The best way to approach any task is for me to sit down and do it.
In the case of design, it is very often a question of starting from writing.
Whatever you have to do, write first. Write everything, do not look around for tutorials and books on how to do the thing.
Structure your task by writing, and only after do your research. It’s better if you write with your hands.
We need to write to do the best job. It is perhaps the most important quality of a professional.
Talent in a certain specialty is something difficult to measure. It depends on a person’s natural aptitudes, but also and above all on the context in which they can be expressed.
Very often I read job offers to find “talent”. I am convinced that in most of them there is something empty behind them. Each of us has its own characteristics and abilities. As we face new challenges in new environments, these characteristics are sought and we learn new skills. If we are in the right place and have enough maturity, we could shine. Contribute a great deal to the task, project or mission that has been entrusted to us.
This does not mean that transported to a new context we will have the same performance. I have seen countless times people considered champions of a sports team fail to achieve the same results on a new team.
Is it perhaps that that person has no talent? Is it possible to forget the talent?
Certainly some characteristics can be compromised over time. Elite players will hardly be able to surprise fans beyond a certain age. In a new context, however, they will be able to offer other qualities.
It would be more intellectually honest to announce that we are looking for the person who knows how to move in contexts like ours. Making the effort of defining well that context, first. That way, no one can feel like they’re not talented, which is generally never the case.
I was in a conversation, one of these groups where tons of people are discussing game development. The founder of a local company says he opened his game as a beta. He invited some streamers to let them try the title. These streamers then left a vote. He stated that it was a success, the game had a high rating.
To me, it all led back to a single characteristic of the speaker: vanity. When you have a product in development, you have to challenge your assumptions. Especially if you want this product to be a real success. There’s no point in inviting people, putting them at ease, and asking them if they liked it. Probably some bias you have will be confirmed, some others will not. The more inexperienced part of the team will feel satisfied, the team will be treated well in the next few days. The boss is happy, everyone is happy.
Then comes the weight of reality, law of gravity. They don’t play your game, even for free. You can not recover the investment. You may need to make some staff cuts. You will still declare “yet we tested the game a thousand times and they said it was a good game”.
By asking the right questions. Believing in a product and betting on its success is very positive. However, it must be done with caution.
This is my advice. Escape from vanity metrics.
My mission.
This is day two since the big decision. Yesterday I published a banner. Today I have another claim better suited to online communication.
I want to tell you a little about my vision. When analyzing the target audience of a game, first of all we have to find the right fantasy to meet. Fantasy is the aspirational aspect of the game. Being a juggler, traveling the whole world, traveling through space. Some fantasy can be abstract. Think of Candy Crush Saga, which offers the fantasy of ordering an open box of sweets. Or Clash Royale where the fantasy is to dominate the opponent.
It’s about understanding people’s dreams and desires to resonate with them on a deep level. And it’s not something abstract. I have developed a very practical method to do it. My secret sauce that makes me have happy customers all over the world.
A compelling fantasy helps create more engaging experiences. And this translates into concrete numbers. Two KPIs that measure the result of a good strategy of this type:
It is a question of carrying out a qualitative research of the gaming market aimed at:
The process takes the form of deliverables that vary from a simple power-point to playable prototypes. Passing through spreadsheets, which are the most used tool by game designers. I design concrete levels in Unity and craft narratives using the most common tools.
I truly believe in this vision and I am pleased to share it with you readers. Wish me luck!
From today the domain sentendo.agency redirects to this blog. From today, I have decided that I will stop freelancing while also looking for a position in companies. I believe that company selection processes discard people like me. I will not leave that door opened anymore. Too much time wasted in false hopes of finding the best project ever. The best project ever in my case is myself.
Sentendo was the name of my first startup that failed to get the right results. Now I have more experience and another vision. Today I work with clients all over the world and I have found my balance.
In Italian, Sentendo means at the same time hearing and feeling. I really like this expression, I always have. I abandoned the project years ago, but after seeing that it still resonates I decided to go back on my steps.
My added value is that I put a lot of focus on fantasy and storytelling, the foundations of any great video game to me. In the sector where I work the most, which is games as a service, this fundamental perspective is very often lost. I have developed a method and tools over the years that allow me to effectively shift focus to these key steps. With real and measurable results.
I also intend to help educated people to enter the industry as juniors. I had an idea that I presented to a couple of realities and it seems that I can activate. At the moment I’m dedicating myself to making a 10-minute video game that won’t be sold anywhere. I hope to tell you more soon.
Gambling games focus their designs on feedback and effects.
Each time the player presses that button:
– is spending some money
– is hoping to receive an award
– is expecting a show.
The game design of gambling games focuses on
1. visual effects: animations, particles, overlays, …
2. fonts: very important to see the numbers grow with monospace fonts
3. the sounds and lights of the machines.
Obviously, the heart of the game is the statistical system. However, what is learned from gambling applies to various games.
After having worked for some time in gambling, the Italian developer Luca Galante created a game that inherits a lot from the chip-eating machines. He builds a business around that and wins a BAFTA, beating the likes of God of War: Ragnarok. The game is Vampire Survivors, an indie hero with a gambling soul.
SEGA SAMMY HOLDINGS INC. is composed of various business branches. The main one, as far as I know, is pachinko games. A type of gambling game popular in Japan where balls are thrown into the playing space and can hit variable objectives, which can be converted into money thanks to a legislative vacuum.
Curiously, they recently acquired Rovio Entertainment Corporation, whose main service is a series of games where you shoot rounded birds with a slingshot aiming to hit goals and score points…
(I know it has nothing to do with the rational point of view of the business. But flying balls can be better understood by those dedicated to producing ball-launching machines, right?)
You learn a lot from gambling!
In these times of automation and cost-cutting, one of the most important things for me is to develop my own special sauce.
That thing that no one can imitate, characterizes and distinguishes me. My secret to bringing value to the clients I work for. Truly quantifiable value.
The best game design book in the world (The Art of Game Design by Jesse Shell, of course) starts with a great lesson on inspiration: Look everywhere else.
In the story there is a gathering of conjurers, one catches the attention of the protagonist who asks him how he can be so original. The magician explains that he tries to look outside his own world and import things from other contexts.
It’s a way of making your own special sauce. I’ve been following this suggestion for years. One of the places I look as a game designer is marketing, specifically the world of UA.
Matej with his content helps me to have better ingredients to put into my special sauce. You should read it too!
When studying a game it is also good to do it by reading people’s reviews.
In the case of mobile games, reviews are very often driven by two factors:
When analyzing the reviews of a game (but also of a product on an e-store in general), I always filter for the average rating and above the average. For example, three and four-star reviews.
In fact, people who leave intermediate values usually leave more detailed comments. They belong to that part of Internet users that are a little less superficial. People who think things through a little more. The best candidates to give quality feedback!
The very fact of choosing to work in a specific sector exposes us to many possibilities.
The video game is one of the businesses where those who work are also customers of this type of product. This exposes you to so many things, some can hurt very much.
So how did I get past the 7-year lifespan average in this industry, then? Thinking about it, there is a mix of a few merits and many things that have been given to me. Things a person can’t control.
An important step is to think in the space of possibilities.
Something so dear to us designers is also present in our lives.
– if I’m developing a game there is a possibility of making a big hit. But there is also the possibility of failing to finish the game, or not getting enough profits.
– if I’m sending resumes around, there is a possibility of getting a job. But there is also the possibility of receiving a lot of rejections and not being able to get any fits for a while.
When anything happens it is because there was a possibility that it would happen.
Knowing this, instead of thinking of ourselves as characters in a story, we can look at ourselves as a field where stories happen.
What if we look at ourselves as a space of possibilities?
I am not a pawn, a knight, or a rook. I’m not even the queen.
Maybe I can start thinking I’m the game board, where various movements can happen in sequence.
Accept things as they are and, when a match ends (as it always does), just let another start. Always.
(Photo from 2007, my first GameCon fair in Naples. We were presenting a series of arcade games. I was scripting those games in Lua, on a Linux system. The one in the photo combined puzzle match with soccer)
I work as freelancer and consultant in this moment of my life. I also feel the need of building something mine, since the market right now is pretty average. More details in this video:
So I am fantasizing about building my own company or having my own team someday. Some wise man says that I should start from the vision, which is like the utopic preview of the World once my company has success.
Well, that is my vision: our Players will remember our games forever.
Simple and clear. Somehow inspired by the Supercell vision: to create great games that as many people as possible play for years and that are remembered forever.
But without the “play for years” thing. I don’t think it matters anymore, I don’t believe that it’s possible with this average content storm we are living right now. Storm that is not going to end soon.
Plus, I do believe that looking for extreme growth is frustrating and leads to the creation of attention traps, not games.
Having said that, I would look for just game designers at my company. I mean, of course we would need artists, developers and so on. But I would always look for people with the special attention to the details that a good game should have to be unforgettable.
We are game designers
What are we not?
