February 2006
6 posts
3 tags
Want to make a game? Here's how.
I get a lot of e-mail from people who want to get started in games but don’t know where to start. My usual response has been to make a mod. The problem with making mods these days though is that engine technology has gotten so good that it takes a lot more work and a lot more expertise to make something on a current engine. Making a mod for Doom took a lot less technical and artistic work...
The Innovator's Dilemma
In my ongoing quest to figure out how to make interesting new games that the market will still accept, I stumbled across a book called The Innovator’s Dilemma, by Clayton Christiansen. Using a case study from the computer disk drive industry, Christiansen shows how noteworthy and successful companies can suddenly be eclipsed by disruptive technologies. These disruptive technologies are...
2 tags
Orson Scott Card and Dani Bunten Berry
I just saw this article linked from Slashdot. It is a column written by the great science-fiction writer, Orson Scott Card. It was written for the venerable Compute! magazine, 23 years ago. What’s interesting is that back then, EA was known as an innovative game company. This was largely due to one reason: Dani Bunten Berry. Dani Bunten Berry has always been my game design idol. Her...
1 tag
Video game sell sheet
How do you summarize a game concept? How do you pitch it? How can you get an idea if your game concept is compelling, understandable and marketable? One useful answer to these questions is the sell sheet. The sell sheet is a one-page high-level description of your game. It includes features, screenshots, system requirements, target audience and ship date. It’s basically what the back of...
The Revolution will be Downloaded
There was a great panel at our local IGDA meeting last night. It was called “The Revolution will be Downloaded: Confessions of Five Casual Game Makers”. It was a 90 minute talk discussing why “hard-core” or traditional game developers should be interested in what is happening in the “casual” game space. I am summarizing (and editorializing) the results for you...
Project Offset licenses tech
My aquaintances over at Project Offset have been shaking up the graphics technology field for a few months now. Project Offset is a small group of folks from S2Games, which NS fans might know of as being the authors of the other big FPS/RTS hybrid. When I moved to San Francisco, Sam McGrath was just leaving S2 and we got together for dinner to discuss the future FPS. Because the number of...