International Conference on Computer System 2014

Developing the Game Design Document for An

Soeheri1 and Lendy Rahmadi2

Educational Game Named “Bank Sampah”


finally have found one fairly comprehensive definition of
Abstract— The development of the trend in today’s games. In the book entitled The Art of Game Design, a game
information technology results in the higher need for it for is defined as an activity to solve problems using the approach
educational purposes and tends to be varied. Especially for of playing or a playful situation [1].
early childhood education. As we know, nowadays children One of the games that is now being seriously developed is
are more familiar with how to use their smartphones, tablets educational games. Educational games is a new breakthrough
and other gadgets that they often use to play games. Therefore, in the world of gaming, where games that have the primary
educational elements that we need to give to the children duty as a problem-solving activity with recreational purposes,
should be more varied and innovative. One way that we can self-entertaining, are combined with the elements of
used is the educational game. In this paper, we are going to education. This type of game is intended to encourage students
develop a game design document or which we can call as the to learn while playing. Educational games are a new
blueprint of a game named “Bank Sampah” or the Bank of breakthrough in the world of education because they combine
Waste in English. This game design document already the aspect of playing with the the aspect of learning [2].
includes all the necessary things in designing a game. It can be According to Andrew Rollings and Ernest Adam, game
said that with the existence of a game design document means
design is a process of imagining a game idea, defining how the
that the game has been ready to be implemented. This “Bank
game works, describing the elements that build the game (in
Sampah” game serve as a learning medium for children in
terms of the concept, the function, the artistic aspect and so
order that they become aware of the importance of not littering
while at the same time fostering their awareness regarding the on) and presenting the information about the idea of the game
benefits of not littering. to the game development team [3].
Meanwhile, according to Jesse Schell (2008), game design
Keywords— —“Bank Sampah”, Game, Game Design is the action to define how a game should be [1].
Document, Educational Game. According to Adams, Ernest (2010), a game design
document is a collection of documents used by game designers
I. INTRODUCTION to inform about the designed game, this process changes the
idea that at first is abstrack into a written plan [4]. There are
Currently, the development of the trend in information
various kinds of game design documents, each has its own
technology increases rapidly in any aspects including the
characteristics and different functions. Here they are :
aspect of education. The aspect of early childhood education is
no exception. Today’s children prefer learning in ways that are
a. High Concept Document.
fun, not boring, entertaining but which still educate them.
It functions to inform the producer or publisher about the
They tend to enjoy learning through games using their
game to be developed. This document consists of the key
smartphones, tablets and other gadgets. Varied and creative
ideas of the game.
education but which still contains educational elements tends
to be chosen by them. This is evidenced from a substantial
b. Game Treatment Document.
number of applications or games with educational elements in
It functions to present the game in an outline form to
android and iOS platforms. The theme “Bank Sampah” or the
those who wish to know about the game that we are
bank of waste in English is taken considering the lack of
going to develop. This document also aims to develop a
awareness of waste, especially that most people have less
more in-depth design, a prototype that later will be
concern for the environment and litter anywhere. It concerns
developed into a finished game. This document is still
us greatly that this might happen for generations and children
simple, may take a form of brochures containing all the
might lose their awareness of this waste as well. This is what
basic ideas of the game is to be develop.
underlies the authors to write this paper.
Based on the foregoing, there is one problem that this paper
c. Character Design Document.
can formulate, which is “How to develop the Game Design
It is specifically used for recording the designs of the
Document for an Educational Game under the Theme of
characters that appear in the game that is going to be
developed, which often take a form of avatars.
“Bank Sampah” ?”.
There are a considerable number of definitions to define the
d. World Design Document.
meaning of a game. Nevertheless, there are hardly any formal
It serves as the basis for all the graphic arts and audio that
definitions. However, from several literature, the authors
describe the game world of the game that is going to be

 International Conference on Computer System 2014

created. This document contains information about the

background of miscellaneous objects in that world. 2. Genre Game
In accordance with the concept of the game, the genre of
e. Flowboard. this game therefore is social education and serious games.
It is a cross between a flowchart and a storyboard, where
the storyboard is a linear document used to plan a series 3. Target Audience
of illustration according to the storyline, while the The target audience of this “Bank Sampah” game is
flowchart is used by programmers to document early-age children, especially elementary school students
algorithms. and kindergarten students. However, adults can also play
this game and get educational and fun values so that it is
optional for them and still the main target audience is early-
f. Story Level and Progression Document.
age children.
This type of document records the large-scale story of the
game to be develop and how the progress of each one 4. Look and Feel
level to the next level. This document contains an To make it easier to play this game based on the
overview of the experience of the gamers after playing isomatrik perspective, a camera is placed on the top of the
the game to be develop. game interface.
The dominance of different colors at each location, color
g. Game Script. adjustments based on the dominant colors in each location.
Game script records the rules and the core game There is additional animation on particular locations, for
mechanics. It can make us know how to play the game an example if one of the characters is at home, the audience
and specify rules of the game in detail. can hear the voice of the character’s parents/ mother calling
the character’s name to clean up the room. Meanwhile, if
The authors began this research with reviews of literature one of the characters is visiting the park for an example,
on theories relevant to the preparation of a game design there will be people walking in the streets while littering
document. Once the authors have reviewed the literature and anywhere.
found the theoretical reference for the preparation of this game
design document, the authors then started to arrange the game 5. Feature Set
design document in accordance with the theories that the The feature set or the features of this “Bank Sampah”
authors have learned. Based on the literature reviews on the game are presented in Table 1 below.
types of game design documents, the authors combined the
TABLE 1
existing types of game design documents and used the result FEATURE SET GAME “BANK SAMPAH”
as a reference to arrange a more complex game design NO FEATURE
document. The types of game design documents that the 1 Timer
2 Scoring Board
authors have crossed among others are high concept 3 Pause (II)
document, game treatment document, character design 4 Close (X) Game Auto Save
document, story level and progression document as well as 5 Graphic Setting
game script. Using them as the benchmark, the authors started 6 Audio Setting
7 Point
developing a game design document of the game overview, 8 Triple Point
gameplay and mechanics, screen flow, physical character, 9 Load Game, Last Auto Save
level dan design artificial intelligence (AI). 10 Change Point To Buy Character and Upgrade
11 Customize Character
II.DISCUSSION
6. Project Scope
A. Game Overview The project scope describes the number of locations that
1. Game Concept can be played, the number of NPCs (Non-Playing
“Bank Sampah” is a game with an emphasis on Characters) in the game which have particular roles. The
educating children about the waste that surrounds them as figure below presents a number of locations that gamers can
its background. By introducing an educational concept play.
related to waste, this game tries to educate children to
dispose of waste into the dustbin.based on the type of the
waste. Gamers are required to collect the waste around them
either at home or in the neighborhood to be thrown into the
dustbin.
The main tasks of the gamers of this game are to find as
much waste as possible and to be able to distinguish the
waste according to its category, i.e. organic waste, inorganic
waste, and glassware. These gamers will be given a time
limit so that they can focus on their own tasks.
 International Conference on Computer System 2014

FIGURE 1. LIST OF LOCATION

Based on the figure above, we can see a list of locations 2. Gameplay, Game Progression
that can be played. The first location is at home.If a gamer The first time a gamer start this game, it will be in an area
completes one location and get a star as a sign of having in a park, with a selection of the difficulty level such as a bit
completed the mission, this gamer can move to another dirty (“agak kotor”), dirty (“kotor”), and extremely dirty
location. (“sangat kotor”). After successfully completing the mission
B. Gameplay and Mechanic in one map location, the gamer will be allowed to choose
another map location. Therefore, the next map location will
1. Character open only if the gamer has successfully completer the
There is a variety of characters in this game that can be mission in the previous location. Each level has its own
played, each with their own strengths and different physical highest score.
appearance. There are some characters that must be
purchased in advance using a number of points which a 3. Mission Chalange
gamer collects and there are also characters that can be Mission challenges or challenges in each mission that
played directly or default game characters. To see all the every gamer has to pass are usually similar depending on
characters of this game, look at the figure below. the level chosen by the gamer. Despite different locations,
challenges that a gamer receives to complete each level tend
to be similar. However, differences in the location will
definitely have a direct impact for the gamer to complete
each challenge. Here are the details of the challenges that a
gamer have to complete at each location based on the
selected level.
a. A Bit Dirty “agak kotor”. The game lasts for 3
minutes
with a target score by 100 and a little amount of waste.
This level is not too complex.
FIGURE 2. LIST OF CHARACTERS
b. Dirty “kotor”. The game lasts for 2 minutes with a
In the initial version of this game, we have made a total of target score by 200 and more waste that is more
eight characters with 5 playable characters and 3 NPC. complex (more varied) and Jono, which is AI’s enemy,
There are 3 NPC in this game : is going to litter twice in this level
c. Extremely Dirty “sangat kotor”. The game lasts
a. Mama Tuti. A mother who always tell his son or
minute, with a target score of 200 and more waste that
daughter to always clean up his or her room house.
is more complex (more varied) and Jono, which is AI’s
b. Jono. A naughty boy character who always littering.
enemy, is going to litter twice in this level
Indirectly the enemy AI for player.
c. Miss Ayu. Character that directs the player through 4. Playflow
the in-game tutorial. It describes the flow of the game for gamers or we can
The specification for playable character described in also say it as some sort of the game tutorial. Here is the
Table 3. Details and specifications of the five playable display of this game tutorial.
characters can be seen in the following table.
TABLE 3
LIST OF PLAYABLE CHARACTER
NO NAME ABILITY PHYSIC
1 Adit Speed : 35% Height : 90cm
Skin : Light Brown
Face : Round
Accessories : Blue Hat
2 Didi Speed : 50% Height : 100cm
Skin : Light Brown
Face : Round
Accessories : Red Hat FIGURE 3. PLAYFLOW
3 Angga Speed : 60% Height : 90cm
Skin : Light Brown Gamers starts with selecting the only location that have
Face : Oval been unlocked, to unlock another game location, gameres
4 Rara Speed : 70% Height : 110cm are required to complete the mission on the first playable
Skin : Black
Face : Round location and so on to unlock another location.
Accessories : Hand Bag After clicking the play button, then the timer will
5 Tina Speed : 80% Height : 90cm automatically run. At first, there is a tutorial directing
Skin : Light Brown gamers to pick up waste and put it in a dustbin as shown in
Face : Round
Accessories : Blue Backpack the figure below.
 International Conference on Computer System 2014

Waste is dragged into the right dustbin or click the waste

and then click the appropriate dustbin. At the time the waste
is put into the right dustbin, the point earned will
automatically increase. However, if the waste is put into the
wrong dustbin, the point earned will not increase. The
mission will be successful if the points collected reach the
minimum target.

5. Mechanic Game
Mechanic game is a set of rules set for the game related
to interactions between the gamer and the game. This FIGURE 9. PLAY SCREEN
mechanic game requires gamers to follow the rules of the
game to be able to interact with the game. When gamers select the game location, the difficulty
The first time a gamer begins the game, a screen level of the game will be by default will in a normal
containing the title of the game with a background of art position. After that, gamers will be directed to a screen of
environment game will appear (the game is loading) or the chosen location and the start menu will appear to begin
which can be called the splash screen. the game. After clicking the start button, time will run and
gamers must choose the waste and put it into the dustbin.
Once the start button is clicked, the waste is strewn around
the location that gamers have selected. The amount of the
waste will depend on the difficulty level chosen by gamers
(read the mission/ challenge and structure). The time scale
of this game is adjusted to the actual state, i.e. 1 minute =
60 seconds.
In the early stages of the game, AI will teach gamers
(tutorial) how to take out the waste and put it in the right
dustbin. When the game starts, music will play to entertain
FIGURE 4. SPLASH SCREEN gamers so thet they do not get bored. The waste is drageble.
By the time the cursor leads to the waste, a small cloud
Once the game loading completes, appear game menus
containing three types of dustbin will appear.
(play, setting, help, exit).
There are two ways to put the waste into one of the
dustbin, by dragging the waste into the dustbin in the cloud
or by clicking on the waste and then clicking the dustbin.
Each time the waste has been put into the dustbin, gamers
can hear a typical sound indicating that the waste has been
put into the right dustbin, (the of people clapping their
hands) and vice versa, if the waste has been put into the
wrong dustbin, a typical sound indicating that the waste has
been put into the wrong dustbin will also be made that is not
similar to the sound made when the waste is put into the
right dustbin (the sound of the cartoon). Time information is
FIGURE 5. GAME MENU
in the right position at the bottom, in the left at the bottom
there are 3 types of dustbins to collect each point; to the
If gamers click the “setelan” button, they then will be right of the dustbins, the total score can be found, which
able to set the audioand the screen. Here are the displays for collect the points earned in the three dustbin.
the audiosetting and the screen setting.
In this menu, gamers can set the background music and
the audio effect. They can click the setting button to check
or uncheck the background music “music latar” or the
sound effect “suara efek”.
In graphic menu, gamers can choose the quality of the
screen that they wish to use in this game. They can click the
setting button to check or uncheck to select either the high
quality “kualitas tinggi” or the low quality “kualitas rendah”
for the game screen
If gamers click the scoreboard button, the the scoreboard
will appear to see who has obtained the highest score. FIGURE 10. GAME PLAY
By the time the play button is clicked, the play screen
will appear. Gamers can choose the location, replace the
characters, continue to play and see the scoreboard.
 International Conference on Computer System 2014

In the right position at the top, there is a close button and

on the leftof it, there is a pause button to pause the game.
C.Screen Flow
The dustbins are made in three ifferent colors, namely
yellow for inorganic waste, blue for organic waste and red 1. Screen Flow Chart
for glassware. To the right of the target point, gamers can The figure below describes the hierarchy of the screen
see the total score that they must meet. flow of this waste-bank game.
If the waste is put into the right dustbin then the dustbin
on the lower left corner will automatically increase the
score. Each waste put into the dustbin will give the gamer a
10-point score, and each point is collected to reach the
specified target. For certain types of waste, there is a triple
point that will be awarded to gamers after they manage to
find triple-point waste with a score of 30 points. A three-
star reward will be earned if gamers can collect points that
exceed the target points in a short time. One-star and two-
star rewards will be awarded if gamers hit the minimum
target. If all the waste in the location has been successfully
cleaned, gamers will get a green reward label and gamers FIGURE 11. SCREEN FLOW
can earn this label in each location provided that they have
cleaned all the waste. To purchase other characters, each At the beginning of the game, the characters will be
character costs a different amount of points since each displayed in a splash screen while the game continues
character has a different speed level. loading. After that, the game menu will appear which
consists of 4 menus, namely main (play), setelah
(setting), bantuan (help), and keluar (exit). In this menu,
games can select the features of the game.

D.Level
1. Level Design
At this stage of level design, we make the design of each
level of this game, i.e. the physical description of each level
and specification of each difficulty level of each level of
FIGURE 11. CHANGE CHARACTER difficulty. The physical description of each level can be
seen in the table below.
At a normal level of difficulty “kotor” and a hard level of
difficulty “sangat kotor”, gamers will have to deal with a TABEL 4 PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION OF LOCATION LEVEL
stubborn boy named Jono who keeps littering anywhere, NO TYPE LOCATION PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION
this child’s intensity in littering at the normal level of 1 “Taman” / Garden There are trees, garden lighting,
green grass and stone walkways
difficulty is different from this at the hard level of difficulty.
2 “Rumah” / House There are dining table, kitchen,
At the hard level of difficulty, this stubborn kid litter more bathroom, living room bedroom and
often while at the normal level of difficulty, he only litters a family room
few times. 3 “Perumahan” / There are trees, street lights, home
Housing lawns and houses
4 “Halaman Rumah” / There are trees, flower garden and
6. Physic Home Yard fish pond
a. General Movement 5 “Gang Dalam Kota” / There are road alley, trash cans and
Not all objects can be controlled by gamers, the Alley in Town walls of the city
control can be moved using a swipe on smartphones, 6 “Gang Sekitar There are aroad alley, power poles
Rumah” / Alley and fences
tablets or other touchscreen gadgets. To move a around house
character, gamers can swipe at the control that 7 “Dekat Sungai” / There are flowing river and bridge
appears on the screen or click a coordinate on the Near River
screen and the character will move towards the 8 “Lapangan Bola” / There are field and goal
direction of the location clicked. Soccer Field
9 “Pasar” / Market There are people selling and street
b. Other Movement market
There are some other movements or a secondary
visual element in this waste-bank game, i.e. the While for specifications of each difficulty level, see
appearance of the character named Mama Tuti to the table below.
remind and advise another character to clean the
house. A character named Jono, a stubborn kid who TABEL 5 DESCRIPTION OF DIFFICULTY LEVEL
likes to litter also appears. Jono will always appear
in any locations except at home.
 International Conference on Computer System 2014

Difficulty Time Target Number Complexity Enemy into a game design document in accordance with the type of
Level Score of Trash Trash AI
the game design document that has been specified in step 3. In
this paper, we have developed the game design document by
Agak Kotor 3 100 150 Sedikit - performing a hybrid using the types of game design
Minute
documents as a reference for developing the game design
Kotor 2 200 250 Sedang 2 document. The resulting hybrid of this game design document
Minute Variasi Times
that we use is resulted from a hybrid of a variety of game
Sangat 1 200 250 Banyak 2 design documents, namely high concept document, game
Kotor Minute Variasi Times
treatment document, character design document, story level
and progression document as well as game script.
E. AI (Artificial Inteligence) In this research paper, there are a couple of things that the
authors have not examined further. And, it is expected that
Artificial Intelligence (AI) as the name implies is an
other researchers investigate further the area which we have
intelligence created by people using specific algorithms that
have a special role in a game. In this game, there are 3 AI that not examined further. For examples, directly implementing
are classified according to their respective role, namely Enemy this game design document into the prototype of an
AI, Friendly Characters and Support AI. educational game named “Bank Sampah” or examining the
algorithms for the determination of the amount and types of
1. Enemy AI waste that appear randomly depending on the level of
Enemy AI in this “Bank Sampah” game is composed of 3 difficulty.
elements, namely:
a. Time. At a particular level of difficulty with a very REFERENCES
short time limit and a substantial number of challenges [1] Jessel Schell, The Art of Game Design,USA Morgan Kaufmann
will definitely be an enemy for every gamer Publisher 2008.
b. Waste. Waste which is the main object of this game is [2] Kurniawan Teguh Martono, Perancangan Game Edukasi "Fish Identify"
Dengan Menggunakan Java, Jurnal Sistem Komputer-Vol.1 No.1 2011
regulated by a specific algorithm that makes waste ISSN: 2087-4685.
random and varied depending on the level will be the [3] Andrew Rollings and Ernest Adams, Game Design: Chapter 1, What is
main enemy for gamers Game Design. New Riders 2003.
c. Jono. This kid is the enemy AI that is responsible for [4] Adams, Ernest, Fundamentals of Game Design, 2010. .ISBN
0321643372.
littering at a certain level of difficulty will be an enemy
gamers for other characters when they attempted to
collect the waste Soeheri, obtaining a Bachelor of Computer (S. Kom), Department of
Information Systems at STMIK Potensi Utama Medan, in 2010. Currently, he
is studying for his Master degree majoring in Computer (M.Kom) at the
2. Friendly Character Master Program in Informatics Engineering of STMIK AMIKOM,
There are two friendly characters in this game, namely : Yogyakarta . Currently, he works as a staff and a candidate of permanent
a. Miss Ayu. who provides a tutorial to gamers. lecturers at STMIK Potensi Utama Medan.
b. Mama Tuti. who encourages gamers to always keep
Lendy Rahmadi, obtaining a Bachelor of Computer (S. Kom), Department of
the room clean. Motivating them. Information Systems at STMIK AMIKOM, Yogyakarta, in 2010. Currently,
he is studying for his Master degree majoring in Computer (M.Kom) at the
3. Support AI Master Program in Informatics Engineering of STMIK AMIKOM,
Yogyakarta . Currently, he works as a staff and a candidate of permanent
Complexity of the waste at each level of difficulty is lecturers at AMIK Lembah Dempo Pagaralam.
different and random in nature. However, particular
waste contains a triple point that gamers possibly do not
expecet and this triple-point waste will support them to
collect more points.

III. CONCLUSION
Based on the discussion of this paper, we come to the
conclusion that develop the game design docuThe ment of the
educational game “Bank Sampah”, there are several steps to
follow. First, it requires an understanding of the scope of the
game to be develop along with a collection of ideas about the
game. Secondly, it takes an understanding of the theories
about the game design document and its types. Third,
determine the type of game design document to be develop
based on the understanding and ideas of the game and the
theories about the game design document. Fourthly, those
understanding and ideas about the game should be developed