Game Design: Lost in the Shuffle

WotC's Magic site posted a selection today from Richard Garfield's old Duelist column, Lost in the Shuffle, predominantly about general game design. Always thought-provoking stuff, it was one of my favourite parts of that magazine.

As a sidenote, one of the things Richard and Skaff Elias were up to recently was Spectromancer, an online card game mentioned on Penny Arcade the other week. I've been meaning to check it out for a while but haven't got round to it.

How to design a game

I'll spare you the pain of trying to find anything via the impenetrable Gleemax interface. My favourite game design ninja, Brian Tinsman strikes again with a series on how to design a game.

• Part 1.


• Part 2.


• Part 3.

Mostly more relevant to meatspace game design than computer games although at the end of the day, both have the same primary aim: provide entertainment for players. Pay particular attention to the sections on emotional rewards - this is a really key area I don't think most designers think about in such concrete terms.

Game Design: Making Games More Fun

Alright, it's plug time. Go read this post on how to make games more fun in the design stage. Sadly, right now the Gleemax site is pretty horrific, as you might expect from Wizards' rather lacking IT expertise. Hopefully they'll make it better in due course.

Full disclosure: Brian Tinsman is a good friend of mine. He's worked on a ton of games in the hobby space at this point - oh, and his book on game design is pretty good too.