The key to future employment in games dev is diversifying your skill set
Game Developer
MARCH 20, 2024
Game design professor Jeremy Bond shares how to prepare your students for the uncertain game industry future.
Understanding Difficulty in Game Design
Game Wisdom
MARCH 19, 2024
Understanding Difficulty in Game Design Josh Bycer josh@game-wisdom.com width="560" height="314" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" Continuing our discussion from soulslikes, for this key to games podcast episode, we’re talking about what it means to understand and breakdown difficulty.…
Game Design 
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Game devs talk design methods, system mechanics in design summit
Game Developer
MARCH 13, 2023
For anyone with an interest in game design, Polaris' developer summit has different articles covering various aspects of design development.
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EA rejection of Alice sequel marks end of American McGee’s game dev career
Game Developer
APRIL 10, 2023
With his Alice: Asylum pitch rejected by Electronic Arts, game designer American McGee is leaving the game industry entirely behind.
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A Shout-Out to The Board Game Design Course by Joe Slack
Brand Game Development
FEBRUARY 22, 2021
If you’re a long-time reader of this site, you likely know that my passion is helping people create their first board game. After all, that’s what the Start to Finish: Publish and Sell Your First Board Game series is all about. Click here to check out The Board Game Design Course.
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Sega, CWA agree on first major US game dev union contract
GamesIndustry.biz
MARCH 27, 2024
AEGIS calls this the first developer union contract at a major US games firm. It will provide various protections for the union unit across company divisions, including game design, translation, and marketing. Read more
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4 Lessons from Exit Games for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
JULY 13, 2020
Certainly, board game designers can learn a lot from well-designed escape rooms. Exit Games by Kosmos are the closest we can get to the authentic in-person experience right now. Exit Games by Kosmos are the closest we can get to the authentic in-person experience right now. Need help on your board game?
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The Clash of Choices in Game Design
Game Wisdom
MAY 25, 2023
The Clash of Choices in Game Design Josh Bycer josh@game-wisdom.com One of the many balancing acts of game design is the act of creating cool, interesting, unique, abilities for the player to use, and then balancing said abilities within the scope and design of your game.
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3 Signs It’s Time to Quit Working a Board Game Design Idea
Brand Game Development
MARCH 29, 2021
From time to time, I see board game creators on social media who have been working on the same design day-in, day-out for years on end. The first are people making a board game as a labor of love, who know they’re taking their sweet time on it, and they’re OK with it. Need help on your board game?
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4 Lessons from Imhotep for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
JUNE 1, 2020
In any case, we received this game as a gift from grandmother, who apparently has a really good eye for which hobby board game to buy! Naturally, we needed to set the game up and take a few photos to send to her, if nothing else. Need help on your board game? One of the elements of great game design is interaction.
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Top 7 Game Dev Myths Explored
DameDev.tv
DECEMBER 16, 2022
Have you ever questioned your ability to make a game? as we explore the top 7 game dev myths Laurie (Avocado Fire) joins Rick Davidson & Tim Ruswick* to discuss these 7 game dev myths and address any concerns that you have. Listen to the whole chat here: [link] and see below for all 7 game dev myths.
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Board Game Designer vs. Developer vs. Publisher
Brand Game Development
DECEMBER 17, 2018
Creating board games takes an enormous amount of time and effort. The simple fact is that there are a lot of distinct tasks that have to be handled to turn a game from an idea into reality. This is why I urge each new board game designer to share the workload , delegating tasks to a team instead of doing them all alone.
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Growing Indigenous worlds in games
GamesIndustry.biz
OCTOBER 25, 2023
Sign up for the GI Daily here to get the biggest news straight to your inbox Among the presentations in last month's Game Devs of Color Expo was Achimostawinan Games' talk on Growing Indigenous Worlds in Games, which explored the themes of reappropriation and combating stereotypes of creative works for Indigenous people.
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How To Know When to Pivot on Your Board Game Design
Brand Game Development
JUNE 29, 2020
A couple of months ago, I asked the readers of this blog to send in answers to the question “ what confuses you most about board game development ?” ” I got a lot of responses, and two of them were about knowing when to pivot during a game design project. Need help on your board game? Save your old work.
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How do you get (or work towards) a promotion as a game designer?
Ask a Game Dev
NOVEMBER 30, 2023
Getting a promotion in the game industry usually requires the designer to take two steps. This means taking on more difficult responsibilities and tasks, the sort that the mid or senior level devs are doing. In my experience, most promotions in a game design career don't happen internally.
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Make a Board Game in 28 Days: A Challenge by Brandon the Game Dev
Brand Game Development
FEBRUARY 1, 2021
Today, I have a challenge for you as a board game designer. I want to see you make a board game in 28 days. That’s why I’ve provided a 28-day game design challenge for you. Need help on your board game? Join my community of over 2,000 game developers, artists, and passionate creators.
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7 Lessons from Monopoly for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
MARCH 9, 2020
Monopoly: it’s one of the oldest board games in the store. It’s one of the top 10 best-selling board games. It’s also a terrible board game. When board gamers need a game to mercilessly mock , they look no further than Monopoly. Need help on your board game? Monopoly has a staggeringly low 4.4
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6 Reasons Escape Rooms Will Make You a Better Board Game Designer
Brand Game Development
NOVEMBER 25, 2019
Need help on your board game? Join my community of over 2,000 game developers, artists, and passionate creators. Escape Rooms will make you a better board game designer. With this in mind, here are six reasons I believe that Escape Rooms will make you a better board game designer.
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Rafif Kalantan’s mission to champion MENA and SWANA devs
GamesIndustry.biz
APRIL 9, 2024
Each year, the organisers of London Games Festival showcase the work of Black, Asian, and underrepresented games professionals working in the UK through the Ensemble initiative. Read more
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Korean indie dev Funnylocks “We made Unstoppable for a global audience”
PreMortem.Games
JANUARY 29, 2024
More and more South-Korean indie game developers take aim at the PC and console market. Set in a New York office building in the 1990’s, the game plays out as a action-filled mini series, including cutscenes that unravel the plot. “To Si-wooks’s deep passion for game development inspired Hee-sang to take a leap of faith.
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4 Lessons from Santorini for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
JANUARY 14, 2019
Santorini is a fantastic board game that came out about two years ago. In its heart, it’s an abstract strategy game that could have come from antiquity. It has been given the modern board game polish, though, with adorably cutesy art of Greek gods, and an incredibly photogenic set of stackable plastic components.
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Learning About Game Design in the Classroom
Game Wisdom
FEBRUARY 13, 2023
Learning About Game Design in the Classroom Josh Bycer josh@game-wisdom.com width="560" height="314" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" For this perceptive podcast, I’m talking with Jeremy Yanofsky who hosts the Engage Show to discuss what does teaching game design and using games in the classroom look like today.
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Final Factory by Never Games takes automation into space and adds bullet-hell
PreMortem.Games
APRIL 19, 2024
Final Factory blends factory building and spaceship design with RTS-style troop commanding and classic bullet-hell gameplay. Pretty impressive for a largely solo-developed game. “At At this stage the game is more like a cross between Factorio and Cosmoteer ”, explains Ryding.
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10 Elements of Good Game Design
Brand Game Development
FEBRUARY 17, 2020
When I was a neophyte game developer, I found an excellent article by Wizards of the Coast, creators of Magic: the Gathering , called Ten Things Every Game Needs. This two-part article was so influential in my initial design of War Co. This two-part article was so influential in my initial design of War Co. Constraints.
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20 New Year’s Resolutions for Board Game Devs in 2020
Brand Game Development
DECEMBER 30, 2019
Need help on your board game? Join my community of over 2,000 game developers, artists, and passionate creators. With that in mind, I want to help you come up with some New Year’s Resolutions of your own, ones specifically related to board game design. Create your first board game. Card games count, too!
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4 Lessons from Root for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
SEPTEMBER 16, 2019
Leder Games really nailed it when they came out with their board game Root in 2018. It’s broken into and remained within the Board Game Geek top 50. Need help on your board game? Need help on your board game? Join my community of over 2,000 game developers, artists, and passionate creators.
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4 Lessons from Sagrada for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
JANUARY 28, 2019
Sagrada is one of my recent favorite board games. It is fundamentally a pretty simple game, but it has a lot of really endearing qualities. It’s ultimately a puzzle game, but a very attractive one with some subtle elements that arise from it being a nearly perfect information game where players draw from the same draft pool.
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G’day GameDev. I am in my late 30’s and considering returning to school to study Game Design. I currently have no applicable/transferable knowledge, skills or experience and I will be 40 years old when I have finished my studies and looking to find my first job in the industry. Am I too late? Will I be wasting my time (and money) trying to enter the industry at that age?
Ask a Game Dev
FEBRUARY 28, 2024
Is doing game design professionally what you really want, or would doing game design as an amateur hobbyist be enough? Remember, getting an entry-level job in the game industry isn't the end of the road but the beginning. I'll tell you now that I never went to school for game design.
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4 Lessons from Twilight Struggle for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
SEPTEMBER 3, 2019
Twilight Struggle has been considered one of the best board games of all time. It’s been on the Board Game Geek Top 10 for as long as I can remember and for a while was the #1 game. No matter how you feel about it, there is a lot that new board game designers can learn from it. Need help on your board game?
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4 Lessons from Quacks of Quedlinburg for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
JANUARY 27, 2020
It has since remained a hot game on Board Game Geek and a perennial favorite in Pangea Games board game giveaways! So with that in mind, what can we learn from this award-winning board game with a silly name? Need help on your board game? Unfortunately, push-your-luck games can quickly become obnoxious.
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4 Lessons from Twilight Imperium for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
SEPTEMBER 30, 2019
Twilight Imperium is among the greatest board games of all time according to BoardGameGeek. Need help on your board game? Join my community of over 2,000 game developers, artists, and passionate creators. Nevertheless, there are great lessons we can learn from this game with even a casual analysis.
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4 Lessons from Ticket to Ride for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
FEBRUARY 11, 2019
Along with games like Catan and Pandemic , Ticket to Ride helped turn board gaming into the juggernaut of a hobby that we know and love today. It’s an elegant game that can be learned very quickly. Need help on your board game? Join my community of over 2,000 game developers, artists, and passionate creators.
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4 Lessons from Pandemic for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
JANUARY 21, 2019
It’s time to talk about Pandemic – one of the greatest games ever made. Pandemic is an evergreen game with a multitude of variants and legacy games. It’s also the first cooperative game for a lot of gamers. Need help on your board game? Can you hear that coughing? You know what I’ve noticed?
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5 Lessons from Catan for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
JANUARY 7, 2019
In 1995, the game formerly known as Settlers of Catan was nothing more than the obscure creation of designer Klaus Teuber. The board game market as we know it today did not exist yet. Catan was the first major hobby board game to come into existence. Need help on your board game? Need help on your board game?
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Game Design Fundamentals: Information Channels
Ask a Game Dev
DECEMBER 29, 2022
askagamedev : Whenever you play a game, you are constantly being fed information about the game’s state through your senses. As a designer, it’s extremely valuable to know exactly what ways information can be conveyed to the player at any given time. So what does this have to do with game design?
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4 Lessons from Paladins of the West Kingdom for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
NOVEMBER 11, 2019
In March of 2019, Paladins of the West Kingdom by Garphill Games raised nearly a million New Zealand dollars (around $600,000 USD) on Kickstarter. Ever since then, Paladins of the West Kingdom has been on the Board Game Geek Hotness list nearly every time I’ve checked. Need help on your board game?
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4 Lessons from Everdell for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
OCTOBER 28, 2019
Last year, Everdell by Starling Games raised nearly half a million dollars on Kickstarter. It has remained a popular board game since, regularly topping out the Board Game Geek Hotness and showing up multiple times as a giveaway prize in Pangea contests. Everdell is a worker placement, tableau-building board game.
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4 Lessons from Terraforming Mars for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
FEBRUARY 4, 2019
I am pleased to say that it is an absolutely fantastic game that’s worth purchasing. I consider this to really valuable for learning game design simply because there is so much going on. Need help on your board game? Join my community of over 2,000 game developers, artists, and passionate creators.
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4 Lessons from Dinosaur Island for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
OCTOBER 14, 2019
A couple of years ago, Dinosaur Island was a massively successful game. Even now, two years later, the game’s name has enough cultural cachet to lead to the most popular board game giveaway Pangea has ever sponsored. Need help on your board game? Take one good look at this game. Let’s be clear.
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4 Lessons from Spirit Island for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
JANUARY 13, 2020
That is by no means a small amount to raise, but what’s interesting is that Spirit Island has remained on the Board Game Geek Hotness list off and on for almost three years. Clearly, there is much more to this game than what immediately meets the eye. Need help on your board game? You’re next, agriculture games!).
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Jussi Kemppainen is exploring AI-assisted game development with Echoes of Somewhere
PreMortem.Games
AUGUST 30, 2023
With the discussions over the use of AI in game development raging on, Jussi-Petteri Kemppainen , Lead VFX Artist at Mainframe Industries and founder of Dinosaurs Are Better , spends his spare time to see what all the fuss really is about. AI affects game design The project’s trajectory shifted with the integration of AI tools. .
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4 Lessons from Azul for Aspiring Board Game Designers
Brand Game Development
FEBRUARY 18, 2019
Azul has taken the board game world by storm. Like Sagrada , it’s a gorgeous and approachable puzzle game with emergent complexity that becomes ever more apparent with more plays. It’s also, somehow, always trending on social media and Board Game Geek. Need help on your board game?
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A friend of mine wants to become a game designer without learning any other disciplines in game dev, he seems very sure this is possible but his confidence comes off as “idea guy” to me. I like thinking about design as well and how it could all fit together cohesively but I’m worried he’s setting himself up for failure by not learning another discipline to go along with it. Am I correct in this thought or am I being an jerk?
Ask a Game Dev
AUGUST 3, 2023
If he wants a career in AAA games, he will need specialized expertise. A level designer doesn't need to create the individual assets, but will need a rock-solid understanding of how the placement of objects and division of space can create places that are intuitive for players to navigate. I wish him (and you) the best of luck.
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Let’s say someone becomes a game developer, but realizes the gaming industry is not for them for whatever reason. What opportunities there for game developers, particularly designers, outside of the video game industry? I imagine one of them is your former job at the gambling industry.
Ask a Game Dev
DECEMBER 22, 2023
You are correct in that it is possible to transfer that body of knowledge over to the other gaming industry that is casino machines. Beyond that, here are some other roles that game design skills could transfer to. Tabletop, board, or card game design. It's still game design, just not in video games.
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