This is something that occurred to me last night as I was working on some ad copy. I came up with my answers, but I thought it would be interesting to hear yours... For you, what is the toughest part of the job of designing games?
Is it the graphics, rules, production, marketing, testing, managing the projects, balancing the game, choosing what game to focus on, getting published...? What's the area that you look at as the toughest, scariest, or just plain most unpleasant?
I always start with a specific concept and work towards a simulation of that concept. There's a point when the excited energy of the original concept runs out and the drudgery of making the math (or whatever) work out that is a real bear to get through. I have a lot of games in the 'not quite playable' stage.
Once playable, the joy comes back and my favorite part of design is in the tweaking. That's where the improvements are apparent and payoff's big and immediate. I think a lot of unpublished games remain in this category eternally.
My graphic design background makes graphics another favorite part of the process, and I try to make my games heavily visual from the outset. I think that is something a lot of designers don't do because they think like designers rather than artists. That's not a bad thing, but the sort of game that results is different.
-Adam!!!
For me it's the rules writing. Ugh!! Not only getting it down on paper, but streamlining it so I don't have 20 pages of lawyer-speak. I tend to put in too much explanation and I find it's very difficult to pare things back to a reasonable length (as anyone who has read my GDW submissions can tell you)!
Coming in at a close second would be trying to get playtesters together to try out a prototype. I have some good friends that are willing to help me out, but I have felt at times that I was trying to get together to playtest more often than they wanted.
Being a graphic designer by trade, the visual aspect of the design process flows pretty smoothly. Sometimes just seeing the graphics come together makes the design process go a little easier.
Me too... making rules that are concise, clear, and brief is an absolute killer. I don't want to leave any holes so people wonder, but then I end up with this dense detail that just takes too much reading. That saps the fun even more when it's supposed to be a party game.
But that's not nearly as bad as getting playtesters - I just don't have anybody around here I can get a hold of to test something larger than 2 players. I even have games I've bought and never played because they take more players (Bang!)!
Coming from a different angle (as I always seem to do), getting to the final product stage seems to be the hardest part for me.
Being part of a small (and I mean small) start up game company, we tend to have a ton of decent ideas.
We have put tons of time into research, designing, writing, tweaking, prototyping, even have 4-10 ppl to playtest most of the time. But getting to that final published stage is always hard. For me, I want things to be really professional looking and it is just down hard (and expensive) to get to that point.
The other downside I seem to run into, coming up with original ideas. Even if it is just a theme/mechanic change, the game world covers so many areas and getting a theme that helps capture an audience of players is just as hard as designing a game.
Oh, did I mention that there is never enough time? I didn't! Silly me, there is NEVER enough time! :)
This is something that occurred to me last night as I was working on some ad copy. I came up with my answers, but I thought it would be interesting to hear yours... For you, what is the toughest part of the job of designing games?
Wow that's an easy one for me. It would have to be this website! Anyone want to buy one slightly used website? Works (for the most part) but needs repair. Comes preloaded with members. Headaches thrown in at no charge.
LOL.
-Darke
I know what my most difficult stage of designing games is. Getting to the point where they don't suck. The average playability at the start for each game has gone up, but I am still at stages where games just suck once you play them
Wow that's an easy one for me. It would have to be this website! Anyone want to buy one slightly used website? Works (for the most part) but needs repair. Comes preloaded with members. Headaches thrown in at no charge.
LOL.
-Darke
ROFL!!
I would take it, but I dont have a home for such a thing yet, sorry!
For me without question the absolute most difficult part in game creation is what the theme is for the game (or what the license will be).
Lots of people can do graphics.
There are lots of mechanics never done.
Everyone loves to play games.
But finding a theme that will be enjoyable -- therein lies the proverbial rub in my book.
For me the most difficult part is getting playtesters together. Really, this is my biggest hurdle. I can handle hours of thankless work. I can do the writing and re-writing. I can even handle (with a deep sigh) shelving games that just have no future. But getting a group together on the same day and time for a few hours is the challenge. That's why I currently have about two dozen completed, press-ready games that languish in a state of under-testedness. Yes, press ready. A huge waste of time, I know, if I need do do revising. But what else is there to do while waiting for the playtesters to get together?
 | Why a SpaceGame (part 2) (2) by X3M |
| Break My Game - "Never Seven" - Playtest Rules (5) by questccg |
 | DuelBotz: Sample New Card (19) by questccg |
| Designing from a personal pool of mechanism (18) by questccg |
| Comparing 2 new dice replace mechanics (2) by X3M |
| Happy New Year!!! (1) by questccg |
| How to design and balance a Rock-Paper-Scissor like mechanism (44) by X3M |
| Monster Keep — Retiring this Design (0) by questccg |
| Build your own [insert game genre here] (13) by larienna |
| Finalists Selected for the VHS Case Challenge (5) by larienna |
| 2025 New Year Sale at The Game Crafter (0) by The Game Crafter |
| Merry Christmas 2024! (0) by questccg |
| Winner Announced for "That Cool Stock Part Challenge" (0) by The Game Crafter |
| End of Year Playtest Event at The Game Crafter (0) by The Game Crafter |
| New Board Game Pieces: 13mm Wood Cubes (0) by The Game Crafter |
| Board Game Blueprint - New Episode Every Wednesday (24) by The Game Crafter |
| Madison Game Design Cabal (0) by The Game Crafter |
| PoA — Major shift back closer to FCE (13) by questccg |
| Voting Begins for "VHS Case Challenge" at The Game Crafter (0) by The Game Crafter |
| New Product: Large Quad-Fold Game Boards (0) by The Game Crafter |
| 2025 New Year Sale at The Game Crafter (0) by The Game Crafter |
| New Board Game Design Contest: ZSA Cards Challenge (0) by The Game Crafter |
| Black Friday Sale Ends Tonight (0) by The Game Crafter |
| The Shadow Of The Nokizaru Update! (0) by Jacob |
| Black Friday Sale at The Game Crafter (0) by The Game Crafter |
Is it the graphics, rules, production, marketing, testing, managing the projects, balancing the game, choosing what game to focus on, getting published...? What's the area that you look at as the toughest, scariest, or just plain most unpleasant?
Finding the time is the toughest part. Finding the time to sit down with some rules mechanics or theme and putting them together in a coherent manner. There is invariably something that comes up to pull me away from my creation right when I'm about to make progress. This leads to the subconscious association between creating games and being frustrated, I'm sure.
I've played lots of different games, and so have had exposure to lots of different mechanics and themes, lots of rules examples (good and bad), etc., so I don't find that part particularly difficult. One exception is possibly the part about polishing up an existing ruleset to be readable by someone other than myself. There is a lot of grunt work there that when I do it, I just want to get it over with. As a result, I tend to miss things. I have to remember to be patient, even though I'm "THIS CLOSE" to finishing.
Finally, graphics are not my strong suit. I have done some work in this area, but typically I don't tend to worry about it. I made the icons for my news game, but that was all the artwork I'll put into the prototype, for example. If the game gets picked up, someone competent will address the artwork concerns. :-)