Skip to content

Tag: myself

Do you keep a gameplay journal?

Published by Paolo on 13/12/2021

Do you keep a handwritten journal for your gameplays? I think it is a fundamental part of my routine as a game designer.

We use everyday a lot of different tools, each one with its subscription models and stuff. But nothing can substitute a journal. On a journal you are alone with your inner self. In a journal you can identify clearly your personality. If you don’t keep a journal is super hard to not become a follower of trends and methods you don’t fully understand.

Do it now! Start a Gameplay Journal.

For every game you play and every time you play it, write a new entry down. What should you write? Well, it’s your journal. I can say you what I write down. This work in my own case.

First of all, I describe in detail everything that I remember. I describe without giving any opinion. “I like this, I don’t like that” is not really important. The important thing is what did I felt in any occasion.

When I am speaking about a new mechanic that I can identify, I sketch also a flow of its rules and how that works. I do it quickly, I don’t have to double check it and pass it to a developer. So that it’s just a way to train my quickness, somehow. I felt that I complete tasks at my day job way faster since I do that.

Finally, I try to reason on design choices and its audience. I also try to stress my assumptions imagining possible risks for the design approaches I find.

When you write down with your bare hands the brain makes connections that are not possible to make with a computer monitor writing with a keyboard. Keep use pen and paper, you will never regret it!

An honest and personal post about how I became a professional game designer

Published by Paolo on 07/12/2021

If you want to get a job as a game designer do the job, don’t look for it. You have to be already working as a game designer if you want to hope to being paid for that.

I remember when I was compulsively looking for a job sending resumes. Poor me.

“I sent 5 resumes today, I have done my job.”. That was my comfort zone.

Some job offer put “having participated in at least 5 projects from start to end”. Some other was more intrepid: “having participated in the complete development of a TOP250 grossing game”. The good old days of 2013!

Do the job everyday

I started, every single morning, waking up early. Having my shower and breakfast. Dressing up with my best clothes, putting my shoes and my clock on. Working all the day at my desk, at least 8 hour per day. Imagining I was going to my office. I discovered the superpowers that “faking it” enable. I started studying seriously from books at night before of going to bed.

I maintained a document with all the job offers and companies here in Barcelona. I studied their games and imagined to work on those. In fact, those games had already their players and their competitors.

Deconstruct games

Deconstructing games is a process mostly mechanic at start. Start from the simple screen flow, make a brickfile. Spot their competitors and do the same. You find a feature that some competitor has and the game you are studying doesn’t? You have your design task! Use what you learnt from books and step by step build your own design framework. This is your secret, in your method there is your value.

Probably those companies you are monitoring will never hire you. They are still looking for the “best talent”. A game designer who worked on successful games. The dream, the rockstar. Nevermind, it’s YOU that want to work as game designer. They are too busy in filtering out people like you. So don’t wait for a company to let you in. Just do it.

Find your people

Try to create and maintain meaningful connections in the industry. I created a meetup, the Barcelona Game Design Meetup. My intention was to join game designers also from other companies. I ignored their strict policies most of those company had, instead. I also ignored that often people working for those companies are NOT the most motivated persons. They just do their job. They work as game designers, but often they are not intimately designers. I met a lot of wannabies and a few professionals. Making connections is still very useful. I just enjoyed any opportunity to talk about game design. Any opportunity!

Why do you design games?

Published by Paolo on 06/12/2021

The other day I was listening to a YouTube video (yeah, listening) with 2 people that I consider industry experts talking about leadership in videogames.

One of the two quoted this sentence from Orson Welles:

“…in Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had five hundred years of democracy and peace. And what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.”

His point was that, as a leader, you shouldn’t try to create a peaceful environment. In fact, great things come out from hard times.

This post is not to enter in the center of the question. In fact, those persons are people with at least five years more experience than me. And in companies with great products where I dream working someday. So that for the sake of this post they are right.

But I ask myself: what do I want to do with my job?

Do I want to become a name like Leonardo or Michelangelo? Or do I want to create something that brings fun in every place it is placed, like a cuckoo clock?

My name is Paolo

Published by Paolo on 22/11/2021

My name is Paolo and I am a game designer. I live in Barcelona, ​​Spain.

I work as an employee for a company called Tangelo Games, where I am a senior game designer.

I also have a consulting business for small clients, I manage some projects and offer help on creative solutions.

Since the work has been growing a lot in recent months, I decided to start a blog to express myself. My insights, privileged moments of awareness.


I hope you can find some inspiration to make great games in these pages!

Feel free to contact me I am a pretty open person!