LudoScience

Game Design (design)

Author(s) : Staffan Björk, Jussi Holopainen
Editor : Charles River Media
Publication date : 10-20-2005
Language : english

This book gathers about 200 "design patterns" aimed to ease the creation of games.  It's a formalized and analytical list of the various elements that composes games, ordered in different categories. For example, in the "Game Elements" category you'll find the patterns "lives", "power-ups" and "avatar", while the "Social Interaction" category gathers patterns like "trading", "competition" and "player killing". Each pattern is described over one or two pages, with examples of uses in popular video games. Instead of a game design manual, this book is rather a reference of the most common elements in videogames, that should inspire Game Designers looking for inspiration.