Designer

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    • I'm much more interested in game design than I am programming. I AM good at programming, though, learning it in college (now a senior and through most of the curriculum for CS) and through a couple of extra books. I learn very quickly, always hand things in on time or earlier (even when NOBODY else does), and tend to be at the top of my class (and usually explaining concepts to others as best I can).

      I'm not the "artsy" type, I guess, though I do my own art for my webpages. I can't draw for shit, but I'm such a nitpicker that when I'm done, it usually looks decent, assuming I have something to go off of.

      The questions is (and it goes out to everyone, not necessarily Mike, though he seems in the best position to answer it), what do companies look for in game designers? What should I do to try to get there?

      Before I learned programming, I considered it a "necessary evil" on the road to game design, but after actually programming, I have to say that I enjoy it for its own sake much more than I imagined. However, its the structures of the program that really gets me going, and think that may help me in designing games. Like most of you, I'm sure, I don't ever feel truly comfortable without some sort of gaming device in my hands, whether its a controll or a mouse/keyboard.

      I already have a couple of games designed that I'm probably going to make soon. One is very original, and the other is more of a unique business model for an established type. When one's done, maybe I'll (A) make sure I link it, and (B), give all of the regular frequenters of this message board lifetime subcriptions (if I make the pay version).

      There's a lot of junk in this message, isn't there? Oh well.
      -Larrik Jaerico

      www.LarrikJ.com
    • RE: Designer

      Please anyone correct me if i'm wrong, but what i've always read is that companies are looking for something sorta unique, something different. Putting together a portfolio of the things you have accomplished. If you show them you not only have ideas, and are able to put them together well, along with being able to program.
      It always seemed to come ddown to you have to make yourself stick out.

      Sorry, i guess that was a little non-descript, but it's about as much as i know.
      Wort wort wort.

      The post was edited 1 time, last by Kaimera ().

    • RE: Designer

      "Designer" is a title than can mean anything from "game visionary" to "level builder" to "data monkey" - and no game company gives this title in a standard way.

      "Data monkey" is something that any intelligent person can do - it usually involves wrangling tons of data, culling and managing files, and things like that.

      "Level builder" is a skilled position - someone who is active in the Mod community, and is critically acclaimed, has the right skills for that.

      "Game visionary" is a truly sought after, but rarely given, position - you'll be in the circles of some of the most revered people in the games industry like Richard Garriott, Warren Spector, and Will Wright.

      In any of these jobs, you must always show your capabilities before you are actually awarded the position - the job is so hard to define that hiring managers tend to "know it when they see it." Just knowing how to play with Unreal's latest level editor isn't enough - you have to know how to create "fun" for other people. That's harder than you think.

      If you want to know if you've got the chops - go create something, and see if people have fun with it. If you can do that consistently, you've got the skills. You've also got something you can show to the game industry - if it's really all that good you'll get your foot in the door.
      Mr.Mike
      Author, Programmer, Brewer, Patriot
    • RE: Designer

      Seems like some good answers. Unfortunately, I never got too heavily into modding. I started making my house in HalfLife, got half done and stopped (I never expected HalfLife to continue to be so popular). Otherwise, that is all I have done, mostly because I didn't know anyone I could team up with to do it, and doing it myself was too big of a task.

      Oh yeah, I tried a few Duke3d/Shadow Warrior levels...I got real real far on a racetrack one, but the vehicles wouldn't work, and then the level got buggy mysteriously, and I quit.
      -Larrik Jaerico

      www.LarrikJ.com