I just had to comment in response to those people who say that a game designer is a minor part of the game process. I would rather have an amazing designer and an ok coder then the other way around. Don’t believe me? Think of the best game you ever played. Was it great because it had a good engine or cool art? Those things certainly help but any great game is great because of the design period.

In short form a game designer is someone who decides when, where, how, what a player will do and not do in a game.

quote: Original post by MorganE
I just had to comment in response to those people who say that a game designer is a minor part of the game process. I would rather have an amazing designer and an ok coder then the other way around. Don’t believe me? Think of the best game you ever played. Was it great because it had a good engine or cool art? Those things certainly help but any great game is great because of the design period.

Your game is limited by your weakest link. No point having great features if your coder isn''t able to implement them. Another reason why I think designer-programmers are the way forward.



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quote:
Think of the best game you ever played. Was it great because it had a good engine or cool art?

well...both actually, and more then that. good engine and good art isnt even enough to make a good game. art and engine are not the only things that a "good" game has.

for instance for RPGs, story is essential, if u dont have a good story then .... well .... .

one of my favourite games is gran tourismo 3. the graphics are i have to admit amazing. but its the way yhe car handles, the customization, the freedom of movement in there that i like the most. i loved gran turismo 1 on the PSX and the graphics on that wasnt nearly even cose to GT3.

another favouite game was Xenogears. but that wasnt because of the art either. its still my favourite game, and if u put it in front of the most recent games the aat dosnt stand a chance compared to the likes of Blood Omen 2, FFX, DOOM III (seen pictures), MGS2, but i still like xenogears better.

see, now i liked xenogears because of the baattle system....and the story

as for choosing a better designer over programmer....well all "videogame" designs flatten out to code (as someone already stated) so what Kylotan said holds true. and also the other way around. ie: a good programmer but a crappy game design wont get u anywhere either.

it all has to be balanced out


Al
"For us it's a natural disaster....For him/she it's a damn memory leak..."
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[edited by - alfmga on September 4, 2002 10:56:35 AM]

quote: Original post by Furion
This shouldn''t be too hard to answer. But to me a game designer is just a person who bosses ppl around, gets to use all of HIS ideas, and skips out on the tough parts like programming and the artwork. Someone plz get this image out of my head. What exactly does a game designer do?

Sure, think of a designer in a team as someone who bosses the programmers around. A decent game is almost always a team effort. If you have an idea like John Carmack or Peter Molineux, you hire 5 graphics/level designers, and instead of your idea they design something totally inappropriate, are you then a dictator when you tell them to do their job and make some graphics for what you designed ?

Just look at solo game programmers. 95% never finish their idea, or make a cool looking demo. When they do finish something it looks like a retro 1992 game, yet doesn''t play on a 486, but requires a 1 GHz and a Geforce 3 to do what games from 1992 did on a 1 MB VGA with a 486/33 with 4 MB.

A programmer can work on smaller projects, but for a good game it''s a team effort, you cannot deny that.