Making Games

[JPickford (retired mod)]

Everything I've heard about phone development is that it's a total nightmare. There are a billion different handsets and supporting a reasonable number is pain.

Puzzle games ARE hard to design. There's nothing to hide behind; the gameplay HAS to be good.

[roadkill]

It's nothing like as bad as it used to be. Although that's not saying much. I'd strongly recommend anyone with the slightest Java or C experience to try the new Wireless Toolkit beta though, even just out of curiosity for the 3D stuff.

The other tool I'm a big fan of is Blender: http://www.blender.org/ where they've just replaced the interactive component again. Good for knocking up quick ideas (3D platformers are dead easy to do) but more specific stuff gets nasty very very quickly.

[zy]

Adams talks up his Bullfrog time a bit.

This is actually the time that he was rehired by EA (in the Bullfrog umbrella) like I was talking about, and he essentially barrelled away on a couple of unmade ideas and was then booted in short order. I can't say how I know this. I just do

I was a designer on the Dungeon Keeper 3 prototype when I left Bullfrog. I heard that Adams had stepped in, so I once tried e-mailing him to wish him luck. "Dear GamaSutra reader..." came the auto-reply.

[Fry Crayola]

There's nothing to hide behind; the gameplay HAS to be good.

I'd like to apply that to pretty much anything I make.

[tiedtiger]

With a script, you give it to people who will visualise it. This visualisation will pretty much be the finished thing. With a game though, you can't really tell if it's fun or not without actually playing it.

And with a film script, you can't tell if it'll be good film until you watch it. The film industry is big enough and developed enough that the people working in it realise this fact, so they don't look for ten minutes of demo footage before agreeing to fund it. A script provides a good potential base, but you're still relying on hundreds of people to help make it a reality.

The games industry's problem is that there's no means to provide a good base that doesn't involve an up-front cost of hundreds of thousands of pounds just to get to the demo stage. That's madness.

[tiedtiger]

Well, I have heard time and again that it is more difficult to write a short story simply because it must be so concise. You have to have a complete story with all the elements and depth that a full novel might in a very small space. I have never played a "mini-"game that is analogous to this, although I think it is possible. I think short unconnected comic-esque games are a very good idea, but, again, it would present certain unique difficulties. Anyway, being concise is a quality that I love to see in games, and I hate when people complain about a game's brevity.

It's not more difficult. It's just differently difficult. Novel-writing is by no means easier just because there's more room.

[Ed-E]

That sounds awful.

Timing how long it takes to get from one end of the arena to the other? Length of jumps? Madness.

It's totally abitrary. You might as well say Mario games have sold more copies than any other platform series so all characters should have italian accents.

There you go, we never need worry about accents again!

You silly! Of course it wasn't saying that was the only reason for it's success. It was saying that different games, all of which were regarded as having "fluid" control systems all tended to use similar timings.

Don't tell me you've never played a game where it felt like the main character was running through treacle, or where the swimming didn't feel right (okay, maybe the last one, but I'm working from memories of an article I read on the toilet once, so ).

Why are there still games that come out like that? It was only intended to be a basic standard, analagous a base class - derivable and overridible. If your character can hover, or fly, you add to it. If your character is a robot, you override it to make it "feel" clunkier.

I can't see what's so bad about that, really.

[Ed-E]

I was a designer on the Dungeon Keeper 3 prototype when I left Bullfrog. I heard that Adams had stepped in, so I once tried e-mailing him to wish him luck. "Dear GamaSutra reader..." came the auto-reply.

Another Good Story.

[JPickford (retired mod)]

You silly! Of course it wasn't saying that was the only reason for it's success. It was saying that different games, all of which were regarded as having "fluid" control systems all tended to use similar timings.

Don't tell me you've never played a game where it felt like the main character was running through treacle, or where the swimming didn't feel right (okay, maybe the last one, but I'm working from memories of an article I read on the toilet once, so ).

Why are there still games that come out like that? It was only intended to be a basic standard, analagous a base class - derivable and overridible. If your character can hover, or fly, you add to it. If your character is a robot, you override it to make it "feel" clunkier.

I can't see what's so bad about that, really.

Why do I need to measure someone else game to work if my character is sluggish?

[Ed-E]

Why do I need to measure someone else game to work if my character is sluggish?

Why would your character be sluggish if you had a "guideline" to work from?

[JPickford (retired mod)]

Why would your character be sluggish if you had a "guideline" to work from?

Eh?

Why would my game be different if I copied another game?

This line of thinking is cobblers. The end result is a long line of soulless clones.

[Ed-E]

Eh?

Why would my game be different if I copied another game?

This line of thinking is cobblers. The end result is a long line of soulless clones.

That line of thinking is cobblers. Why would a game be a soulless clone if it controlled well? Is that all games are, control systems? Obviously the graphics, music and actual gameplay are secondary, by your line of thinking.

[JPickford (retired mod)]

That line of thinking is cobblers.  Why would a game be a soulless clone if it controlled well?  Is that all games are, control systems?  Obviously the graphics, music and actual gameplay are secondary, by your line of thinking.

You aren't talking about making a game control well you are talking about measuring other games and mindlessly copying elements without understanding them.

Once you start saying a jump should be yay long and a level should take so long to traverse then you've switched off your own brain and you are relying on the judgment of others. Or more likely you are relying on arbitrary decision made on a different product, for reasons you aren't privvy to.

Obviously the graphics, music and actual gameplay are secondary, by your line of thinking

You've lost me.

[Fry Crayola]

And with a film script, you can't tell if it'll be good film until you watch it. The film industry is big enough and developed enough that the people working in it realise this fact, so they don't look for ten minutes of demo footage before agreeing to fund it. A script provides a good potential base, but you're still relying on hundreds of people to help make it a reality.

The games industry's problem is that there's no means to provide a good base that doesn't involve an up-front cost of hundreds of thousands of pounds just to get to the demo stage. That's madness.

A film is non-interactive. You can get a fairly good picture of how good it would be from just the script - especially as there are less restraints in making it than there are with games (control issues, graphics, reaction, coveying information etc.). To say a game will be good based on concepts and ideas is a bigger leap because essentially games are about playing, not about visualising.

[Ed-E]

You aren't talking about making a game control well you are talking about measuring other games and mindlessly copying elements without understanding them.

Once you start saying a jump should be yay long and a level should take so long to traverse then you've switched off your own brain and you are relying on the judgment of others.  Or more likely you are relying on arbitrary decision made on a different product, for reasons you aren't privvy to.

I never said it was to be a strongly-enforced standard, rather a basic starting point that is proven to work well. I've already said that you would override it if you character had a specific reason to be faster/slower. The 'size of the level' thing was more about the speed of the character moving through their environment, and was rather genre-specific.

I see no reason why Lara Croft should swim at a different speed to, say, Buffy with regards to the size of their environments. And if there was a specific reason ( Buffy suddenly becomes a size 32, say) then you alter it accordingly.

[JPickford (retired mod)]

I never said it was to be a strongly-enforced standard, rather a basic starting point that is proven to work well. I've already said that you would override it if you character had a specific reason to be faster/slower. The 'size of the level' thing was more about the speed of the character moving through their environment, and was rather genre-specific.

I see no reason why Lara Croft should swim at a different speed to, say, Buffy with regards to the size of their environments. And if there was a specific reason ( Buffy suddenly becomes a size 32, say) then you alter it accordingly.

So why bother? Why not trust your own judgements instead of measuring other games.

Any attempt to reduce a creative endeavour to some sort of mechanical process is doomed. You'll never produce anything but a subset of what has gone before.

This sort of approach leads to products like Vexx, Kao the Kangaroo and most of Rare's sad Nintendo rip-offs.

[Ed-E]

So why bother?  Why not trust your own judgements instead of measuring other games.

Any attempt to reduce a creative endeavour to some sort of mechanical process is doomed.  You'll never produce anything but a subset of what has gone before. 

This sort of approach leads to products like Vexx,  Kao the Kangaroo and most of Rare's sad Nintendo rip-offs.

Quite why you think having a similar control system would lead to uninspired level design, characters, graphics, enemies and AI is totally beyond me.

Hey, it's very typical for games designers to be overprotective of their craft

(or perhaps I'm doomed to a future in EA. Job security, at least)

[tiedtiger]

A film is non-interactive. You can get a fairly good picture of how good it would be from just the script - especially as there are less restraints in making it than there are with games (control issues, graphics, reaction, coveying information etc.). To say a game will be good based on concepts and ideas is a bigger leap because essentially games are about playing, not about visualising.

I think you're serious underestimating the amount of multi-disciplinary effort required to make a film. It easily dwarfs a game in that respect, and is nowhere as straightforward as its final product would appear.

The interactivity/not-interactive element is completely irrelevant. In both cases what you are simply looking at is a large-scale project with input from many quarters that needs a lot of working and reworking to get right.

It is not that far-fetched an idea to mock up a game in some analog form to see if it'll work. It's surprising how often such a process yields tangible results and helps contribute toward an actual design. The problem is not a leap of judgement from ideas to actual working software. The problem is the clarity and standard of design that has gone into those ideas. Scriptwriters often spend six months or more putting together a single film script for this reason.

Most game designs that I'm aware of are done in a few days and conists of having a few brain storming sessions and slapping together a design document. No wonder you can't tell what the hell a prospective game will be like when the amount of design thought that gets put into design is so generally shallow.

[smac]

It called for a standard design "vocabulary"... I can't really remember much of it except that I agreed with it. Which is handy.

I had wondered whether anyone had gotten around to applying design patterns to games.

On first blush, this sounded like a good fit to me; on reflection, I suspect that this would just generate a lot of really obvious patterns with little real use.

Actually, thinking about it, I recall that Ernest Adams was working on a book of games design patterns . . .

[smac]

It is not that far-fetched an idea to mock up a game in some analog form to see if it'll work. It's surprising how often such a process yields tangible results and helps contribute toward an actual design.

Populous. Lego

(Apocryphal).

[roadkill]

I think you're serious underestimating the amount of multi-disciplinary effort required to make a film. It easily dwarfs a game in that respect, and is nowhere as straightforward as its final product would appear.

You're wildly underestimating what interactivity brings to the table.

As I pointed out in something of this sort before, in a film you only have to fool the camera from the angle the camera is coming from (and the amount they do this would surprise most people). In an interactive scenario where the viewer can move the camera this falls apart instantly.

If you only have to paint 3 sides of the box for the film to look right that's all you're going to do. You can't get away with this in games.

[Ste Pickford]

Most game designs that I'm aware of are done in a few days and conists of having a few brain storming sessions and slapping together a design document.

Good god! The very definition of how not to design a video game!

[smac]

[Films:] The interactivity/not-interactive element is completely irrelevant. In both cases what you are simply looking at is a large-scale project with input from many quarters that needs a lot of working and reworking to get right. 

[...]

The problem is the clarity and standard of design that has gone into those ideas. Scriptwriters often spend six months or more putting together a single film script for this reason.

Most game designs that I'm aware of are done in a few days and conists of having a few brain storming sessions and slapping together a design document. No wonder you can't tell what the hell a prospective game will be like when the amount of design thought that gets put into design is so generally shallow.

Sure, and games are also much more "front-loaded" than film; if you don't make the right decisions up front (technical, design), then you're screwed later on as the tech. gets frozen.

As games reach the end of production, and control that the designers exercise over the final product disappears, and the technical constraints rule. You have to get your major creative decisions over with at a relatively early stage.

Contrast this with film -- I contend that a major creative act of the director takes place at the end; after all of the raw film is in, the director (usually) edits the film to make the final cut. And can change this edit if screen-tests warrant it.

Unless you're running some sort of wildly iterative process, you don't get that in games design.

So prototyping becomes much more important. You'd think publishers would realise it's probably better to fund a half-dozen prototypes costing $1m each than spend the money on funding a single monolithic development. Spread the risk.

[roadkill]

Most game designs that I'm aware of are done in a few days and conists of having a few brain storming sessions and slapping together a design document. No wonder you can't tell what the hell a prospective game will be like when the amount of design thought that gets put into design is so generally shallow.

The reality of commercial game development these days is that how it plays is secondary to if the screenshots look interesting.

"Game design" in the current climate is 90% artist mockup time. Meetings about what is actually going on in those screenshots will only happen if the project goes ahead.

[smac]

Good god! The very definition of how not to design a video game!

I think we have the classic misconception that design=design doc. I'd be surprised if the design didn't evolve from that initial document through discussion.

Now, if there isn't one person who owns the design and who controls how that design evolves, then that's a different problem.

[tiedtiger]

You're wildly underestimating what interactivity brings to the table.

No, I'm not.

It's a lot of work.

What I'm saying is that there's much more work in fields like film than some of you realise.

As I pointed out in something of this sort before, in a film you only have to fool the camera from the angle the camera is coming from (and the amount they do this would surprise most people). In an interactive scenario where the viewer can move the camera this falls apart instantly.

If you only have to paint 3 sides of the box for the film to look right that's all you're going to do. You can't get away with this in games.

If you want to make Z-list movies, that's what you do. But those things are on a par with the shittest of the shit 6-month knocked-out games. The sort that make Driv3r look like art.

If, on the other hand, you intend to make a halfway decent film, it's an incredible amount of work. There's writing issues, acting issues, costumes, props, set, lighting sound, score, editing, production issues, effects, on and on and on. It's a massive undertaking. Most film shoots are shorter than the average game, but the overall production and creation time from first script concept through to final edit often takes years. And during that production period, you're usually talking about having to organise a couple of hundred people for endless takes and 20 hour days that just don't stop for, oh, 2-5 months.

Bottom line: It's a hell of a lot of work.

[tiedtiger]

Good god! The very definition of how not to design a video game!

That's what I'm saying.

And yet it's done all the time

[Ste Pickford]

I think we have the classic misconception that design=design doc. I'd be surprised if the design didn't evolve from that initial document through discussion.

Now, if there isn't one person who owns the design and who controls how that design evolves, then that's a different problem.

The misconseption is pretty common throughout the whole industry, and almost always a feature of the people who organise the 'brainstorming' sessions and expect the design doc on their desk in a few days.

Starting with a 'brainstorming' session is just about the worst way to ensure that there is a person who 'owns' the design.

[Fry Crayola]

I think you're serious underestimating the amount of multi-disciplinary effort required to make a film. It easily dwarfs a game in that respect, and is nowhere as straightforward as its final product would appear.

The interactivity/not-interactive element is completely irrelevant. In both cases what you are simply looking at is a large-scale project with input from many quarters that needs a lot of working and reworking to get right.

It is not that far-fetched an idea to mock up a game in some analog form to see if it'll work. It's surprising how often such a process yields tangible results and helps contribute toward an actual design. The problem is not a leap of judgement from ideas to actual working software. The problem is the clarity and standard of design that has gone into those ideas. Scriptwriters often spend six months or more putting together a single film script for this reason.

Most game designs that I'm aware of are done in a few days and conists of having a few brain storming sessions and slapping together a design document. No wonder you can't tell what the hell a prospective game will be like when the amount of design thought that gets put into design is so generally shallow.

My point is that a scriptwriter can write a script, and on the basis of that script a film can be given the go-ahead. He doesn't need to produce a storyboard, or shoot a scene himself.

Meanwhile a game designer needs proof that his ideas will work, and that means he either needs extra abilities as JPickford says, or he needs mates/co-workers who can do that for him. Take Sonic Crackers as an example - the basic idea was that Sonic and Tails are joined together with an elasticated rope. From a designers point of view, he's concerned with how it would work, what puzzles could result, etc. However it's only when the game is prototyped that it's fully realised that the idea is unplayable (as anyone who's attempted to play Sonic Crackers would attest).

The interactivity plays a huge part. It's no use designing a game without at least knowing if it's going to be fun to play, and the best way to do that is prototyping. And that requires alternate skills. Meanwhile a scriptwriter can easily visualise his film and know if it is working. It's a basic skill most people are born with.

[smac]

the overall production and creation time from first script concept through to final edit often takes years. And during that production period, you're usually talking about having to organise a couple of hundred people for endless takes and 20 hour days that just don't stop for, oh, 2-5 months.

Well, not strictly speaking "production" time -- the film industry has come up with the concept of pre-production, production and post-production phases.

A lot of the timescales your talking about is spent in pre-production, with fewer people involved and lower ongoing costs. One difference between film and games is that the film indstry seems geared to fund pre-production, where the games industry isn't. Except maybe for first-party devcos.

And sure, film also has loads of long days. Unlike software crunch times, 'though, there's a *lot* of sitting around waiting for the next take.