Industry Research Week 1: Game Designer Roles

13/09/21

The role of a game designer is one that fits within the many aspects of video game development and it focuses mainly on creativity and design that results in producing a game for enjoyment and/or educational purposes. It entails, for example, the development of narrative that is engaging, characters that are interesting, goals that are achievable, as well as rules and challenges that guide interactions with characters, players or objects. A game designer is the person who is responsible for bringing a game to life and who usually fulfils the combined roles of writer, artist and programmer. Troy Dunniway is a AAA game designer with many years of experience behind him. In an interview with Nadia Stefyn on CGSpectrum, he states, "It's a multidisciplinary job that often requires you to understand a little of everything. It's not just about playing games and having ideas. You need to not only understand how to apply your ideas into many different, and often conflicting, areas of game design; you must also understand HOW to design, WHAT to design, WHEN to design each feature, and WHY you are designing what you are designing."

Ever since I started my undergraduate degree programme, I always believed that this would be the ideal role for me, which was reinforced even further when I started my postgraduate degree programme at master’s level. This was when I started to develop a more in-depth understanding of what is required in order to be become an excellent game designer. By conducting research on local studios, I found Rare that is based in the UK and by investigating international studios, I found Square Enix based in Canada. Both studios are recruiting game designers and have a similar overlap in terms of what they are looking for.

-Imagination

Having a vivid imagination, which is brimming with ideas that you can take from conception, through prototyping and into production, is perhaps the most important thing that a game designer must have in order to create memorable experiences. For a game designer, the combination of having immense creativity and an active imagination is essential. Creativity can be defined as the ability to bring fresh and inventive ideas into reality, as well as the ability to perceive the world in innovative ways, to discover hidden patterns, to link seemingly unconnected phenomena and to produce solutions.

-Team Player

Being in a team with other game designers requires an open mind, a listening ear and a considered voice. The more effectively I collaborate with others, the more successful the development team will be in meeting its objectives. Employees are frequently required to cooperate or work with others to achieve tasks and complete projects, by having experience in collaboration skills, it will greatly enhance my participation in a team.

-Problem Solving

It is always very important for a game designer to prepare, as best as possible, for the unknown. Creating new experiences means tackling challenges that I may not have encountered before. The skill of solving complex problems in game design is imperative to create lasting experiences and, as in the point above, working as a team in synergy with one another for the purpose of solving problems, goes a long way to make the development of a game as smooth a task as possible.

-Understanding Players

It is key to fully understand the types of players to be targeted towards specific types of games. This includes realising their motivations and the impact of the different features of a game on their emotions. Having an excellent understanding of the target market segment is also important, as is keeping an active watch over direct or indirect competitors. It is every game designer’s goal to create a game that is appealing to the masses. Coming up with scenarios, experimenting with them, implementing them, and then finally testing them on subjects with different levels of skill and styles of play is vital to creating a game. It is necessary also to survey as wide as possible, to obtain and analyse as much data as possible, and to make the most refined product as possible in order to fully understand players.