December Days: Game design
Dec. 16th, 2014 06:11 pmGame design is one of many things I toyed with the idea that I might be good at, but ultimately decided would only ever be a minor hobby.
Several friends (angoal, alextfish) have had board games actually published! Which I am very impressed by.
I think I am originally drawn to game design through the same impulse that leads me to try to "break" rulesets when I see them: the urge to tinker with rules and see what I get.
I've dabbled in a few simple concepts, but never gone very far. I still like my "armies moving on a hex terrain grid, movement controlled by a deck of cards to simulate the chances, gains and setback of real combat" concept, but I need to radically simplify and distil it if I return to it.
However, I'm also fascinated by game design, especially computer game design, as it's a combination of things I like designing: programming; a little bit of art; a moderate amount of story; and a sense of reverse engineering people's emotions and making them out of abstract concepts :)
But I think I never really want to make a large story-based computer game as it's a lot of effort for something people will consume once. I'd like to do that as a hobby if I ever have time, but it feels like if I'm going to write any computer program, it should be one that you can't finish, or one that's a matter of taste if you like it, it should get the best possible rate of return on effort invested by being used by as many people as possible!
And I find it hard to accept that other people don't find the same things fun as I do :)
There's one other abstract thing I'm interested in, which is the process of evoking specific sensations by different combinations of rules. Some games (board games or computer games) feel frenetic, some games feel triumphant, some games feel terrifying. Even each of them has about the same chance of ultimate victory. This is like, some things can best be evoked in prose, some in poetry, some in paintings, some in film -- and some in rulesets. Arkham Asylum feels like being Batman, even if you took the graphics and plot away, because you're always striking from the shadows, and always having the advantage over enemies, but only if you exploit it elegantly and ruthlessly. Agricola feels like being a subsistence farmer, because even when you're doing well, you feel like you're constantly racing to stay ahead of starvation. To me, capturing not just the look but the feel of something is a delicate art, one not often appreciated. But any player can tell when it feels wrong :)
When people say "games aren't art" I want to cry, have you tried to evoke an emotion with a small finite state machine?
Several friends (angoal, alextfish) have had board games actually published! Which I am very impressed by.
I think I am originally drawn to game design through the same impulse that leads me to try to "break" rulesets when I see them: the urge to tinker with rules and see what I get.
I've dabbled in a few simple concepts, but never gone very far. I still like my "armies moving on a hex terrain grid, movement controlled by a deck of cards to simulate the chances, gains and setback of real combat" concept, but I need to radically simplify and distil it if I return to it.
However, I'm also fascinated by game design, especially computer game design, as it's a combination of things I like designing: programming; a little bit of art; a moderate amount of story; and a sense of reverse engineering people's emotions and making them out of abstract concepts :)
But I think I never really want to make a large story-based computer game as it's a lot of effort for something people will consume once. I'd like to do that as a hobby if I ever have time, but it feels like if I'm going to write any computer program, it should be one that you can't finish, or one that's a matter of taste if you like it, it should get the best possible rate of return on effort invested by being used by as many people as possible!
And I find it hard to accept that other people don't find the same things fun as I do :)
There's one other abstract thing I'm interested in, which is the process of evoking specific sensations by different combinations of rules. Some games (board games or computer games) feel frenetic, some games feel triumphant, some games feel terrifying. Even each of them has about the same chance of ultimate victory. This is like, some things can best be evoked in prose, some in poetry, some in paintings, some in film -- and some in rulesets. Arkham Asylum feels like being Batman, even if you took the graphics and plot away, because you're always striking from the shadows, and always having the advantage over enemies, but only if you exploit it elegantly and ruthlessly. Agricola feels like being a subsistence farmer, because even when you're doing well, you feel like you're constantly racing to stay ahead of starvation. To me, capturing not just the look but the feel of something is a delicate art, one not often appreciated. But any player can tell when it feels wrong :)
When people say "games aren't art" I want to cry, have you tried to evoke an emotion with a small finite state machine?