Designing Games

How do video games resonate with players to become worldwide hits? This practical book shows you how the right combination of story elements, psychology, and game theory can generate emotionally charged experiences that take players beyond mindless entertainment. Author and experienced game designer Tynan Sylvester takes you through everything from narrative to motivation, using down-to-earth advice and real-world examples. Great games affect people in ways that stories alone cannot, and there are lots of possibilities yet to discover. This book is a light along that path. Learn how to make practical design decisions and weigh trade offs Establish a planning horizon and test your design through iteration Find low-cost, high-reward solutions for making your game accessible yet deep Understand methods for balancing levels, scheduling rewards, and designing rich multilayer interactions Provide motivation, and discover how to make the game just difficult enough

Author Biography

Tynan Sylvester first designed games in 2000. His smallest projects were one-man independent games on which he wrote every line of code and painted every frame of art. His largest was four years on Irrational Games 110-person development team making BioShock Infinite. He has also written several feature design articles for Gamasutra, the biggest game design website. Tynan believes that much of what we think of game design grows from the metaphors we use to describe it. He likes to work at finding metaphors that create useful answers instead of deadly assumptions. He also enjoys bacon and prefers Picard to Kirk.