Troy's Standard Rant #1

[Graham W]

The most useful question for me, when designing my first game, would have been "What problems do you see coming up during play?".

Other than that, I like the questions of the form:

0. What are you, the game designer, totally excited and pumped about?

and I agree with the numbering - that that question is more important than "What is your game about?".

Slight tangent: I was recently developing a LARP to which the only answer to that question would have been "Well, it's a development of my previous game and people seemed to like that one". In other words, I wasn't excited about the game at all.

[Troy_Costisick]

Heya,

Y'all should check out this thread from about a year and a half ago: Streamlining Design

Mike Holmes, in particular, suggested 10 or so REALLY good questions that game designers should ask themselves.

-Thanks!  That is the very kind of thing I'm looking for.  My search-fu was weak before I started this thread and it didn't come up.  Very much appreciate that link.

Peace,

-Troy

[M. J. Young]

1.   What is the game about?
2.   What do the characters do?...

The Pool is an excellent game, and yet I don't think you can really answer (1) and (2) for it. Is that a failing of my understanding, of the Pool or of the questions?

I ask because the game I'm working on is "generic" like the Pool. These questions stare back at me with defiance. I wonder if understanding why they don't fit would help define other helpful questions.

I can't speak for The Pool, but I can speak for Multiverser.

The big revelation in my understanding of the game I had created came when we were forced to change the name for trademark reasons from Multiverse to Multiverser. Up to that point I had been thinking, "this is a game in which you can go anywhere and do anything." At that point, I realized that this was not really what the game was about. Rather, I began thinking, "this is a game in which you can go anywhere and do anything." The game is very much about what happens to the characters, ordinary people thrown into a reality in which everything imaginable is real.

If your game is not about something, you probably haven't thought it through yet. What is it about the game that makes it different? Why would you prefer to play this than any of the other generic systems out there--GURPS, Fudge, Fuzion, and the list goes on. What are you trying to do that they don't do? If it's only a matter of providing a game engine that is less finicky than GURPS, more powerful than Fudge, why are you doing it? Where do you expect this engine to take you that those won't?

I think the next question on the list should be, how do the choices you are making facilitate those objectives? That, though, is the repeated question that is asked specifically in connection with each choice. How does character creation facilitate this, how does the resolution system facilitate this, and so forth. This produces extremely focused game design. I'm not saying that's always the best, but it's usually better than completely unfocused design, and most people wind up less focused than they could have been anyway.

--M. J. Young

[Tony Irwin]

1) While playing your game, when do you expect players to be having the most fun?

2) What do you hope they'd be thinking at that moment in their heads?

3) What do you hope they'd be saying to each other at that moment? (Apart from character dialogue)

Tony

[Troy_Costisick]

Heya,

Where do you expect this engine to take you that those won't?

That is the best way I have heard this question put yet!  Usually someone will ask "What does your game do that others don't" or "What makes your game different?"  I hate asking it like that because you end up with a bunch of mechanics on how their magic system is different in their post instead of how their game is really different.  But this, MJ, this asks so much more.  Might need some tweaking, but this is how such a question should be phrased.  It's about where you go during play not about the system tweaks the desiginer is putting in.  It's about how the game pushes you as a player and provides totally different experiences.  I like that.

Peace,

-Troy

PS: Tony, your questions were excellent as well.  I will be adding them to my list.  I appreciate your input.