A Game Development Project by
Samuel Tomé - Creative Director, Game Developer, Artist & UI Designer
Jay Roth (JR01) - Additional Game Developer
BDA - Client, Calendar & Event planning
Each week in December, company members received a brand-new game to enjoy on their mobile devices or computers!
These were uniquely tied to the companies, featuring themes and elements that resonated with Intel and Dell's identities.
Creating Games for everyone, to play anywhere!
We created four Games to connect Dell and Intel employees, through an Advent Calendar.
This customized Calendar was developed by the creative team at BDA, a global innovative creative agency.Each week, employees unlocked a new game through QR codes in the calendar, blending tradition with modern interactivity reminiscent of the December holiday surprises.
Recognizing the diverse age range and experience levels of the audience, I focused on developing games that were intuitive and easy to learn.
Ensuring everyone, from seasoned gamers to first-timers, could join and play creative games inspired by classic game mechanics.
To ensure seamless access for everyone, the games are web-based - which means they are playable directly in any web browser. With no downloads or setups, everyone can start playing instantly.
All the games were developed and tested to make them responsive and cross-platform.
They can be played across most devices through an internet browser, from iPhones, Android phones, Tablets, iPads, Macs, and Windows!
To make this possible, I collaborated with Ken, founder of Flowlab, to bring responsiveness to the web pages and games. We also tested and made various performance improvements, so the games could even be played on older or slower devices.
Flowlab is the versatile game engine I, Samuel Tomé, have been using to create all these amazing games professionally and for my projects for many years.
Through various completed and published projects, I've gathered experience and extensive knowledge on game development and the Flowlab game engine.
Therefore, I knew that it was the perfect game engine for creating these web games.
The Process Behind Unique Hand-drawn Games.
This project started with a discussion with the client where I listened to their needs and ideas for this event.
We went back and forth in an exciting and constructive conversation where we discussed the amount of games, and what each game could be.
The goal was to create short, accessible games that could be played by everyone and completed in under 5 minutes - a “short and sweet experience”, as beautifully described by the project's clients.
Once we finished discussing the games' concepts, I brought the ideas we discussed to life through a simplified Concept Art illustration for each game.
The Concept Art helped us visualize what the games would look like, and if the game's ideas and style matched the client's vision. Once the first iteration of Concept Art was shown to the client, we addressed feedback and decided together which games would be going forward.
The Concept Art phase was done, and the game’s directions were decided…
It was now time for me to proceed and create the Game Prototypes.
The prototyping phase is the perfect phase to explore ideas and creative mechanics, where I prefer to focus on the game’s foundations and experiment with how the game could be played.
I always set the “Art creation” phase to a later phase, as it allows me to have more freedom in experimenting with different sizes and features without having to redo any assets or animations.
Below, you can see the initial state of two of the games we created for this event.
The “Scout Wilder” prototype game, shown below, featured a unique control scheme where the user would drag their finger to control the character.
While it was fun to see, we ended up replacing it with a more familiar control scheme, using User Interface buttons to control the character.
Samuel Tomé illustrated and animated all the games’ Art assets in a clean and vectorized style that resembled the client company's identity and color palette.
The User Interface of these games was also designed by Samuel Tomé, translating and using the brands' guidelines as part of the game’s world, by featuring the client’s original Typography, and illustrations inspired by their icon family style.
Combining and expanding, Intel and Dell's brand to a new universe with original, but familiar games.
The clients were involved throughout all the game creation phases.
It was a collaborative process between me, BDA, and the clients, as some of the games also feature text written and provided by the client brands.
I was also able to count on Jay Roth (JR01) for his additional support as a programmer, we worked together on some parts of these games and his help was insightful and trustworthy.
The Games Collection Overview
Stop at Nothing! - Race through this chaotic track while avoiding obstacles and competing with agile opponents.
Scout Wilder Adventure - Play as Scout Wilder in a side-view world & learn about Marketing Strategy by collecting all the Blue keys.
Pipeline Generator - Quick! Before the time runs out, organize the pipes to let the coins flow freely from one funnel to another in this puzzle game.
Competitive Quiz - With only two lives, answer as many questions as you can.
Upon losing, players can compare their best scores on a Global Leaderboard.These 4 games were made under three months from start to finish, going through various essential phases: Client onboarding & project discussion, Concept Art phase, games Prototypes, and the final phase where the games were finalized with hand-made art assets, animations, and sound effects.
During the event, the special Calendars featuring the surprise games were distributed to both Dell and Intel employees. It was a success and everyone was excited to showcase their best times and scores after receiving each game.
Some games were later shared online and were a hit, gaining a special “Featured” star on Flowlab's website, and gathering more than 19K (nineteen thousand) plays across all games worldwide.
“The games were a HUGE HIT! The Calendar program was a success.
I’ll definitely reach out for future similar opportunities!”
- From “BDA”, Project's client.
This project was an enormous partnership between many parties to make these incredible games possible, and collaborating with everyone was a very positive and enriching experience.
Thank you for reading,
- Samuel Tomé
