Thread by @dom2d

Tomorrow is our yearly @squareenixmtl game jam! This year, four teams are making board games! Exciting!

I made them a quick presentation on how to evolve an idea from theme to mechanics, and I'm pretty proud of that cover page. Lemme know if you'd like me to share it here! ✨

@SquareEnixMtl Alright let's do this then!
Here we go, how to get an idea from theme to mechanics, in a game jam!
(Sidenote: it sort of applies to commercial game design, but then you'd probably have to add a lot of market analysis and player expectation research steps in there)

@SquareEnixMtl First, you're given a theme. Those can be really scary and weird! 👻

Picking your own interpretation of the theme is a bit scary. I say, list a bunch of ideas before deciding, and don't hesitate to come back to this step later if an idea doesn't blossom like you thought it would. 🥀

This is the most crucial step to me! Figure out what experience you'd like to translate from reality (be a race car driver!), or invent in pure fantasy (find your way through a magical labyrinth that keeps changing, and is full of space eels), or somewhere in between!

A few examples of what I mean by "experience"!

The first idea is never the best one! Explore it a bit, then toss it aside and try a few more ideas. The richer, more original ideas are often behind the more obvious ones!

Then you must extract the system for that experience, in broad terms.
Ex: A race car driver must direct a car around a track, try to be as fast as possible, without crashing, and manage fuel and the state of their car.

And now we get to the good stuff - putting mechanics to that system. This part is easier the more you know what has been done in the past, as you can use shortcuts others have figured out, but it's also fun/rewarding to try to find how to play a system in novel ways.

The full slide in case you wanna refer to it later. Now let's move on to an example.

*goes to get a glass of water while you read the example*

The design of mechanics is very open-ended. This is where you should define your intent! ✨

And by the way, this is just one of many different paths you can take from theme to mechanics - sometimes you can flip things around. 🌀
If a theme gets you inspired by a mechanic, start from there!

Onto the prototyping phase! Aim for a super small, simple version of the game first.

This is an iterative process. You'll go back and forth between the mechanics you defined (and will re-define sometimes!), the prototyping and the playtesting. This is where you'll spend most of your time!
Find 👏 the 👏fun 👏 in 👏 your 👏 game!

Some ideas of what to look for while iterating. 🐊

And finally! Once you have a more solid base for a game, now you can gradually make ⭐️CONTENT⭐️ for it, and go back to playtesting and iterating, again building upon what's fun. But then again, maybe your game doesn't need content, who knows.

A quick note about art through-out this process. As the game becomes more focused and safe, the art can become more precise and some assets can be developed.

And then the fun-killer - writing the rules! I think it's not 100% necessary in a jam, but very soon you'll want to share your game and will need a way for others to play without you yelling at them.

And that's it. It's very high-level and a bit dry, but I hope it's an interesting look into how I tackle "ideas" and grow them into semi-random explorations of what games can be. Sometimes the result will be bad, and it's fine too! As long as you take a shower once in a while. 🚿

Thanks for reading! I'd be curious to hear how differently others have done it before, please discuss! ☺️

I'll add another point here! While you're developing a gameplay, it'll become difficult. The details aren't right, some parts aren't optimal. You'll be tempted to jump to another experience or another system altogether... but don't! 😮

Every new idea is sexier than the one you're currently struggling with, because the new idea's problems aren't visible yet - but trust me, every idea has its own set of issues! Keep at it and work out the last 20% of the game one hurdle at a time! 😚

Also! Accept that no game is perfect! Games are made of many compromises by nature! 🌈
(Of course some designs are just bad, and yeah move on from an idea if it really yields nothing at all!)