02 Game Documentation

Tvorba a dizajn počítačových hier (FMFI)

Návrh a vývoj počítačových hier (FIIT)
Michal Ferko
29. 9. 2022
Documents related to Game Design
• Concept Document
• Game Proposal Document
• Game Design Document (GDD)
• Technical Design Doc
• Art Style Guide / Art Design Doc
• Project Plan & Schedule
• Test Plan

Image from The Art of Game Design: A book of lenses

Pitch Deck (or Concept Doc)
• Convey the goal and purpose of the game
• For management level to help “sell” the game
• Assess viability, budget, scope & timeline
• Sell to management/investors/publishers/co-founders
• Usually a presentation, with ~10 slides
• Concept doc can be 1-2 pages, max. up to 5
• Written by the producer/creative director
• No well-defined form
• List key things you want to communicate
• Sort by importance
• Most important first (since nobody might read the whole thing)

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Pitch Deck contents
• Premise – high level concept, describe your game and how it is unique in a few sentences
• Player motivation – what will motivate the players? How do they win?
• Hook/Unique Selling Points – Why will players pick YOUR game?
• What makes it different from the rest
• Target Market – Age, Gender, Motivators, Platform, Genre, HW requirements…
• Target rating (mature content, violence, …)
• Competitor & market analysis
• Budget, scope, timeline, revenue projections
• License
Pitch Decks
• Loot River: Prototypovanie a príprava pitch decku | Miro Straka, Straka Studio
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJ8BJI3uxgQ
• The 10-20-30 rule of PowerPoint
• https://guykawasaki.com/the_102030_rule/
• Pitch Deck examples
• https://www.notion.so/Pitch-Decks-f56e38c13fe6417f8379859e74367e1a
• How to pitch your game to a publisher or anyone
• https://www.tinybuild.com/how-to-pitch-your-game
Game Design Document (GDD)
• Similar to a software requirements specification
• Complete description of the software
• All functional requirements
• Detailed description of features
• Should answer all questions about the game
• The GDD must contain
• Complete gameplay description – mechanics, interactions
• Description of all game elements (creatures, NPCs, items, classes, story…)
• Can be very long – 50 – 200 pages
• It’s a living document
• Updated throughout development
• When a design change occurs, the designer must update the GDD
GDD
• The GDD is used mainly by the production team
• Artists when creating art
• Programmers when programming features
• Designers when creating new mechanics or improving existing ones
• Should be the “ground truth” for the team
• When something is unclear, the GDD should have the answer
• If it does not, the designer should update it
• The form is relatively loose
• Certain sections are irrelevant for certain games
• There is no magic template
• Purposes: memory and communication
• You make lots of decisions and you might forget them
GDD forms
• Google Docs
• Pros: Easily shareable, can link to any section, quick to prepare, all in one place
• Cons: Struggles with larger documents (50+ pages with images), more linear reading
• My experience: people use a ton of separate Google Docs and link between them
• Wiki system
• Pros: More structured, can link very well, quickly editable, good revision history
• Cons: Does not have everything in one place, slower setup, might be harder to edit/maintain
• Miro (single visual board)
• Pros: Everything in one place, more visual, less structured, able to integrate detailed
documentation into diagrams
• Cons: If you do not maintain structure, it can be very confusing and hard to navigate
GDD Structure
• Core gameplay description
• Core game loop
• Character, Controls, Camera
• Player tools
• Challenges (problems to solve)
• Game World
• All static & dynamic objects and their behavior
• Pickups, weapons, enemies, enemy AI…
• List of levels/locations
• User Interface
• All screens, UIs, HUDs
• Story, Lore, NPCs…
Core game loop
 2D Camera
Isometric

Side-scroller

Top-down
 3D Camera 1st person

3rd person

Top-down
Controls
• PC or Console or Touchscreen or VR or Gyro or GPS or …
• What is controllable & how
Characters
• Single character (avatar) – one person
• Multi character – party
• Lots of units – commander
Characters
• Specific or customizable?
• Visuals
• Stats
UIs
1 Picture > 1000 words
Technical Design Document
• Describes the engine/technical solutions on which the game will run
• Comparison to other engines on the market – why did we pick our engine
• Technology production path
• How they will get from concept to software
• Specific requirements and features, HW & SW
• Refers to the GDD/ADD
• Closer to the SRS, farther from the concept document

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Art Design Document
• Describe art that will be used throughout the game
• Art style, mood boards
• Color palettes
• 2D sprites, 3D models
• Animation
• Techniques, software, workflows
• Visuals & audio

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Production Plan
• Required team & allocation
• Tasks & time estimates
• Gantt chart
• When will we ship?
• Marketing strategy
• Post-launch plan, DLCs, LiveOps…

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 Example Concept
Documents and GDDs
Super Mario, Race’n’Chase, BioShock, …

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Game development
stages

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• Image from https://digitalworlds.wordpress.com/2008/04/10/the-process-of-game-creation-the-game-
design-document/

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Development phases
• Concept - Start with a small team, work on a concept document
• Prototype – not only gameplay, also art
• “A working piece of software that captures onscreen the essence of what makes your game
special, what sets it apart from the rest, and what will make it successful.”
• Pre-production – Create GDD, TDD, ADD, mechanics
• Production – create all content
• Alpha, Beta, Gold
• Post-production

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Problem & Solutions
• Waterfall is not cool
• Moving towards Agile/Scrum
• Very cool
• Game Development is inherently iterative
• Need to test various systems
• Do players like XYZ?
• Are the graphics good?
• Is the music suitable?
• Are the controls good?
• Build-Measure-Learn
• Read “Agile Game Development with Scrum”

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References
• http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/131791/the_anatomy_of_a_design_document_.
php
• http://www.gamedev.net/page/resources/_/creative/game-design/tom-slopers-format-
for-game-design-specifi-r243
• http://sloperama.com/advice.html
• http://www.cs.tufts.edu/comp/150CIS/AnAntsLife/AnAntsLife-
GameDesignDocument.pdf
• http://www.scribd.com/doc/53563149/Grand-Theft-Auto-Design-Document
• http://www.gamepitches.com/
• http://code.tutsplus.com/articles/effectively-organize-your-games-development-with-a-
game-design-document--active-10140

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References (2)
• Novak, J. (2012). Game Development Essentials : An Introduction. Clifton Park, N.Y:
Delmar. 3rd ed.
• Chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, 11
• Further reading: Chapters 10, 12
• Adams and Dormans (2012). Game Mechanics: Advanced Game Design (Voices That
Matter).
• Chapter 1 – Designing Game Mechanics
• Keith, C. (2010). Agile Game Development with Scrum. Addison-Wesley
• Just read the whole book!
• Schell, J. (2014). The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses. A K Peters. 2nd ed.
• Must read for every single game dev

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