I usually like to talk about parts of games that are well designed, or how they could even be made better with simple improvements. But today, I’m going to critique one that I do not believe accomplished its design goals. I will also provide my solutions for the issues. Just before GDC 2019, Microsoft announced… Continue reading Game Critique: Microsoft Studio Stacker card game
Tag: game design
Games for School
I provide child care for a few families in my area, and recently one of the 5th grade kids was doing homework through a game. He told me it was algebra, and it mostly looked like fractions using sides of a die. It seemed that the goal was to drag a static die to the… Continue reading Games for School
Writing for tabletop RPGs
For Gen Con 2018, I was tasked with writing a guided mode for our game Apocrypha. Guided mode is very similar to any tabletop role playing game, just with the cards, and a guide leads the saints through the story by giving them omens when they take a turn (turn order is by player choice,… Continue reading Writing for tabletop RPGs
Design Challenge: Dragon Age II Level Design Spec Sheet
I decided to do a level design challenge last month in which I had to modify a level in an existing game and here's what I came up with. The attached image is how I would present my work to a team! I wanted the bulk of it to be easy to comprehend and be… Continue reading Design Challenge: Dragon Age II Level Design Spec Sheet
This weekend I gave a talk on tutorial design using rulebook writing techniques and tbh I've been too tired and sick to write up a post summarizing it, but have this picture of me talking with my hands about reference guides in games.
Caturday Blog
It's Saturday and it's been a very draining last few weeks. Please enjoy these pictures showing the rarely seen gamer side of my cat.
“To be useful, an item must be used.” – Francine Jay, The Joy of Less.
Something I like to think about when creating systems and content in games. This quote helps me when I'm feeling overwhelmed about all I want to do with my projects; I just need to think about the things that my players will find useful and enjoy. Don't confuse this for thinking of how games look… Continue reading “To be useful, an item must be used.” – Francine Jay, The Joy of Less.
