Friday we went to our final GDC session entitled “Attack of the Design Direcors”. The talk was given by Brian Allgeier, the Design Director on the “Ratchet & Clank” games. While enlightening, it was also very entertaining.
Some of the things I brought away are summarized below.
A good game designer/design team needs to work like the “A-Team”:
- Hannibal - the leader, focus on the overall plan, is it cohesive?
- The Face Man - the promoter, pitch concepts, a people person
- B.A. Barracus - the mechanic, technical contraints, etc
- Murdock - the creative aspect, think outside the box
Going with this idea, things to question about pitching design ideas:
- Is it Cohesive?
- Is it Feasible?
- Is it Innovative?
- Is it Marketable?
Some key things that he attributes to the success of their projects were:
- Weekly design meetings to tighten feedback loops between teams and increase knowledge sharing.
- Always find ways to measure work so an accurate perception of progress can be made.
- Delegation is key to empowering team members and creating ownership. Find ways to keep the momentum going.
- Maintain aggressive schedules.
One thing he stressed was that, to be successful, you have to “stick to the plan”. The problem with working on a project is that, over time, ideas go stale and you begin second-guessing your design ideas. This can be a developer’s worst nightmare and is one of the driving issues behind the saga that was John Romero and Daikatana (an excellent read if you have the time). Though I think the tragic flaw behind Romero was his ego, I think he might have been able to learn something from Allgeier about the role of the design director and management.