Intro

The introduction...

I suppose this is where I am to write all about myself and attempt to convince you that I am the most interesting person in the world, and that you need to add me to your bookmarks and favorite and hang on to my every word. Sadly, this is untrue. I'm not the most interesting person in the world, and I highly doubt anything I do here is going to revolutionize either of our worlds, let alone "THE" world.

I surmise that this is the point where anyone reading this would ask themselves "Wow, why would I want to read what this guy writes?!" Well, the only reason to continue reading is because you are interested in a shared topic as myself. The topic of Game Design.

Now, before either of us can go any further, It's rather important for me to define "Game Design". I'm not here to talk about your level 80 orc necromancer, nor am I here to talk about your uber leet gamerscore. Though, each of those could lead to some important topics within the scope of game design. What I am here to do is to attempt to analyze the concepts of design on a higher level. Anyone can pick up a game, and say "oooh! this is fun!" but not everyone can define what makes that game, or better yet, analyze that, break it down, and learn to replicate or improve on it.

This is my goal with this journal. While I do not claim to be the authority on the topic, this is a place where I am able to critically analyze my opinions, my thoughts, and try to break those down and ultimately find out what makes the modern industry of gaming work, what makes games tick.

I suppose this is where I am to write all about myself and attempt to convince you that I am the most interesting person in the world, and that you need to add me to your bookmarks and favorite and hang on to my every word. Sadly, this is untrue. I'm not the most interesting person in the world, and I highly doubt anything I do here is going to revolutionize either of our worlds, let alone "THE" world.

This is my goal with this journal. While I do not claim to be the authority on the topic, this is a place where I am able to critically analyze my opinions, my thoughts, and try to break those down and ultimately find out what makes the modern industry of gaming work, and more importantly what makes the games themselves tick.

I believe this is where the majority of aspiring game designers break down. They don't take the time to critically analyze what is already out there, and to understand it. Nobody will give you a job in a creative field if you don't understand what makes a good product good, or a bad product bad. With this in mind, I'm going to be dedicating this first post to all of the aspiring game designers out there. In hopes that reading this will help to dust off the cogs, and make you think, even if just for a second.

First thing is first. If you hope to have a shot at getting into the gaming industry, you need to know exactly what it is you want to do. There are huge numbers of job descriptions within the gaming industry, most of which are fairly specilized. What are you passionate about? Take the time to really think on this question for a bit. This question alone can make a serious impact.

During my time in Art school, I met countless students who looked at games and say "I want to do that!" Which is a great first step, unfortunately, many people don't further research it or think past that concept. I know that the idea of it is what led me, personally, to college in the first place. As a child there were only two things I can only ever remember wanting to do two things with my life, one was be a doctor, the other was make games.

Through my studies and interactions within the industry, I personally found that "Game Design" was the place for me. Now, before either of us can go any further, It's rather important for me to define "Game Design". I'm not here to talk about your level 80 orc necromancer, nor am I here to talk about your uber leet gamerscore. Though, each of those could lead to some important topics within the scope of game design. What I am here to do is to attempt to analyze the concepts of design on a higher level. Anyone can pick up a game, and say "oooh! this is fun!" but not everyone can define what makes that game, or better yet, analyze that, break it down, and learn to replicate or improve on it.

But what does "make games" mean? On a video game specific level, this can have a multitude of defenitions. Everything you see in a video game was created by someone. As well as the huge multitude of things you don't see. There are large numbers of Artists and Programmers that work their assess off (and don't fool yourself dreamers, working in the game industry is not easy work) to make everything you see and do into a cohesive piece of sofware. There are huge numbers of play testers who spend well over 40 hours a week playing the same level over and over litterally trying to break the game. Again, a career path that many dream of (I want to play video games for a living!) yet many end up hating once they actually obtain it. (sit and think about it, really, take a minute to actually think about playing the exact same single level of a video game for 8 hours a day for a week. Does that sound fun? Think about equipping Item XYZ and walking around for 10 seconds to make sure it looks right, and doing this with hundred of items. Does that sound like fun, or like a job?)

My position here is with a focus on design. I want to use this space to ponder game theory, to look at games and understand what makes them work. Not programming, not art asset creation. But what makes them work with the human interaction. I suppose that this is more of a journey in self understanding and investigation into the behaviors of human interaction and entertainment then, huh?

Does the average gamer think about what's going on within the system when they push the jump button? Does the average person look at a game and think about the color scheme? I feel that in my individual interactions with hundreds of aspiring "game makers" (And I interact with hundreds on a daily basis) most stop their thought at that point. They say "I want to make games!" and end it there. I constantly hear "I could do this better" or "this would be better if" within circles of gamers. This is where the fire dies. I attempt to push these comments further, I say "Oh? How would you make it better?" or "Why would that make it better" only to be greeted with responses along the lines of "It would be more fun." or "Cause it would be better". Thanks for the deep thought there.

I suppose I've rambled long enough, considering this is an introduction. I guess my ultimate goal here is to have documentation of my self exploration into game design and gaming theory. And hey, if I'm lucky I'll meet some cool people along the way.

I apologize if the writing here is a bit scatterbrained. I'm quite tired at the moment.