Friday, April 8, 2011

Best Game Designing Courses Conclusion...

A bout of 'Man Flu' got me down for much more time than I had allotted for it. And you had to wait for a really long time to find the answers for the question I had raised a few days back. But still, on the Friday evening, I feel good enough to edit/add to the post that I had already completed.

Again, if you haven't read the previous post, you can refer to it here.

IN the previous article we discussed how game design courses, diplomas and degrees will help you in spending your mom and dad's hard earned money more than anything else. With that the question arises as to how you are going to learn game design and become a true game designer. I have made a few observations and I am not doing bad as a game designer so might as well have a look.

Dumbledore told Harry Potter that what really makes Harry match up to the Dark Lord and defeat his powers is his ability to 'Love.' ;) .(LOL) Rightly, Potter was disappointed by that answer. He's a wizard for Merlin's sake and when he expected some adrenaline pumping words like 'the chosen one' the 'legendary dueler' or 'the gifted one', all he got was 'His ability to love?' Shucks!

And although my answers are not going to be AS disappointing as Dumbledore's, the answers to your questions lie with you. I will just help you discover them. Here we go...




Keep your eyes open (or Exposure)
Remember that it doesn't matter what formal education you have undergone. You can be a lawyer, a doctor, an engineer, a farmer, a shepherd or pretty much anybody. What really matters is 'keeping your eyes open' and observing the world around you. The best solutions for your game design problems would not be offered by bookish knowledge but how well you have observed (various) things till now. I have stopped the count of the times where this off hand knowledge has helped me during designing games. It doesn't matter if you just like to watch movies. But if you have kept your eyes open to see how the screen play is paced or how good or bad the cinematography is, or how well or bad is the movie edited, you have already gained something out of it.


Know what you are best at
Not everyone is made alike and while you might be weak at something, there must be a definite strength as well. For a good game designer, it is very important to know what he can be best at. Know that strength and see how you can optimally make use of that strength in your game design career.

What new can you bring to the table
As a game designer, you will most probably work with a team of game designers and if you are copies of each other, there's nothing good to be gained out of it. In a team of 5 designers, one is good at game-play the other one at mechanics a third one is a balancing expert the fourth one only cares about level designs and the fifth one is a critic fresh out of QA appears to be a much potent combination where each of the five designers can learn something different from the other. If you work in such a team, it will be an awesome learning experience.


Learn from the ones who have been there and done that
(I won't explain this. It cannot be made any simpler than that)


Find your source of inspiration
This is the latest addition and which I realized recently (it's a constant learning process, after all) that the source of my inspiration is my daughter (You will often find mentions of her in my articles). She gives me all sorts of lessons everyday without her knowing about it . The important point is, for you to realize what or who inspires you and what are you learning from them and most importantly that you are learning from them.

4 comments:

Sirisha said...

Wonderful structuring of sentences..it looked more like a flow this time :) and Vevi hain toh hit hain!

avinashblog said...

all right..few more grt tips...worth the wait..

Poornima Seetharaman said...

Real nice! I was gonna bug you about the delay, but realized there has to be a reason :)

And I totally agree with Sirisha's comments! :D

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