Nope, we are still talking about game design here. There are many times where you have to get your design ready for something and need to put in a lot of effort in a short amount of time. You may be preparing for a convention, to send your game to a publisher, to send your game to blind playtesters, or just have a gamenight coming up you need to prepare for. This week I want to talk about some of the benefits of a cram session, and how to create these for yourself, even if you don't have anything coming up.
I always thing of cram sessions as a negative thing, where you forget everything afterword.
That may be true for a school, but in game design they can be very productive. Some of the benefits of cram sessions include:
- Focused effort - You force yourself to think about the obstacles you are facing in your design. Also, you are carving out time to specifically work on those problems
- Time sensitivity - Even if it is a "fake deadline" it still forces you to sit in front of your prototype instead of the TV (or whatever other distraction)
- Streamlined solutions - I find that I will typically come up with much more streamlined (both component wise and gameplay wise) solutions when I need to get it done by the next day. If an idea seems too complicated I will couch it and try to come up with something easier or stick with my current way of doing things and work on something else in the game. If you can't come up with a simple solution, maybe you are looking at the wrong problem
- Small chunks - I won't try to fix the whole game at once. This will let me micro focus on one aspect of the game. "This week I am working on the items...next week I will handle character powers." First off it is easier (and better) to test one thing at a time. Second you will see your efforts paying off as your game comes together. Just like a lot of things in life, if you take them one small bit at a time they don't feel so big anymore
This is why I decided to do this post. I was finding that I didn't have any upcoming events, and all my time was getting filled up with other things. This would lead to my design projects getting pushed to the side. My wife and I decided (ok, it was her idea, and a great one) to give myself a design night. A night where Mike and I would get together and tackle a whatever we needed to. This has worked out great. Not only does it encourage us to work on the games on our own during the week, but also gives us a night to plan for. Cram for. Playtest for. And lets us get in a cram session once a week even if we don't get to the anything else during the week.
Lesson Learned?
Give yourself a game design night. One night you know you can focus on your games. Just try to solve one problem you are working with, or tweak one part of your game. You can either use the rest of the week to prototype and playtest it, or wait until the next week to do those things. If you schedule it, you can even start looking forward to it and plan around it. It will make those around you happier too as they can plan around your night. Cram sessions work, and they make your game better one step at a time.
What's Next?
That's it for this week, next week I am going to talk about special powers. Until then, I am Peter, keep designing great games.
This is a great idea. I don't think I've touched my prototype since WBC four weeks ago. Maybe this Thursday or Friday night I'll set aside for "design night."
ReplyDeleteMy wife does something like this for writing, except over a much longer timeframe. She does a two-week "fast draft" in which everything else get set aside while she works to her daily word-count goals over 14 days. It's very productive, but it definitely requires planning ahead. (Her next one is in October.) Can you imagine dedicating two weeks to game design?
Yea, that would be fun. Although with design work you might run out of ideas. The other part of the once a week thing I like is having the whole week to think about what I will be working on. It is passive thinking so it doesn't interfere with whatever else I am working on, but sometimes ideas just come to you. Then I really look forward to my design night so I can focus on them.
ReplyDeleteThere are pros and cons for doing your design night on a Friday. The positive is that you can stay up as late as you want and not really have to suffer through work the next day. The cons are about maintaining your schedule. It is hard to keep a Friday night free every week. And just like exercise once you fall off the horse for a while it is hard to get back on. Good luck to you Paul. There are 2 UnPubs coming up too so that will help with motivation.
That's a nice idea Peter, especially the "focus on one thing part".
ReplyDeleteMe and my wife love the Wrath of Ashardalon BG, but we thought it was too short. And WoTC doesn't like to create expansions for the game, so we set out doing our own work. We ported monsters from Descent, created more tactics for the monsters, new conditions, rebalanced some Items and create some more. When we finally set out to play, the game was unplayable. Too hard, the decisions didn't matter because we kept losing the same way everytime and really quickly. So what should have done was to add each "new" things separetely and test each one to see if it was balanced and fun.
Lesson learned!
Bakakyo,
ReplyDeleteI love your passion. At some points you are going to add too much at once, and need to dial it back. When you do, you can take the same approach. If you keep losing in the 2nd room to a spike track, nerf the spike trap. See if you get further. See what breaks next. Sometimes the spike trap isn't the problem, it is all the stuff that happened before. Making small changes sometimes leads to big results. I can't tell you how many times I have been ready to scrap an idea just before the breakthrough.
PS - It is so cool that your wife is taking this journey with you. Games are a great way to bond with someone, but design (even if it is a variant) is a fantastic way to bond with someone. My design partner Mike and I have become very close in just a few years. I talk with him more than I talk with some of my friends I have had forever. It is a very cool way to build relationships.