Iterative Design

http://www.designer-notes.com/?p=654





I would like to discuss bottom-up design in video game development. It is very common in video game design to start with the end-user experience. "They will do this, and then they will feel this, and then this will happen." This often completely ignores the underlying low-level systems and features that deliver that experience. When a project nears its deadline, many of those features and experiences will be thrown out. This can ruin the gameplay pacing that the game designer wanted at the start of the project. A much more sane approach is to start with mechanics. Programmers can develop small tools, tech demos, or proof-of-concept applications. These small pieces can each be tested on their own to find the few which stand well on their own, or certain combinations which provide an enjoyable experience together. These software facets should be built with no context in mind, because they are ideas that may prove to be worse than the designer originally thought. Even a large software project can progress in this manner with frequent testing and iteration. If many small ideas are presented to a skilled designer, or to the team as a whole, the team can quickly decide which ideas have merit and which are a waste of development time. The result is a higher-quality product which can be coherent despite the piecemeal method used to design it.