by Alan Emrich
Here, I explain that where one stands on the issue of game design creativity greatly depends upon where one sits.
There is a certain alchemy that goes into game design. As per Thomas Edison, like all “genius,” the game design formula roughly breaks down to 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. While the latter consists of mundane matters of writing, prototyping, testing, printing, packaging, distribution, marketing, accounting, and all those things that make lazy anti-capitalists blanche, what goes into the former? Is it art? Is it craft? Or is it science?
The answer is, “that depends.”
The Science of Game Design
When a computer game is designed, it is usually a science. More often than not, it is a social science. That is because in computer game design, much like in a big Hollywood production, there are a lot of people who have “input” involved, and to keep them happy, one must play the negotiating game. The game-designer-as-artist will generally see their contributions as wholly unnecessary. They’ll complain, like a chef, that “everyone says the soup won’t taste right until they get to piss in it!”
And you know what? That’s just about what happens. The whims of the boss or sales guru or marketing overlord must be addressed. Game designs must be compromised and the “science” of game design takes over as vision and innovation are suppressed. The trick for the scientific game designer is to find a way to “put the genius in the box.” Those are, to conform to every restriction (particularly time and budgetary) and still manage to get as many clever ideas in there as can be pulled off under scrupulously monitored time and resources. It can be rewarding to accomplish this, the game designer’s equivalent of playing “hide the virtue” in a Pandora’s Box project.
When you’re a “hack” game designer trying to schlep out the next title to make Christmas and hit the fourth quarter sales numbers, you rely on the science of game design - tried-and-true formulas with just a dash of inspiration (if the game publishing “system” hasn’t beaten it out of you). While bravely trying to defend your right to creativity as marketing demands another “me too” product, you slouch forward with a collection of conscious compromises clamoring to comply with cacophonous “consultants” to your creation. This is life on the treadmill of game design, but you stay at it. After all, there’s a dozen people cueing up for your “glamorous” job and you are in “show business.” (Shouldn’t you be happy?)
The Craft of Game Design
Not every game designer is a “hack” (i.e., someone you’ve probably never heard of), just like not every writer for the newspaper is a “hack.” Sometimes, names get known as reputations are built. Sid Meier and Will Wright are among the most recognized names in game design these days. They no longer have to sweat the abyss that can be the science of game design. No, they have transcended from its depths up to the stage of the game design “craft.” That is, they are the “craftsmen” among game designers.
These craftsmen have enough clout to get the additional time that they need to develop their own ideas and vision, and then have publishers thank them for doing so. They get the opportunity to consider and reject outside influences, and often get to nurture their designs along every step of the way. Their experience has taught them about the special needs of the others members on project team, and they’ve learned how to design with them in mind. When a problem arises during production, a hack designer must change the design to fit the new constraint or “work in” the new technology. The craftsman, however, maintains the sanctity of his vision and knows that some problems have engineering solutions (and what those might be), some have graphic solutions (and can make suggestion), while others have design solutions (and knows which will be best for the project and the finished game).
It’s a brutal road to becoming a game design craftsman, paved with hack titles (many of which you’d like to forget). Craftsman, you see, serve their hitch in apprenticeship as hacks. Sid Meier had his Covert Action and Will Wright had his SimEarth. But they picked themselves up, dusted themselves off, and somehow got to publish a game that was driven by their vision, and so today we marvel at Civilization and The Sims. These are works of craftsmanship, honed from years of hard lessons in the industry.
The Art of Game Design
In the computer game arena, the “art” of game design is largely non-existent. Since computer games are no long self-published works, the urgencies of meeting a payroll demand the science (or at the very least the craft) or game design be employed. One has to look to the more relaxed side of paper-game publishing to find what little art there is among game designs. It is here in an almost “vanity” press business where game designers can take years to research and test a game before it ever sees the light of day and truly make it their own “labor of love/work of art.”
Alan Emrich is the former Strategy Games Editor at Computer Gaming World magazine, has written several computer game strategy guides, and has designed and developed several published board, card and computer games since the 1970s.