What Makes a Good Game Designer
Game Set Watch has an article called, "How to Hire a Good Game Designer." Scott Jennings has a follow-up on Broken Toys entitled, "How to Interview (As) A Game Designer."

As I have said before, when I first entered the video games industry, I knew I was a brilliant game designer. As my experience has grown, I now feel I suck at it. What was responsible for this regression?

Naturally, a lot of it simply had to do with me learning how much more I had to learn. Like every hard-core game fan, I had a bunch of opinions and ideas when I started out. While I'd done some game development on my own, I'd never actually stood the test of releasing my creations to the public. But then there's the whole shattered confidence thing, and my soul getting sucked dry by too many years in the business, which no doubt contributed to a real plunge in my game design talent.

But I think these articles point out some of the ingredients essential to a good game designer. They are not exhaustive - you can have a terrible designer to demonstrates all of these abilities. But I think they outline some key requirements:

#1 - A good game designer is passionate (and opinionated) about games. 'Nuff said.

#2 - A good game designer is detail-oriented. Most human beings understand fun, and can come up with some big ideas for what might be fun in a game. But it is the tiny details that make or break a game. The subtle weighting of risk vs. reward, the delicate balance between abstraction and complexity, and the ability to turn all the zillions of little factors and ideas into numbers and logic are all part of this.

#3 - A good game designer is a strong communicator. They can explain to their team what they want. They can demonstrate and explain the gameplay to the player through the medium and make it fun. They can succinctly explain what makes an element "fun."

#4 - A good game designer is flexible and can adapt and change his (or her) design to meet the demands of the real world.

#5 - A good game designer has a breadth of gaming and non-gaming interests and experience. They can incorporate ideas from all over into their game, not being limited to just what they've seen in World of Warcraft.

#6 A good game designer understands fun. And understands how to translate this into a good gaming experience.

I've found that a lot of game designers are like a lot of marketing people in the games biz - they just play follow-the-leader, and copy what the front-runners are doing. While that's not necessarily a bad thing, assuming the designer understand WHY said design decisions were made in the first place.

Labels: Game Design

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