Professional game design
The transition from 3D art student to
3D industry professional was like night and day. The transition from
amateur game designer to professional game designer was also just as
drastic if not more so. I was no longer taking vague gameplay ideas and
stumbling to develop that idea into engaging gameplay mechanics. The
professionals I worked with had a structure and process to game
design that really opened my eyes.
From what I have learned, I believe
that the process of game design happens in 4 different stages. The
concept stage, the documentation stage, the implementation stage, and
the play test stage. This is my overview of the process.
Concept Stage
In the concept stage you build up the
concepts and game ideas. Designers brainstorm on what the concept
could develop into and how it would make a compelling game. This
stage builds a lot of excitement because there are limitless
possibilities to the potential games that designers can dream up. All
that brainstorm gets refined into a game loop and extended game
loops. The game loops illustrate the main flow, and extended flow of
the game.
Documentation Stage
This stage builds on the game loop and
extended game loops. I consider this to be the most difficult stage
of game design. All the ideas from the game loops are defined in
technical specification documents (tech specs), that define game
mechanics in fine detail. Some gameplay mechanics can be defined in
one tech spec. Others may need more than one spec if it is a complex
mechanic that needs to be broken down into smaller mechanics. These
tech specs are assembled in a Game Design Document (GDD) to serve as
reference for anyone who needs a clear understand of what each
gameplay mechanic does.
Implementation Stage
Game designers, artist, and engineers
all work together in this stage to begin building the game. This is
a very exciting step in the game design process as everyone on the
project is able to see the game come together. This stage relies
heavily on the GDD. Designers rely on the GDD to accurately convey
game design ideas and game mechanics to engineers. Engineers build
out tools and systems for designers to implement the gameplay, and
content of the game. Artists create the art to populate the game
world.
Play Test Stage
This is the coolest part of the game
design process. Everyone works on refining the game. Artist polish
the items,props, and environments and gradually renders out the game
world. Engineers fine tune the systems. Game designers run through
the game, testing it for content and gameplay. The whole game goes
through refinement passes. If all goes well, the game as a whole
goes to QA for final testing.
Conclusion
I hope you've found this overview to be
informative. Now that you have a little break down, this all may
seem pretty straight forward. But it did not seem so straight
forward to me, until I started working as a designer. Now, even
though the processes is clearer to me, it still requires a lot of
hard work. A lot of talented and passionate people put a lot of time
into creating a game. It is a fun and amazing process, and I love
being a part of it. Thanks for reading.