A blog, tracking the progress of a career in the games industry...

[Nikolas]

I wouldn't naturally think a musician would make a good designer... but maybe I'm just prejudiced. But if I think about it, I don't see why someone like you or Mods wouldn't know enough about other aspects of development to make a good game designer.

Well because of the way composers are treated firstly (not imporantly though). Music, in most cases (and sadly for me), comes last. Dave had his composer work for 15 days for example. I've been asked to do the same (and actually declined cause I was dead busy at the time). Music comes last and there are valid reason for this, though I don't like it. Either way by coming last, you put the least input in. Thus you don't learn. Certainly here in AGS it is not the case and of all the people I've worked here we all are a happy family, all working togehter pitching in...

Then it is that music is the most abstract of the elements in a game. Art can have huge impact and you can very well design a game from that perspective. Same goes with coding (of course), and level designing especially if we're talking about RTS/FPS/etc...

but somehow the practical skills required of a composer is fast working, little form, repeating, which are not useful in level design. For a coder it works differently and so on...

Ah well...

I do know for a fact though, that in order to work out a design document as the ones I've seen, I would spent half a lifetime. Full my life, in order to make it work actually. not that my ideas are bad, but just for fun I made one, with high hopes, and showed it to someone. She destroyed half of the scenario in a matter of minutes. It was leaking from everywhere

It is impossible to start from scratch, scotch, and you probably know it. Publishers are also useful (although we do tend to hate them), and need a living as well, and the less risks the better. It works the same way everywhere! The few diamonds will shine eventually, but it would blind us to have only diamonds around. And it would probably devalue the diamonds value

[buloght]

Musicians can be as creative as anybody else and more, where does all the music come from I've seen some of Nikolas' designs for his games and they were pretty awesome. But then maybe I don't know what a good designer is 

[m0ds]

Well because of the way composers are treated firstly (not imporantly though). Music, in most cases (and sadly for me), comes last. Dave had his composer work for 15 days for example. I've been asked to do the same (and actually declined cause I was dead busy at the time). Music comes last and there are valid reason for this, though I don't like it. Either way by coming last, you put the least input in. Thus you don't learn. Certainly here in AGS it is not the case and of all the people I've worked here we all are a happy family, all working togehter pitching in...

LOL, what projects are you working on? The majority of people here I do music for like it in early, so they can draw some inspiration from it themselves. But then, I see what you mean about the "real world". I can also see that someone who starts out souly as a musician probably would have an extreme lack of real experience of level/game design. But then, what is level/game design? It's only a bloody form of entertainment! It's not rocket science. I get the impression people think there is some kind of godly wisdom to creating a great game. There really isn't. Can you entertain your friends? Yes? Then you can probably write a pretty decent level. Have you played a game that entertained you? Then you can probably write a pretty decent level. You just look at what's been successful and build on that. You make the game clear & exciting, and you don't allow the player to sit around thinking "wtf?". If you can achieve that you can undoubdtedly achieve a pretty decent game. And the real geniuses try new things or take new directions. Yes, when they fail, they burn. But when they're a success they seem to make far more than originally expected.

[Nikolas]

No, design is of course, not rocket science! Not at all! But I don't want to reduce the designers by saying that "what you do is rubbish", the same way I wouldn't want someone to come in my face and say "what do you think you're doing? One note here, one there and you're done. Big deal!".

But yes in the end of the day, I don't see something soo special in a designer without any other capabilities. At least (from AGS), vince, Esper, lemmy and binky all do things alone. And all of them have heard me from the very begining. Heck lemmy had to redo AGX module from scratch because of my demands Which is heavy design from my POV but not gameplay design Same with Vince, he busted his arse to create that dual music mode, but it was all worth it!

Either way I personally find that I have plenty of creative force, but heck! No one should speak about themselves

B: Thanks;)

[Redwall]

There's a lot more to level design than entertaining your friends... there are all sorts of rules and principles that one needs to learn and follow (or not, as the case may be, but as with everything you have to know the rules before you can break them). It's a field of its own and not to be dismissed lightly as "a bloody form of entertainment". If you ever hear/read one of the really good level design guys talk/write about how they work, it's fascinating. There's a lot more depth to it than people realize.

[fred]

There's a lot more to level design than entertaining your friends... there are all sorts of rules and principles that one needs to learn and follow (or not, as the case may be, but as with everything you have to know the rules before you can break them). It's a field of its own and not to be dismissed lightly as "a bloody form of entertainment". If you ever hear/read one of the really good level design guys talk/write about how they work, it's fascinating. There's a lot more depth to it than people realize.

I agree. game/level design can be hard, especially all the math involved in balancing a complex game. Sure it's all about fun, but you spend alot of time solving equations to achieve it. Try balancing a game like StarCraft with three very different competing species, without any math or theory. Part of good design is the grace when something enormously complex is made seem easy and intuitive. But it doesn't mean designing it was easy - it often means a lot of extra effort was put into it. I'd recommend Game Architecture and Design to all game designers. It covers a lot of ground without losing sight of the basic entertainment aspect.

[Vince Twelve]

I read the same book that fred recommends several years ago.  Probably an older edition.  It was a very nice high-level look at both game design and team management.  The architecture stuff is nice too for wanna-be designers who don't know anything about programming.  Obviously, understanding more about what goes on under the hood can greatly improve your ability to design.  However, this book is really just a high-level overview.  I still don't think that there's any better way to learn how to be a designer than to just dive in and design.  Even if it's not going to be made into a real game.  Just writing up a design document can be good practice, and fun!

And on the musician versus programmer becoming a designer front:  If there were some kind of creative-ometer that we could use to compare a random sampling of musicians and programmers, I'd bet on the musicians having higher scores.  Not that creativity alone can make a good game designer.  But it is interesting that I've heard of lots of artist and programmer-turned-designers, I can't off hand think of any musician-turned-designers in the industry.

Oh, and I'm enjoying the blog!  More please!

[shbaz]

Needs more sex and violence.