In the second edition to the acclaimed Game Design: Theory & Practice, designer Richard Rouse III balances a discussion of the essential concepts behind game design with an explanation of how you can implement them in your current project. Detailed analysis of successful games is interwoven with concrete examples from Rouse?s own experience. This second edition thoroughly updates the popular original with new chapters and fully revised text.

* Follow the entire game development process, from brainstorming a game idea and establishing the focus to getting the gameplay working and playtesting.
* Learn the techniques of top game designers through in-depth interviews:
Doug Church, Thief, System Shock, Ultima Underworld
Chris Crawford, Balance of Power, Eastern Front (1941)
Ed Logg, Asteroids, Centipede, Gauntlet
Jordan Mechner, Prince of Persia, Karateka, The Last Express
Sid Meier, Civilization, Pirates!, Railroad Tycoon, Gettysburg!
Steve Meretzky, The Hitchhiker?s Guide to the Galaxy, Planetfall, Zork Zero
Will Wright, SimCity, The Sims
* Learn how to most effectively document your game ideas. Includes the full design document for the action-horror game The Suffering.

One of the most important but least discussed elements of a computer game is the gameplay that makes a game compelling and entertaining.

Great book for every game designer...

That’s really great book for every game designer or someone who wants to be one, but also a good one for all other people working on game, so that they can understand design work. Just don’t expect programming or animation or other topics from it, it’s about "game design" not "game software design" or "game graphics design" or others. It’s also very important that author actually IS game designer of commercial games, and included example of design document of one of his released games (The Suffering) - some really good material there, that one is really worth it!

Great interview and practical examples book.

The editorial review is kinda deceiving, so I’ll just write what’s missing on it: The book tries to balance between theory, practical examples and interviews.

Which may be great to some, but not that great to others.

The book is basicaly structured in this way:
30-50 pages of Theory
5-15 pages of a practical example (something about the theory on an actual game)
15-40 pages of Interview (with some famous game designer... which might be good if the reader knows their games, and might be bad if the reader doesn’t, since not much of it is exactly "game designer" content).

That structure is repeated through over and over the book’s 677 pages.
But don’t get me wrong, the content is still very good. Cover lots of stuff from developing the game concept, to more technical stuff like AI, Multi-playing, Level design and playtesting.

So, a good book that covers lots of stuff on game design without going too deep in specific stuff.

Excellent resource for students

I am currently using this as my Game Design textbook. As a student, it provides not only mere theory, but valuable interviews with upstanding designers. It is clear, and a joy to read.

Great book. helped for class greatly

I got this book to help in a class since it was a course requirement. It has alot of good info and intangibles about game design that is very helpful to anybody that would want to know.

Didn’t tell me much more than I already knew

Being an avid gamer, and dreaming of working in the video game industry, I pretty much knew everyhing there was in this book. However, if you’re not like me, then I think you will find this book useful.
The book goes from the beginning stages of video game design up to the completion of a video game. It gives really good information about what makes a game good and not tired and done before.
The interviews of the game designers are kinda helpful; it really depends on if you already know the designers work and are familiar with it.
This is a non-technical book though, so it won’t tell you how to code a game or make models. It basically tells you all of the intangibles you can’t learn in a class or really anywhere.

It’s worth the read.

Solid and well done

This is a great walk through for a beginner. I would recommend it for its overview and insight into games and making games. I played a few more games because of it and was able to hone my eye to know why I enjoy and what I look for in games. Great first book; if only for the interviews.

Second Edition Surpasses the First... I’m Impressed

I’m a big fan of the original edition of Game Design: Theory & Practice. Of all the game design books I’ve read, it was one of the most impressive at balancing lofty ambitions and invigorating game design theory with a relatively in-depth take on the realities game development today. As a professional game developer myself, I also loved the book’s sense of video game history. In particular, the interviews with Meier/Wright/Mechner/Meretzky et al were fantastic.

So I was quite pleased when I saw a second edition had come out. I recently managed to pick it up and found that the second edition impressed me even more than the first. There’s the obviously new chapters, like the one on multiplayer (one of the weak spots in the original book), the massive interview with the brilliant Doug Church, and the insightful deconstruction of Grand Theft Auto. But reading over sections of the book, I can tell they’ve all been worked over. The whole book feels more thorough.

Other books may offer more design theory or more practical tips for making a level or tweaking a particular game mechanic or whatever, but there’s a special blend of the two at work in Game Design: Theory & Practice, that makes me want to make better games and shows me how I might do it. This makes Game Design: Theory & Practice hands down my favorite book on game design. Most definitely required reading.

Must-have for game designers

There are not many books on game design, as opposed to the relatively huge number of game programming and art books available out there. But game design is the most important discipline in terms of theory. Richard Rouse does a great job of putting together different design elements into this book. I was lucky enough to get the 2nd edition, which is more up-to-date and includes an analysis of games such as The Sims and Grand Theft Auto 3, along with classics such as Karateka and Centipede. It also includes great interviews with some of the most progressive designers in the industry’s history.

If you’re a game designer, and wish to learn more about your craft, there’s no question about it - you must buy this book.

A Worthy Effort

This book is a pleasant surprise. The author modestly sets out to simply tell us what he knows of game design, and that, apparently, is a great deal.

Solid throughout and occasionally inspired, the book touches on a very wide array of subjects, and does so thoroughly and intelligently, offering many and useful practical suggestions.

The book’s theory, as far as it exists, is coherent, though nothing revolutionary. This, however is its shortfall - a coherent and comprehensive theory of computer games has yet to be founded, and that is what the field is missing most and no book, including this one, has provided it this far.

Though concise and narrow, the book’s six game analyses are excellent and illuminating. Would that computer game critical analysis of this quality were more common. If Mr. Rouse is reading this, I am willing to pay full price for a collection of your game analyses!

Avoiding the mistake that Adams and Rollings have made by erroneously proclaiming that all computer games are not art, the author goes to the other extreme with the too liberal statement that all computer games are art, falling short of the truth that SOME computer games CAN be art. At least he’s in the right direction.

The author expresses an understandable yearning for a successful merging of a game and a story in a way that creates a truly interactive story - though in different words. Unfortunately, he does not provide a practical suggestion as to how to strive towards that goal.

That, perhaps, would have been the greatest contribution any book on the subject could make.

The Best That’s Out There

I work on video games professionally as a programmer, but I read a lot of books on design because that is the most challenging aspect of what we do. Technology is a solved problem; project management is getting there; that leaves the black hole of design. Of the books I’ve read, Richard Rouse’s is the best. Where most books on game design treat you as if you have somehow landed in the position of creative director for a thirty man team -- and now you need help -- Rouse’s book covers everything from level design in the trenches to the concept work of the lead designer. They say those who can’t do, write, but Richard is an exception, with a few above average games in his ludography (and a flop or two, just like me). And when his knowledge isn’t enough, he supplants it with interviews with the greats. Although it’s true that some of the greats are no longer in the game, their advice is still valuable. (One thing that all of them agree on is the value of other people playtesting, whether it’s Ed Logg field testing coin-op machines or Steve Meretzky looking at transcripts of people playing text adventures.) This book is also a survey of current trends in game design, from simulation to emergent strategy to meaningful choices. It provoked me to think deeper than I had before.

So why only four stars?

Yes, it is somewhat dated. Interviews with John Carmack, Warren Spector, and Jason Uyeda would be more relevant than the coin-op/PC game gurus presented here.

Furthermore, I could have used less survey and more depth. Take emergent strategies, for example: he touches on this concept, says that It Is Good, but without really giving it the treatment it deserves: how does one create a game in which emergent strategies develop? What are the costs of such an approach to game design?

Still, if you only read one book on game design, this should be it.

Excellent game design book plus more...

As a beginning game programmer, this book perfectly fills in the
gap of (hopefully) making me into a better one.

The author was wise enough to include interviews with respected
game designers to prevent the book from being too opinionated.

The best thing about this book is the author’s honesty about
why some of his games were flawed in the hopes that we learn
from them.

The sample game design document is one of the best
I’ve seen. I’ve seen samples from the web that were either too
short (leaving it to the team to assume anything) or too long
(too detailed).

Lastly, he doesn’t comment on the ’business’ of the game
industry (he pokes at them though). I think this was a wise
move. Who wants to read about project management, financial
forecasts, focus groups, marketing in a book about game
design?

I don’t think I’ll be buying any more game design books until I
find one that can best this.

The fundamentals, in a clean read.

This book brings the very fundamentals of game design. I dont think its dated, because those are the things that every game will always have, period.

A very good read, with very good examples and interviews. Rouse talks a lot about his own games, specially Centipede 3D, but I think it’s natural. To make everything complete, Rouse could get deeper about the commercial side of game industry, with things like schedule pressure, getting fund and etc. The main objective is to teach how to design games, but this kind of information adds great value.