Recommend me a games design resource

    Hi guys

    So i'm primarily a level designer and at Codemasters there are two separate teams - us and the games designers. This means I don't get to look into the actual design of the games I work on very much so I was looking to read up on it. Are there any books/online resources anyone would particularly recommend? I'm looking for something that covers the specifics of writing games design documents, game mechanics and everything else that game design entails, basically.

    Cheers!

    most of what has been written about game design is very much from academic point of view, and as such i CANNOT recommend much. i think the closest thing you have to something like reading up on it would be the MDA framework (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MDA_framework); however take into account that even this is a product of subjective value judgments and not in any way something objective.

    there are also of course specific branches of game design you could be interested in, such as game balance (e.g. competitive games), where you can find some amount of articles about the balancing part itself, but also related things such as spectator values and what makes a sport a sport.

    if you really want to get into the academic stuff out there (there is A LOT of bullshit), don't hesitate to use google scholar, but as a level designer i would think you'd have more experience from practicality than any "game scholar" will ever get from theory.

    Quote from Sentura

    most of what has been written about game design is very much from academic point of view, and as such i CANNOT recommend much. i think the closest thing you have to something like reading up on it would be the MDA framework (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MDA_framework); however take into account that even this is a product of subjective value judgments and not in any way something objective.

    Urrgggghhh, it's like dissecting a clown to see what makes him fun.

    Get 'Design of everyday things' while your at it.

    Not focusing on games, but the relationship between design and end user.

    And it's a good read anyways.

    Quote from Evert

    Get 'Design of everyday things' while your at it.Not focusing on games, but the relationship between design and end user.

    And it's a good read anyways.

    yeah, i can recommend this. also when it comes to stuff like non game design but still tangential to these things: blink by malcolm gladwell

    Unfortunately there is a lot written about diegetic narratives and post-game emotional art synergy, but it’s quite hard to nail down some hardcore design stuff.

    There are two RSS feeds I have for design:

    What Games Are: This is a fantastic blog and I can’t recommend it enough. He’s a consultant so you’ll also see a lot of information on start-ups and small companies but it’s all good.

    #AltDevBlogADay: This has more posts about coding than design, and the design posts can be hit and miss, but it’s worth subscribing to. Claire Blackshaw is writing a relevant series on practical skills to stop people being ‘useless designers.’ And I really like her Respecting Design article as some vicarious venting.

    Mike Birkhead posts his stuff on AltDevBlogADay too. It’s still about design rather than showing you how to write documents, though. I don’t 100% agree with what he writes but it’s still 90%+ and mostly semantics (my definition of Depth and Breath is the other way around, for example). When I started as a combat designer I relied more on Eric William’s awesome blog, but he no longer updates.

    Well, it is, but it’s not really something a designer worries about. I find articles written about tangible design theory and practices are thin on the ground whereas I’m always reading about narrative, believable characters, emotional responses, et cetera.

    I’m going to stealth edit my original post because I meant to be amusing, not bitter.

    i get pissed off most of the time when i see badly written articles, especially in the field of game design. i don't understand how people can excuse themselves for being verbose and obtrusive when the goal of their article is communicating a message. what's worse, people don't seem to be bothered by this and some even begin to glorify it. i'm thinking this will pass as the field will mature, but right now it doesn't make me less want to punch some writers in the face for the utter glorified nonsense they spout.

    i quite honestly want people from the industry, people with experience of doing things, to write how they do things, like the production structure, the design iteration and everything that comes in between. i want them to identify what games mean to them and how they figure out what they mean to people. who are these people who think they can talk about games without actually playing them, or without any real design or studio experience?

    Quote from Sentura

    who are these people who think they can talk about games without actually playing them, or without any real design or studio experience?

    had a teacher in game design last year, that haven't played a game in 9 years, and that game was Harry Potter. That class was a trainwreck of frustration.

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