Brief Introduction to Game Design

Course Curriculum

Lecture 1: What you'll discover

Lecture 2: 10 "Need to Knows" about Game Design

Lecture 3: Introducing the Teacher

Lecture 4: Voluntary, anonymous survey of just 10 questions

Chapter 1: What game design is all about

Lecture 1: What game design is – and is not!

Lecture 2: Can just anyone design a game?

Lecture 3: Game designer characteristics

Lecture 4: "I'm going to get rich" – NOT!

Lecture 5: It's not about ideas or stories and no one will make your game for you

Lecture 6: The best ways to learn, part 1

Lecture 7: The best ways to learn, part 2

Lecture 8: Know your target audience

Lecture 9: What is the player going to DO? – games are not stories, they're activities

Chapter 2: Game Making in a Nutshell

Lecture 1: Awareness Exercise

Lecture 2: Playtesting and modification is the heart of game design

Lecture 3: Making a game for the very first time

Lecture 4: All I really needed to know (about game design) I learned from tabletop D&D

Lecture 5: What's important in designing games, in one page

Lecture 6: Six words about what game designers do

Lecture 7: "What is it like to be a game designer?"

Lecture 8: The many meanings of the word "Theme"

Lecture 9: What makes a game "good" Part 1

Lecture 10: What makes a game "good" Part 2

Lecture 11: Game design: is it art, engineering, science?

Chapter 3: The End of the Beginning

Lecture 1: Practice/Exercise: Make a game the Quick way

Lecture 2: 11 More "Need to Knows" About Game Design

Lecture 3: Beginner's project scope

Lecture 4: How many game designs should I work on concurrently?

Lecture 5: Platforms

Lecture 6: How Twitter can be useful for a game designer

Lecture 7: Are you a game designer or a fiction writer?

Lecture 8: Where to from here?

Lecture 9: All of the slides used in the lectures as of 1 Sep 13

Chapter 4: Bonus Material (also available on the Web, usually at my site or YouTube)

Lecture 1: "A tax on people who are bad at math"

Lecture 2: "Bonus Lecture" – Lew's online courses and information sources

Lecture 3: Why I wrote my game design book

Lecture 4: Lew's "Bonus Lecture" about his courses and published games as of Nov '17

Lecture 5: Results of late 2012 game designer survey

Lecture 6: What makes my game design book unusual (or unique)

Lecture 7: Games and Interactivity

Lecture 8: Of course you can design a game, but can you design a good one?

Lecture 9: Slides: Of course you can design a game, but can you design a good one?

Lecture 10: Special Powers Card Games

Lecture 11: Origins 2007 process of game design

Lecture 12: Slides for Origins 2007 talk