@Codman (pls don't rate me down..yell at me shout at me but pls don't rate me down)
What about the idea that concept may be abstractization of real life(read practice) related information(be it directly given by stimuli or by combining other concepts-) what I mean there would be no abstract game concept until we figured out what could be doen with a computer in terms of programming and playing.
So what some of us would be doing here would be just exploring this ocean of possibilities and confront him with current moment feasibility and attractiveness and extract maybe new paradigms.
So not understanding game concepts(or not only) but creating new concepts by every means (well..), not necessarily based on old ones.

So yes, I guess nebulous ideas are welcome(in my view).Anything could prove useful to someone(not that it would)

Vallentin, I won't rate you down, I never do it. In terms of game design I only reward people for doing great or give them another chance to step forward. Like you said, a thing that says nothing to me can inspire another one, so let him rate you up.

Are you talking about getting inspired from reality to build new concepts? This supposes a strong understood of the world rules which is done after a LOT of reading, analysing and paying attention to surroundings. Even that, it takes great analytic skill to extract the core of your analysis because in games we don't simulate, we emulate the world laws. We build and simulate rather abstract processes to emulate the real world result.

If I read you corectly you say let's talk more and analyze every corner of inspiration from real world. I say let's see what we do know before doing that. Underline relations between continous concept (from real world) and finite concepts (from game world). My core design belief is that everything can be modelled with math formulae and templates. I'm one of those designers who dream of the days when the game design will have a "Grand Theory of Unification" as Einstein did for Physics. But the first step is to make it a science and work and advance with scientific methods. Right now everyone has oppinion and this is good. But it is not science.

I think we have to work hard for every brick to make it rock solid. I still think game design is still at his teenage with some schools reaching an early maturity. At this moment we are learning game design as, in old times, an apprentice was learning blacksmithing from his master. Stealing. But great blacksmith skill can be figured out to a sequence of basic actions and restrictions. I'm not talking about limiting creativity but refining it, learning when our work is going to go somewhere or is a blocked road.

I think everyone here on this forum can put a word to a Game Design Vocabulary.

I talked a lot and not very ontopic but it is my vision about what I'm looking on this forum. And... creativity is combining old rules in a new way to achieve the goal. But you have to know the rules and be able to farsee the results.

I have a slight different opinion than you..
first we only operate with concept..that is we cannot escape concept when we are exchanging information(this is a nice blow against my own opinions as presented before or so it may seem but...).The nice side is no concept is valid unless it has a meaning: it could be the direct abstractization of experiences in the world-a result of experience- we live or it could be a special construct involving a special experience-the experience of working with abstract concepts-a result of introspection.(or in-between)
First thing to notice is this: to have this to operate, you first need the basics. The basics for the computer games come from experience:as i said from gameplay and designing and testing mentally(it is a shortcut).So game designing experience is not emulating real world situation (see 5 in a row) is just having new ideas.Who knows what other fun(key word in gaming) ideas may stay around the corner.To prematurely start categorize and impose a rigid structure, is in my opinion profoundly wrong.Game design is in my view more of an art now(not many rules) as opposed to game programming, which tends to be a science.
I believe it is profitable for science to be built using rules, and for art to build using imagination and/or other methods.
So to make one story short, there should be no bounds for creation of new ideas, while refining should not be forbidden, but creating a meta-structure to express the rules by which we can add ideas to game design is momentarily counter-productive(it may hide us interesting new views and ideas) as the field has not been studied by far.

There may be some rules to express the ideas, but the ideas in art must stay free.Of course we can conceptualize what we have, but this should not limit new ideas to appear(and appearing may or may not benefit from rigid structuralization)

Original post by Sneftel

Quote:

Original post by sinx ...I hated GTA and Halo 2 and FarCry and World of Warcraft and Deus Ex and Max Payne and Half-Life 2 and God of War and Psychonauts and Call of Duty and Zelda and Ninja Gaiden and Prince of Persia and Kingdom Hearts and Mario Kart and Metal Gear Solid and Metroid Prime and Quake....

are you being sarcastic or did you stumble onto the wrong site?

can't people be dreamers?.. there is no reason to shun that kind of thinking, ..just because people like to get a bit glossy eyed and hope for making some ridiculous game idea, its what they enjoy and with time these "17 year old dude"s will come back down to reality a bit because by doing all this thinking and brainstorming they are learning what is effective and what isn't effective... ever been to a hl2 mod forum?

Hey, some of the dreamers are over 27.I just enjoy dreaming and sharing my dreams.When I have the will and time I like putting them into practice

its also that when i read game design ideas i feel that its not a game design idea is more like abstract philosophy themed on game design.

this is the sort of thing that makes me go pheewwww is that a game design or someone is really impressed by their college classes ?

Quote:

What about the idea that concept may be abstractization of real life(read practice) related information(be it directly given by stimuli or by combining other concepts-) what I mean there would be no abstract game concept until we figured out what could be doen with a computer in terms of programming and playing. So what some of us would be doing here would be just exploring this ocean of possibilities and confront him with current moment feasibility and attractiveness and extract maybe new paradigms. So not understanding game concepts(or not only) but creating new concepts by every means (well..), not necessarily based on old ones.

its not "practical and applicable" thinking.... i dont want to explore an ocean of possibilities and feasibilities to extract new paradigms ! hehe i want to develope a game.

dont get me wrong.. i understand what the user wrote but this kind of talk doest sound practical at all... if i was going to pass on a design document with this kind of sentences in it to programmers and artists they would probably reply " wtf mate haha !?!?? what exactly do you want us to do !??!? "

anyway... maybe its part of the learning process of designing a document ? making it clear and keeping the talk "practical" ? illiminated the speudo philosophy and all that.

[Edited by - sinx on March 30, 2006 6:08:59 AM]

That was a comment on another posted reply..I do not write only this pseudo-philosophy.It was just smth.in the line I see posting new ideas..
Bottom line is maybe someone's posted idea needs refining, maybe not and/or it may seem a bit off.But there could be one to answer the challenge and continue the work from there.

Conclusion:I agree with posting incomplete, apparently unfeasible ideas(I may not agree with the content however, everyone has his own tastes) all because what I have just said.
Feel free to contradict me.

I see two relevant aspects that should be learnt in gd:
1. the game design theory (here belong extracting or analysing general concepts - most of work around)
2. the knowledge of writing a design document.

The first point is a continous improvement for every designer. There you discover the rules that make a game mechanic interesting.

The second point is the communication hub to programmers. Poorly defined "stories" always lead to a poor results. It IS the designer's task to clearly define objects' behaviors, interractions and properties if you don't want to say at the first running demo something like "What is this? This should move like that! Where is that button? I think the game needs a lot more work to fit what I have in head". This is what many people around should learn before comming with ideas like "I have a extraordinary idea for a game" and write null valuable information. NULL! In fact those people have no idea about theory nor GDD. They must accept it and, if they really want to MAKE SOMETHING, hit the ground and start writing GD documents, more complex with each iteration. Writing a good GD makes the game "buildable". Using good concepts in that design makes the game interesting.

I think people should focus on efficient communication working in parallel their improvement upon theory skills. This should be made more obvious on these threads. Designers are not allowed to be lazzy like most players are. They should work for results.

Don't get me wrong, I am only trying to figure out a development direction.