Introduction Swipe This Book! 1

Some Possible Reasons You Picked Up Swipe This! 2

Who is This Book For? 2
? ? ? ? ?
Working Video Game Professionals 3

Future Video Game Designers 4

Students of Game Design 5

People Who Love Video Games 6

Why Another Book on Game Design? 7

What You Won’t Find in This Book 7

Very Deep Theory 8

The Complete History of Video Games 8

How to Program Video Games 9

How to Create Video Game Art 9

Lameness 9

What You Will Find in This Book 9

Practical Information 10

Good News! 11

Chapter 1 Hardware Wars 13

Touch and Go! 18

More Things to Be Touchy About 20

Game On! 21

Destroy All Humans! 28

Developer Interview 1 Paul O’Connor 29

Chapter 2 Clown-On-A-Unicycle 33

Let’s Get High (Concept) 35

Yes, But is It a Game? 39

Really Quick Guide to the One-Sheet 40

Form Follows Function 41

Function Follows Form 42

Length Matters 43

The Average Play Session Will Last 2 to 5 Minutes 45

The Overall Game Length Should Only Be a Few Hours 45

Develop Gameplay in Terms of Depth, Not Length 48

Emphasize Repeatability Over Content 48

Create Natural Play Breaks Over the Course of the Game 49

Emergent Eschmergent 49

I Want to Be Rich and Powerful 51

Game Design Spotlight 1 Fruit Ninja HD 53

Chapter 3 Finger Fu! 57

The Fabulous Folio of Facile Fingering 60

You Only Have Two (to Four) Fingers 68

Hands Solo 70

Virtual Joysticks Suck … or Do They? 75

Hands Get Their Revenge 77

Developer Interview 2 Andy Ashcraft 81

Chapter 4 GenreBusters 85

Making a Name 91

Games Need Story … or Do They? 94

Unreliable Narrators 106

Game Design Spotlight 2 Helsing’s Fire 107

Chapter 5 Puzzlings 111

Superior Logic 115

The Problem with Math 118

Don’t Be Difficult 121

Physics: It’s for the Birds 123

Let’s Get Wet 127

Do You See What I See? 128

Hiding in Plain Sight 131

Word Up 133

And the Solution is … 135

Developer Interview 3 Erin Reynolds 137

Chapter 6 Arcade Crazy 141

The “Good Ol’ Days” 143

Games? I’ll Give You Games! 147

A-mazing Games 151

Cuteness Counts 152

The First Rule of Fighting Games … 155

Get on the Ball 159

Baby, You Can Drive My iPhone 162

Beat It, Kid 165

Everything New is Old Again 166

Game Design Spotlight 3 Where’s My Water? 171

Chapter 7 Action Guy 175

Think Like an Artist 177

The Metrics System 179

Didn’t We Already Talk about Character? 182

World Building for Fun and Profit 183

What’s with All the Zombies? 189

How to Design an Enemy in Six Easy Steps 190

Fighting for Cash and Glory! 194

Pain, Pain, Go Away, Come Again Some Other Day 201

Putting the “Ack” in “Feedback15” 202

The Only Good Player is a Dead One 203

Developer Interview 4 Blade Olsen 205

Chapter 8 DoodleCat 209

Get to the Point 210

Finger Pointers 212

The Artist’s Way 214

A Line on Fun 217

Meow Meow Meow 220

Game Design Spotlight 4 Jetpack Joyride 223

Chapter 9 Casual Fryday 227

Board Games 229

Card Games 232

Real Time Strategy Games 234

How to Create a Tech Tree 236

Tower Defense Games 238

God Games 241

Sports Games 246

RPGs and MORPGs 249

The Crown Jewel of Casual 253

To Clone or Not to Clone? 255

Developer Interview 5 Sam Rosenthal 257

Chapter 10 The New Genres 261

Micro-games 263

Gesture Games 264

The Art of Art 266

Tilt Games 268

Endless Runners 269

Augmented Reality 276

Now is the Future! 280

Game Design Spotlight 5 No, Human 281

Developer Interview 6 Andy Reeves 285

Chapter 11 Make Your Own Star Wars?289

How to Start 292

Diversion #1: How to Storyboard Gameplay 293

Diversion #2: A Word About Title Screens 296

Team Building 101 300

Sound Advice 304

The Three -ions 305

Diversion #3: Where to Find Teammates 305

RadGame-GDDFirstDraft-20XX0614-SR.doc 308

Production Pointers 309

The Topic No One Likes Talking About 310

Ship It! 314

Marketing Your Game 315

You Can Make a Game, But Can You Do the Paperwork? (Submitting Your Game) 317

Diversion #4: How to Design an Icon 318

Now Where Were We? 320

Post-Release Strategies 320

What to Do for an Encore? 321

Game Design Spotlight 6 Angry Birds 323

App-pendix 1 The Class of 2008 329

Arcade Games 329

Breaker Games 331

Classic Games 332

Puzzle Games 333

Racing Games 335

Rolling Games 335

The Others 336

App-pendix 2 Touchscreen Template 337

App-pendix 3 Gameplay Storyboarding Template 339

App-pendix 4 The Game Designer’s Checklist 341

Afterword 343

Index 345