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'The Door Problem' of Game Design

Posted by Soulskill on from the making-adoorable-games dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Game design is one of those jobs everybody thinks they can do. After all, they've played a few games, and they know what they liked and disliked, right? How hard could it be? Well, professional game designer Liz England has summed up the difficulty of the job and the breadth of knowledge needed to do it in what she calls 'the door problem.' Quoting: 'Premise: You are making a game. Are there doors in your game? Can the player open them? Can the player open every door in the game? What tells a player a door is locked and will open, as opposed to a door that they will never open? What happens if there are two players? Does it only lock after both players pass through the door? What if the level is REALLY BIG and can't all exist at the same time?' This is just a few of the questions that need answering. She then goes through how other employees in the company respond to the issue, often complicating it. 'Network Programmer: "Do all the players need to see the door open at the same time?" Release Engineer: "You need to get your doors in by 3pm if you want them on the disk." Producer: "Do we need to give everyone those doors or can we save them for a pre-order bonus?"'"

10 of 305 comments (clear)

  1. Will the door have windows? by ciderbrew · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'd like little windows so people can see into the next room. These are always missing in games.
    ALSO, I want to shoot something through the doors and blow them up with things.
    #FeatureCreep

    1. Re:Will the door have windows? by ciderbrew · · Score: 4, Funny

      I'm going for a manager vibe. I've read the word json somewhere and I think all company use of HTML should in the Json now. So if you could just implement that and fill out this TPS report that would be great.

    2. Re:Will the door have windows? by Assmasher · · Score: 3, Funny

      I love that "Feature Creep" is both adverbial and can be a noun. "Oh, look, it's the feature creep..." ;)

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      Loading...
    3. Re:Will the door have windows? by CrimsonAvenger · · Score: 1, Funny

      ALSO, I want to shoot something through the doors and blow them up with things.

      Oh, Gawd, a believer in the Joe Biden School of Civilian Marksmanship....;-)

      --

      "I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
    4. Re:Will the door have windows? by ciderbrew · · Score: 3, Funny

      If you're going to disprove my point with facts and logic that's unsportsmanlike.

    5. Re:Will the door have windows? by Quirkz · · Score: 3, Funny

      Good one. I'm stealing it and putting it in my novel about a parody dungeon crawler video game. I'd give you credit, but, frankly, "Thanks to Assmasher" isn't something I'm willing to put in print. Er, a second time, since I guess I just said it once.

      --
      The Quirkz Handbook of Self-Improvement for People Who Are Already Pretty Okay
  2. Re:RPG Games by SJHillman · · Score: 3, Funny

    It's A Long Way To The Top, If You Wanna Open Every Door

  3. Re:RPG Games by Remus+Shepherd · · Score: 5, Funny

    I spell it CDO, because it doesn't annoy me as much when it's in alphabetical order.

    --
    Genocide Man -- Life is funny. Death is funnier. Mass murder can be hilarious.
  4. Manager vibe, you say? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    In games industry it's more like this: "I don't like the main character, change it to something more contemporary, a special-ops operative maybe? I don't care it doesn't fit with your theme of magic unicorn land, make the other magical creatures into taliban and we're sorted, right? Well then make it an FPS, no one plays plaforming games any more anyway. Oh, and throw in some realistic explosions, fancy mo-cap and destructible environment. No, you can't have more money. Just make sure the story is coherent and up-to-date. I don't know, look at the last 3 CoD titles' storylines and mix it up a bit. Heck, I DON'T NEED TO TELL YOU WHAT TO DO - YOU'RE THE DESIGNER HERE! NOW MAKE IT HAPPEN! And fix me up with a Gantt chart so that I have something to fiddle with while I'm talking to you next time..."

  5. Re:Easy answers by rainmaestro · · Score: 4, Funny

    Obligatory comic:

    http://www.screencuisine.net/h...