Skip to content

Month: September 2025

Cost of Duty

Published by Paolo on 30/09/2025

I was working on my game, Pawtners Case, when suddenly I experienced a surge in my workload. I was looking for funding, in fact, I was paying an outsourcing company mainly for the art and some blueprint implementation in Unreal Engine. I needed money to pay them, and extra help from external funds would have helped a lot.

The game was abandoned, but I still have the code in my repository and on my PC. Now I have more time, and I have to make a choice. I could leave it where it is, forever. Or I can pick it back up and continue its development.

I am writing a book on game design, thanks to Jettelly, and I am using Pawtners Case as a case study for my book. The book will focus on ideation of new games, one of the most overlooked stages in game development—and probably one of the most important, too.

Using my game as a study, I am tempted to seriously resume its development. However, another peak of work for others may come up, in which case I would have to abandon it again. Other opportunities would then be sacrificed in the name of duty.

Everything contributes to my growth as a person and as a professional, so in the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter after all. I continue to design games every single day; that’s all that counts. Still, every choice has a trade-off and a weight on my shoulders somehow. And time passes, and I know this won’t be forever.

To land down a vision

Published by Paolo on 29/09/2025

More often than not, a game designer’s job is to translate someone else’s vision, be it from a creative director, a product manager, or a client, into a concrete plan.

This means you have to create detailed proposals and present them to the team as if they were your own.

It’s common for a feature that has been proposed, discussed, and approved to be changed by a developer or even your boss just a few weeks later. The original plan is often sacrificed for faster execution.

When this happens, you meet again and discuss what changed, and someone in a senior position makes an executive call. That’s just how it works.

It’s said that Michelangelo used to make fake ‘final touches’ to his works so that his patrons could feel a sense of authorship. I don’t know if the story is true, but it makes perfect sense.

While game design is central to development, it’s an activity that involves the entire team. We, as game designers, are there to facilitate this process. Patience is key.