Game Designer

Where do we start?

Pick one door. Whatever you pick, you land in ② the machine and can change everything there.
YOUR WORDS
what the game is about — a feeling, a world, an action
for example:
about 40 s · the assistant picks 4–7, each with a reason in your words
A GAME YOU LOVE
start from how the catalog sees a game
how the catalog’s authors see it — not a full analysis
AN EMPTY BOARD
build it yourself, brick by brick
KIND OF FUN
FEELINGS
DYNAMICS
MECHANICS
take bricks from 📚 library, answer the machine’s questions
③ the machine
✋ core action — what the player repeats
more: a jam theme · 9 steps (Fullerton) · what the builder gets
theme · a prompt, not a rule
output · what the builder gets
…
full prompt — the builder's role + the whole task

        

      

      

      

        

        

      

      

        
📚 The library — 623 bricks of the catalog

          
          
          

        

        

      

    

  


  

    

      

        
where ingredients come from

        

        
      

      

    

    

  


  

    

      

        
        
        
        
        
        
        
        
        
      

      
      

      

      

        
knobs — the prototype's key numbers, move them while you play
          

      

    

    
  

  

    

      
      
assistant · this game

      

      

      

      
      

      

      
    








  
How to use this

  
For games, one line runs along the top: ① Start → ② Machine → ③ Run ↺.

  
    
    
  1. ① Start — three doors: your words (the assistant turns them into bricks — patterns from the catalog, each with a reason), a game you love (how the catalog sees it), or an empty board.
    2. 
    
  2. ② Machine — your bricks on a board: up — what the player feels, middle — what happens in play, down — the rules; columns — parts of the game (Fullerton). The catalog’s wires run bottom-up — hover one for why. On top is the roof: MDA’s eight kinds of fun; a feeling wires up to the kind it is a form of; 📌 pin what you aim for. Click a brick: why it is here, its wires, ⇄ others like it, ✕ take it out. A red socket — or a pinned kind with no wire — asks a question: choose one of three. Scroll over the board to zoom.
    3. 
    
  3. ⚡ Run the machine — the builder makes a grey prototype from it.
    4. 
    
  4. ③ Run — play, ● Start test, talk to the game’s design assistant; under the game — what happened to each brick: ● works · ⚠ a label · ○ not built.
    5. 
  

  
Worlds keep their own two screens.

  
Built on: the catalog Patterns in Game Design
    (Björk & Holopainen, book 2005, wiki) · MDA
    (Hunicke, LeBlanc, Zubek, 2004) · jam themes of Ludum Dare · nine steps from Fullerton's
    Game Design Workshop.
    The catalog marks a layer for only 224 patterns; the layer and the part of the game of every pattern here, and the kind of fun of each feeling, are our reading of the pages.