

🎮 Final Reflection: Closing the Questline