Level Up.pdf

T
LeveI 4
You Can Design a Game, But
Can You Do the Paperwork?
A Japanese game director once
visited the studio where I worked to
impart his wisdom to our team about
his philosophy of game design, which
mainly had to do with how much
money his latest game had made. As
he was leaving, he asked our team a
cryptic question: “ I believe making
games is like fishing ” he said. “ When I return, you will tell me why this is
so. ” If he had been wearing a cape, I ’ m sure he would have swooshed it
mysteriously as he left.
I spent a lot of time thinking about just exactly how making games was like
fishing. In the end, I decided that making games is nothing like fishing.
Fishing is quiet and slow and involves waiting for something to happen that
may never happen 1 . I also decided that this game director was full of crap.
So I developed my own analogy.
Making games is like making chili
(bear with me — it ’ ll make sense).
Like making chili, you first need a
recipe and that recipe is the game ’ s
documentation. Having the right
recipe is important. You are not
making soup or stew. You want to
make sure your documentation not
only covers what is in it, but how it
can be made: just like a recipe. Be
sure to follow the recipe, but be
1 You may be able to tell from this statement that I do not enjoy fishing.