2. Blue sky thinking. Brainstorming ; Automatism ; Other blue sky thinking techniques ; Designers, spreadsheets, and the power of the list
3. Research. Research on the internet ; Image research ; Don't neglect the library ; Field trips ; Interviews ; Shadowing ; Research notes
4. Game prototyping: an overview. Game mechanics, verbs, and player activities ; Three kinds of prototyping ; Every game developer is a game designer
5. Making a digital game prototype. Choosing and using a game engine ; Choosing an operating system and a hardware platform ; Build your prototype as a toy, not a game ; The importance of sound for digital game prototypes
Playtesting and iterating on a digital prototype ; How many digital prototypes should we make? ; When to follow where a prototype leads ; Ideation deliverable: Prototype builds ; Masterpiece syndrome ; The emotional side of prototype playtests
6. Communication as a game design skill. Communication, collaboration, leadership, and conflict ; The most basic communication skills ; Sandwiching ; Respect, trust, and consent
7. Project goals. Experience goals ; Writing down your experience goals ; Design goals ; Taken together, experience goals and design goals give us our project goals ; Repertoire and growth ; Considering the possible audience for our game ; Becoming a developer for a specialized game platform ; Advice about forming your project goals
8. The end of ideation. How long should the ideation phase last? ; Some final advice about prototyping ; A summary of the ideation deliverables
Designing by doing. 9. Gaining control of the process. The assembly line and waterfall ; Making something new ; Planning during preproduction ; Mark Cerny and method ; The value of preproduction
10. What is a vertical slice? The core loop ; The three Cs ; Sample levels and the blockmesh design process ; The size and quality of vertical slice sample levels ; The beautiful corner ; The challenge and reward of the vertical slice
11. Building a vertical slice. Work from a prototype ; Create an early sequence from the game
but don't make the very beginning yet ; Iterate on the core elements of your game ; Commit to a game engine and hardware platform ; Practice good housekeeping ; Start to add debug functions ; Fail early, fail fast, fail often ; Work in the same physical space or together online ; Save and categorize your design materials ; Be guided by your project goals ; When to modify your project goals ; What we are doing by building the vertical slice ; Preproduction cannot be scheduled conventionally ; Timeboxing
12. Playtesting. The designer's mode, the system image, and the user's model ; Affordances and signifiers ; Playtesting for legibility and experience ; Best practices for playtesting ; Running regular playtests ; Evaluating playtest feedback ; "I like, I wish, What if ...?" ; Playtesting for designers and artists.
13. Concentric development. Why the universe is organized into hierarchies
a fable ; What is concentric development? ; Implement primary mechanics first until they are complete ; Implementing secondary mechanics and tertiary mechanics ; Concentric development and design parameters ; Test levels ; Polish as you go ; Don't use defaults ; Polish can be punk ; Concentric development, modularity, and systems ; Iteration, evaluation, and stability ; Concentric development helps us manage our time ; The switch to concentric development ; Concentric development and the vertical slice ; Concentric development and agile ; Maximizing the amount of work not done ; The pace of concentric development
14. Preproduction deliverable
the vertical slice. Delivering a build of the vertical slice ; Supporting the vertical slice with other materials ; Learning about scope from the creation of the vertical slice ; Playtesting the vertical slice ; Focus testing our game's title and early key art
16. Story structure for game designers. Aristotle's Poetics ; Freytag's pyramid ; Game structures mirror story structure ; Stories and gameplay are fractal ; The components of story ; How to improve the stories in your games ; When in doubt...
17. Preproduction deliverable
the game macro. Making a map for full production ; Why use a game design macro? ; The game design macro and our project goals ; The two parts of a game design macro ; The game design overview ; The game design macro chart ; The rows and columns of the game design macro chart ; A game design macro chart template ; Player goal, design goal, and emotional beat ; An example of the relationship between player goal, design goal, and emotional beat ; The advantage of a game design macro ; The game design macro is set in stone ; Is the game design macro a game design bible?
18. Writing a game design macro chart. The granularity of the macro chart ; Sequencing the game design macro chart ; Making the macro chart complete ; Micro design ; Nonlinear games and the game design macro chart ; Example game design macros
19. Scheduling. Simple scheduling ; How many person-hours do we have to make our game? ; The simplest schedule ; Simple schedule information for each task ; Scoping with a simple schedule ; Tracking a project using a simple schedule ; The burndown chart ; Deciding what can be cut ; Rescheduling in a burndown chart ; Burndown charts create an atmosphere of trust and respect
20. Milestone reviews. When to run milestone reviews ; Internal and external milestone reviews ; Holding a milestone review ; The Pixar braintrust ; What makes a good note? ; What should the presenting game developers do during a milestone review? ; Presenting to project stakeholders ; Emotional aspects of the milestone review process
21. The challenge of preproduction. Committing to a design ; Canceling a project if preproduction doesn't go well ; Onward into full production ; A summary of the preproduction deliverables
Phase three: Full production
building and discovering. 22. The character of full production. Presenting the vertical slice and game design macro ; Working through you task list ; Changing gears in the transition from preproduction to full production ; Checking in on your goals ; Stand-up meetings ; The milestones of full production ; What order should a game be built in? ; Game feel and juiciness ; Focuses for full production ; When to take a risk during full production
23. Types of testing. Informal playtesting ; Design-process testing ; QA testing ; Automated testing ; Public-facing testing
24. Preparing for a formal playtest. Formal playtesting at Naughty Dog ; A formal playtesting practice for everyone ; Preparing a formal playtest script ; Preparing a formal playtest survey ; Preparing for an exit interview ; Devising exit interview questions ; Focus testing our game's title, key art, and logo design ; Preparing for the day of the formal playtest
25. Running a formal playtest. Formal playtesting in an informal environment ; Finding playtesters ; Finding a location, arranging a time, and deciding a playtest coordinator ; Preparing the location ; The arrival of the playtesters ; Immediately before the playtest starts ; The play session ; The debrief session ; Clearing up after the playtest ; Analyzing the playtest results ; Acting on the feedback received from a formal playtest ; Dealing with difficult feedback ; Going into the next round of formal playtesting
26. Game metrics. Game metrics at Naughty Dog ; Implementing metrics in your game ; Metrics data and consent ; Testing metrics data systems ; Visualizing metrics data ; Game metrics implementation checklist ; The opportunities and limits of game metrics
27. The alpha phase and bug tracking. A simple bug tracking method
28. The alpha milestone. Features and content ; Being feature complete ; Being game sequence complete ; A good onboarding sequence by alpha ; The role of the alpha milestone ; Choosing a game title at alpha ; Summarizing the alpha milestone ; The milestone review that takes place at alpha
29. Stubbing things in. What is a stub? ; Stubs in videogames ; An example stub object process ; Stubs and functionality ; Stubbing in content versus concentric development
30. Reaching the audience for our game. Make a marketing plan ; Make a website and press kit for your game, and contact the press ; Running a social media campaign for your game ; Working with social media influencers ; Integrating game development with professional marketing
31. The beta milestone. What's needed for the beta milestone ; Completeness and the beta milestone ; The beta phase, concentric development, and game health ; Credits and attribution ; The challenge of reaching the beta milestone ; Summarizing the beta milestone ; The milestone review that takes place a beta
Phase four: Postproduction
Fixing and polishing. 32. The postproduction phase. How long should postproduction take? ; Bug fixing ; Polishing ; Balancing ; The character of postproduction ; Mobility of viewpoint ; Postproduction waves
33. The release candidate milestone. What is needed for a release candidate? ; From release candidate to gold master ; Releasing the game
34. The certification process. The certification process timeline ; Passing and failing cert ; Updating games after passing cert ; Content ratings
35. Unexpected game design. Types of unexpected game design
36. After we've finished. Releasing a game ; The post-project review ; Resting at the end of a project ; Post-project blues ; The next project ; R&D ; Starting with some direction ; When to leave a team ; Back to the beginning
Appendix A: The four phases, milestones and deliverables of the playful production process
Appendix B: Transcription of figure 7.1
Appendix C: Game design macro for Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (detail) from figure 18.2.
