Mechanic Maker: Accessible Game Development Via Symbolic Learning Program Synthesis

TL;DR

Mechanic Maker is a novel tool that enables users to create diverse game mechanics without programming by using symbolic learning from examples, thereby democratizing game development.

Contribution

This paper introduces Mechanic Maker, a symbolic learning-based system that allows non-programmers to synthesize game mechanics from examples, expanding accessibility in game creation.

Findings

User ability to use the tool was independent of programming experience

Participants successfully created various game mechanics without coding

The tool demonstrated potential to democratize game development

Abstract

Game development is a highly technical practice that traditionally requires programming skills. This serves as a barrier to entry for would-be developers or those hoping to use games as part of their creative expression. While there have been prior game development tools focused on accessibility, they generally still require programming, or have major limitations in terms of the kinds of games they can make. In this paper we introduce Mechanic Maker, a tool for creating a wide-range of game mechanics without programming. It instead relies on a backend symbolic learning system to synthesize game mechanics from examples. We conducted a user study to evaluate the benefits of the tool for participants with a variety of programming and game development experience. Our results demonstrated that participants' ability to use the tool was unrelated to programming ability. We conclude that tools like ours could help democratize game development, making the practice accessible regardless of programming skills.