[GOOGLE THEME MUSIC]
MALE SPEAKER: Are you tired of making the same old games?
Do you miss playing games in the same room as your friends?
Today we're going to talk about how
to create games utilizing Google Cast interaction model
and bring multi-screen games to the living room for all
to enjoy.
So what is a Google Cast game?
A Google Cast game enables multi-screen gameplay
between mobile devices and television,
whether it is for one person or many,
you can bring connected experiences
to the best screen in the house.
When you combine the biggest screen
in the house with an amazing controller,
great things can happen.
But in order to make something truly great,
there are design nuances for multi-screen gaming
which you need to consider first.
First, make the game setup with Google Cast fast and easy.
All Cast games should utilize the Google Cast
SDK to discover nearby cast devices
and automatically present the user with the option to cast
as part of the game setup flow.
Next, you need to decide whether the game is cast-enabled
or if the casting behavior is required for gameplay.
Each option has slightly different considerations
on how the players can enter the cast flow
and whether they can play this game
when they're away from the television
or they need to be in front of it.
If the game requires a Google Cast endpoint in order to play,
make sure to explicitly tell the players
and their first action should be connect to the endpoint.
This will start a receiver application
on an endpoint like a Chromecast.
If the game is cast-enabled, meaning
the game can be played without a Google Cast endpoint,
you need to clearly call out the capability
to cast the game session on the main screen of the game
and provide a clear user experience.
How are your devices in the Google Cast endpoint going
to connect with each other?
There are several different models that you can use,
but each one has different implications.
First, let's talk about how Cast applications work.
This is going to get technical now.
Sender applications connect to a receiver device
such as a Chromecast, passing along
the application ID of the receiver application to load.
The application is registered via the Cast SDK developer
console.
The receiver device loads a receiver application
from the cloud using a URL, which has also been registered
from the Developer Console.
The application is downloaded each time
it is launched by the sender.
The Cast SDK establishes and maintains
a session between the receiver application and the sender
application.
Sender applications in this model
communicate with the receiver application via the session
to implement a game experience on the TV.
There are other models such as a peer-to-peer model.
The peers connect to one device which
acts as the host sender and the host sender
maintains communication with the receiver device
while updating the peers.
In this case, a companion technology like Google Play
services real-time multiplayer is an excellent choice
for peer-to-peer communication.
In the cloud-centric model, a cloud service
manages most of the game and player state
and keeps all clients in sync.
In this setup, both the senders and the receiver
are clients of the cloud service.
Here, Google Play game services can also be used
for cloud-enabled API's.
So there's lots of different ways to make a game.
All the games we released in our game wave in November, 2014,
use the methods we just covered to make great games.
Just like these games, your real creative genius
shows itself when you combine great social multiplayer
with the power of mobile devices on the big screen.
Why?
Because mobile devices are amazing game controllers,
believe it or not.
You can use touch, the accelerometer, swipe,
selection, manipulation, microphone,
sound, even the camera.
There's so many game interactions you can create.
Why not explore and experiment?
Let's look at a spectrum of game controls.
Abstract controls interacts with the action
on the screen via some other mechanism such as motion
or touch anywhere.
Virtual controls, are somewhere in between,
touch something to control something else on the screen.
Direct controls occur when you touch
the thing you want to interact with directly like an answer
on a trivia game.
When deciding on the games input method,
consider the key characteristics of the game.
What is the pace?
Is their public versus private information?
Is there multiplayer?
Being aware of how these characteristics will effect
gameplay will help you make decisions
around your input mechanics.
For visual design, remember not to fatigue the player
by making them constantly look up and down at the screen.
Design the 10-foot experience adhering to the TV design
guidelines and the 1-foot experience adhering
to mobile guidelines to understand
what to emphasize in the relationship between the two.
When you do it all right, you create
an entirely new living room experience and players really
get involved with the game.
We've seen this happen with several great Cast games
already and we want yours to be next.
So how do you do that?
To get started, check out the following links.
There are so many unexplored games just
waiting to be created to inspire and excite millions of gamers.
Please go make something awesome.
That's it.
Thank you.
[GOOGLE THEME MUSIC]