MARY CHEN: Hey, everyone.
Welcome to another episode of "Assistant on Air."
This season we're talking about games.
We'll be chatting with the designers and developers who
built some really creative and awesome new games for Google
Assistant smart displays.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
My name is Mary, and I'll be your host for today.
I work on strategic initiatives for the Google Assistant.
And I'll be talking to Melissa, who's a UX designer at B-Reel,
who planted all the designs for our newest game--
Gnome Garden.
Hey, Melissa.
Thanks for joining us.
MELISSA AMES: Hi, Mary.
Thanks for having me.
MARY CHEN: Of course.
Tell us about yourself.
MELISSA AMES: I'm Melissa.
I am a UX designer with B-Reel.
I've been there for a little less than a year.
And I'm in our LA office, where we
focus on product-based pieces, and we really
look at the whole picture holistically,
so looking at not only what happens inside of the screen
but how people interact outside of the screen as well.
MARY CHEN: Yeah.
And I think this project is basically
a perfect combo of both, right?
You're designing a game for the screen,
but you're also taking into account the environments
around the screen.
MELISSA AMES: Definitely.
MARY CHEN: So before we begin on the game design process,
can you explain what Gnome Garden is?
MELISSA AMES: Yeah.
It's a game where you really get to sculpt
a garden with your voice, and you
get dropped into an empty garden,
and a quirky gnome asks you questions
that are unrelated to the garden,
but your answers actually influence
what happens with the growth of the garden.
MARY CHEN: I love what you said about sculpting
with your voice.
That was a really cool element.
So walk us through ideation stage.
That was a really fun process.
What types of user experience where you going for,
and what types of insights led to the concepts in the game?
MELISSA AMES: We wanted to create a ambient game that kind
of fit into your daily life in the background
since we're constantly surrounded by screens.
And we really looked into how the Google displays--
how people use them in their daily life,
and it seemed like a really nice companion
for sitting on the couch or baking and just
a moment of relief to zoom into this and have a moment of joy.
MARY CHEN: And I liked how you talked
about the ambient aspect of it.
I think it's definitely something that's new.
In traditional gaming, you're so in the zone,
so focused or fully immersed in the game.
But this lets you basically have an opportunity
to be as plugged in as you want with the game.
And I think, also, the persona adds to that ambient mood
as well.
It's really like your companion in a way.
And there's a whimsical feel to the game,
I'd say, from the intro story of Ms. [INAUDIBLE]
to, basically, all the questions that you
were saying that Norman the Gnome asks,
and even the wildflower aspect.
So can you talk through, basically,
the persona-building part of this experience
and how that translated to the game design elements?
MELISSA AMES: We wanted to have something that helped guide you
through the full experience.
So creating the persona was one of the more exciting things
for us in this whole experience.
As you go through, you are guided through by the gnome,
and he is this, I guess, ever-present, whimsical figure
that leads you through and lets you
cue into different aspects of it.
And there's a few different features
throughout that kind of allude to that whimsical feel
as well, like the wildflower feature,
where weeds will grow through the garden.
And you can either tend to them, or you can leave them be,
and your garden will become overgrown with weeds.
MARY CHEN: Yeah.
Actually, in the beginning of the project,
I came across a quote.
I remember sharing it with everyone.
Basically, the difference between a flower and weed
is judgment.
So I loved how you incorporated it into the game.
MELISSA AMES: Yeah.
We actually started really liking
the way the weeds looked, so hopefully, other people
feel that way.
MARY CHEN: They're beautiful.
So how are the sound effects and music
also included in everything that you've been building?
Can you talk through that?
MELISSA AMES: Yeah.
As a more ambient game, we wanted
to create these moments that help
you cue into what's happening on the screen
if you are walking around your house
and still interacting with it.
So whether you start from the beginning,
the theme song in the beginning is a nice intro
to give you a feeling of the light tone.
And then as you go through, there's
different moments where the sounds that
are happening help you cue into what feature is happening.
So a flower grows, and you get a nice sound with that.
And then there's birds chirping in the background,
so it's this moment of a natural feel that gives you
some relief rather than making you overly
aware of what's happening.
Yes.
MARY CHEN: I actually kept the game on just
for the birds chirping sound.
I know it was background music, but it really just elevated
the whole experience for me.
So another aspect I want to talk to you about
are the layouts of the gardens.
So there's so many different types of layouts.
It's kind of random when you build a new garden,
and I know that it was a very creative and intentional design
element--
or design choice that went into thinking about these layouts.
Can you describe how you came up with these layouts
and how it basically got translated into the code?
MELISSA AMES: So there was a nice collaboration
between the design and development
team on figuring out how to merge these pieces, I guess.
And as we were going through, we figured
that we needed to create a blueprint that
would help understand what the layout might look
like without, I guess, creating every single one
of these layouts because there's many.
And as we went through, we kind of created this almost
quilt-like-looking design that we could narrow in
on what it might look like.
And then we had this intermediate piece
that actually helped us test those designs with before they
went into full development.
And it was a really nice collaboration
between our design and development team
just to hone in on all the different pieces really.
MARY CHEN: Speaking about the collaboration,
I know it was basically a huge undertaking from your team,
from completely making a new gaming
experience on smart displays to putting
in these cool layouts, sound effects, voiceovers,
storytelling elements.
Can you tell the viewers basically
on your side who was involved in the game design and development
process?
MELISSA AMES: Yeah.
We had a really tight-knit team that went end
to end with this project, and it included everyone
from art director, animator, copywriter, and then
our rock star team of developers.
We had a technical director and then
two developers that really made this thing come to life.
MARY CHEN: Well, thank you so much, Melissa,
for sharing your insights with us today
on the game design elements that went into Gnome Garden.
I really enjoyed having you on the show today.
MELISSA AMES: Thank you so much for having me.
MARY CHEN: Of course.
And that's a wrap on today's episode.
I'm off to tend to my digital gnome garden,
and I think my physical garden needs some love as well.
And if you're in the mood to have your own garden,
check out how to play Gnome Garden in the details below.
Bye, everyone.
[MUSIC PLAYING]