Videojug Videos: Being A Game Designer

Harry Ravenswood moved to the UK from Australia in 2004, where he had been working at Torus Games. He has worked on 7 published titles on a range of different consoles, and has been working as a designer for over 6 years. He recently worked on The Regiment for Kuju Entertainment, an action title which saw him working closely with current and previous members of the SAS to get it as authentic as possible. (from Videojug).

"Videogames have come an awfully long way since the heady days of Pong and Pac Man all those years ago. If you think gaming is still just a few nerdy kids holed up in their bedrooms needing to get out more, prepare yourself for a shock. The videogame industry is now worth billions. The level of sophistication, both in terms of gameplay and graphics continues to grow at a phenomenal pace, and in many households they've overtaken TV as the entertainment of choice for winding down in the evening. The flipside, of course, is that videogame production is now serious business. While you may think being a videogame designer is just a day-long play-about, the truth is it's a very demanding, albeit very rewarding job..."

Talking About These: Video Games and Sex

Daniel Floyd is the creator of an animated lectures series where he expresses a fresh and in-depth view on industry trend topics.

Recently graduated from the Univerity of Georgia, he received a bachelor's degree in Drama, focusing in Digital Media, and is currently pursuing a carreer in the videogames industry as an animator.

This is the second lecture of his series, Talking About These.

"A "sequel" presentation made for a Media Theory class at SCAD. Inspired by the style of Zero Punctuation reviews.
Based on "Sex in Video Games" by Brenda Brathwaite and writings by James Portnow and Leigh Alexander.
Made to be presented in a classroom."

Via Talking About These

Brenda Laurel on games for girls

Brenda Laurel is a pioneering writer, researcher, designer and entrepreneur in the fields of human-computer interaction, interactive narrative and cultural aspects of technology. (Wikipedia)

"A TED archive gem. At TED in 1998, Brenda Laurel asks: Why are all the top-selling videogames aimed at little boys? She spent two years researching the world of girls (and shares amazing interviews and photos) to create a game that girls would love."

There is something dark and hideous about this one. And no, its not about the apparent main topic, but about the underlying methodology.

They took years for the most exhaustive research possible on the likes of the target audience, and then developed design heuristics in accordance with the results. Finally, they developed products using those patterns.

Where is the creativity? Where is the choice?

"We are not trying to tell them who they have to be, but we are really, really happy about who they are..." Laurel says in the talk. However feels like an enormous contradiction, as the genesis of the games they are delivering is a contundent exposition of who those girls should be, according to their statistically determined archetypes.

And this was more than 10 years ago... Eventually the company got degluted by Mattel, which also has quite an experience in delivering stereotyped messages toys.

Talking About These: Video Games and Storytelling

Daniel Floyd is the creator of an animated lectures series where he expresses a fresh and in-depth view on industry trend topics.

Recently graduated from the Univerity of Georgia, he received a bachelor's degree in Drama, focusing in Digital Media, and is currently pursuing a carreer in the videogames industry as an animator.

"A presentation for an art history class at SCAD. Done in the style of Yahtzee's Zero Punctuation reviews (sort of). I have no idea how he makes one of these every week.

Made to be presented on screen in the classroom."

Via Talking About These

Aquaria Design Tour

First video of the Design Tour series, made by the prominent indie team, Wolfire.

"Whenever I play a game, I look for design lessons that I can learn and apply to my own games. Recently, I decided to show these lessons in the form of a video tour of games that make interesting design decisions..."

Via Wolfire blog

Chris Crawford: The Dragon Speech

Chris Crawford, one of the most influential characters in the history of the industry. He pushed to give identity to game design by introducing his unique view to the media. Among other achievements, he is the father of the GDC, and of course, his name is high among the most important game designers.

"Chris Crawford in 1992, giving the last speech of his career as a "game designer" and his first as a researcher into "interactive storytelling"..."

Via PlayThisthing.com - Thx Patrick!