Arm yourself with the practical skills and cutting edge insights needed to successfully design engaging games across a variety of genres and platforms
Key Features
- Master the skills, processes, and techniques required to work in a professional studio
- Ace the core principles and processes of level design, world building, and storytelling
- Design, implement, and polish high quality features and mechanics for modern video games
Book Description
If you are seeking an up-to-date and actionable guide to game design, then you have come to the right place! Immerse yourself in the fundamentals of game design with this book, written by two industry veterans with decades of game design experience across a variety of genres and platforms.
The second edition retains its original goal of teaching the basics of game design in a practical manner, but also adds some of the most recent trends in game design and a whole lot of new practical examples from games of the current generation. A new chapter on games as a service will explain how the role of the game designer is evolving and go deeper into the design of games that are meant to be played forever.
Starting with learning how to conceptualize a game idea, you will gradually move on to devising a design plan and adapting solutions from existing games. You will discover how to produce original game mechanics, and test and eliminate anticipated design risks. You will then learn the basics of Level Design, Interactive Storytelling, User Experience and Accessibility.
In the final chapters, you will learn to wrap up a game ahead of its release date, work through the challenges of designing games as a service and free-to-play games, and understand how to significantly improve their quality through iteration, playtesting and polishing.
What you will learn
- Define the scope and structure of a game project
- Conceptualize a game idea and present it to others
- Design gameplay systems and communicate them clearly and thoroughly
- Build and validate engaging game mechanics
- Design successful games as a service and prepare your games for live operations
- Master the principles behind level design, worldbuilding and storytelling
- Improve the quality of a game by playtesting and polishing it
Who This Book Is For
Whether you are a student eager to design your very first game, or a game designer looking to expand your skillset, this book will help you master the fundamentals of game design, across all stages of game development. By focusing on best practices and a pragmatic approach, Practical Game Design provides insights into the arts and crafts from two senior game designers, with insider knowledge that even the most seasoned industry veterans can appreciate. Prior experience with game development is not absolutely necessary. However, a basic knowledge of some popular video games will be helpful.
Table of Contents
- Introducing Game Production Process
- Preparing a Game Concept
- Scoping a Game Project
- Creating Design Documentation
- Understanding Game mechanics
- Designing Systems and Features
- Making Prototypes
- Designing compelling stories for games
- The Fundamentals of Level Design
- Creating Characters
- Balancing your content and systems
- Building a great User Interface and User Experience
- Making your games accessible
- Mastering games as a service
- Understanding Monetization Techniques
- The Final 10 Percent
