iCombat

It occurred to me as I sat here going through dozens of game sound effects and game graphics that I don’t have the foggiest idea what I am doing.  Sure I have played plenty of games and have a clear vision of what this app should look like but beyond that, I have not read one book or one article about good game design.  I did stumble across The Hummingbird Manifesto but this is little more than a cheeky bit of pretty intuitive advice.  As my game development gets further along though I find that I have made dozens if not hundreds of decisions and all I am going off of is my past game play experience.

Atari Pong Screenshot

I am fairly confident I have limited just how much I can screw this up by keeping the game simple and without too much of a plot as this seems to add another layer of design complexity. This is why I chose to do a game based off of some of the original gaming platforms: these focused on the quality of in game play rather than depth and variety of sound or visual effects (of course there was no choice back then).

After just building what we have, and you guys will get to be the judges of how well we have done soon, I can say I really respect professional game designers.  To have the vision to not only create a fully developed plot but then to fold in the complexity of quality sound and graphics really is a huge effort.  Especially when you are inventing a new theme or world from scratch.  No wonder game budgets are becoming so enormous like Spore’s estimated $35 million and there are tons of Bachelor’s degree programs for game development and design like this one. Read more…