As you regular readers (or feedburner checkers) may have noticed, I’m a bit behind. I missed posting my regular Sunday game design last Sunday, and I seem to have missed it yesterday as well. The reason for this is that I am currently engaged in northern New England in a summer job that, while not […]
This showed up on Raph’s blog the other day. I can’t believe the simplicity and subtle genius of this idea. But more than a static instance bank with a cheesy LCD game that kids can play like the old Tiger toys, why not a full-fledged online MMO like Habbo Hotel or Club Penguin? Think of […]
I’ve been reading Max Brooks’ seminal work, World War Z, for the second time this past week. If you’re not familiar, check it out. Also listen to the interview on NPR’s Talk of the Nation. It has to be one of the most captivating books I’ve ever read, and that includes classic literature. The funny […]
Last night an old friend of my brother’s came by and hooked up his machine to play games with my brother and me. We played Starcraft, Sins of a Solar Empire, and Battlefield 1942. There were stores of Coke and chips and Twizzlers, and the basement room in which we were arrayed heated up by […]
Last night my team, the Detroit Red Wings, finally bested the upstart Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 6 to win the Stanley Cup and their fourth championship in eleven seasons. I have been an ardent Detroit fan since I lived there as a child and witnessed their back-to-back sweep of the championship in ‘97 and ‘98, […]
My brother recently graduated from college with a degree in physics and a minor in mathematics. After spending the summer with me working theater in New Hampshire, he’ll be heading to sub-Saharan Africa to teach science for the Peace Corps for two years. When he returns, he plans to enter graduate school in Edinburgh in […]
One of the things I find most attractive about game design is the need for true multi-disciplinary thinking. A diverse mind engaged in diverse pursuits is a far more fertile designer than one that is focused, however nimble or learned that mind may be. Game designers create whole universes, and no mere education in digital […]
I have occasionally thought that pursuing an advanced degree is a bit like playing a game… a massive, cumbersome, complex game. Maybe that’s a sign I think about games too much Recently, I had a rude awakening regarding the structure of this game I’m playing: they changed the rules on me. Rather, the rules […]
“It’s not a mistake, it’s an iteration. I’m a game designer — everything I say is a prototype.”
- Brenda Brathwaite
The other day I gave a lecture on the importance of criticism in game design, and I drew a parallel to ideas from my undergraduate study in philosophy. One of the tenets of Western philosophy is the idea of debate and defensibility as proof of merit. Simply put, philosophers debate ideas because they hold that […]