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The Designer's Notebook

The Designer's Notebook columns

The Designer's Notebook is a (mostly) regular column I write for the Gamasutra developers' webzine. Below is an index to all 120 columns archived here, newest first. For my online articles that didn't appear under the Designer's Notebook name, see Online articles.

2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004 2003 2002 2001 2000 1999 1998 1997

2013

December 21Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! XIV
August 23We Don't Need the Haters (And I Can Prove It)
April 8Three Problems for Interactive Storytellers, Resolved

2012

December 21Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! XIII
August 16Machinations, A New Way to Design Game Mechanics
July 26A Call to Arms for Decent Men
June 5Triple-A Games for Women? Seriously?
February 28How Should We Judge a Game Jam?

2011

December 26Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! XII
October 25Passion versus Professionalism
June 14Eight Ways to Make a Bad Tutorial Français
April 13Introducing The Blitz Online

2010

December 2Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! XI
October 28Don't March, Dance!
August 25Sandbox Storytelling
May 12Preventing the Downward Spiral
April 8Selling Hate and Humiliation

2009

December 7Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! X
September 29How to Write Sports Commentary
July 9Sorting Out the Genre Muddle
April 14The Genre That Would Not Die!
January 27Numbers, Emotions, and Behavior

2008

November 25The Moral Panic Isn't Over Yet
October 9Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! IX
August 19The Tao of Game Design
May 14Difficulty Modes and Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment
March 5Damn All Gameplay Patents!

2007

November 26Ten Years of Great Games
September 4Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! VIII
July 17Why Design Documents Matter Français Polski
June 6Is It Time To Dump EA?
May 1Why Action Games Suck (And What to Do About It)
January 31Asymmetric Peacefare

2006

December 22PS3 vs. Wii -- The Designer's Perspective Farsi
November 1Employees Leaving? Deal With It!
September 29Revenge of the Highbrow Games
August 7Where's Our Merchant Ivory?
July 10Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! VII Français
June 1Introducing Ken Perlin's Law
April 21Cheer Up! Video Games are in Great Shape
March 2Strange Agents are Profiling Our Games!
January 30Multi-Level Gameplay

2005

November 28The End of Copyright Chinese
October 3The Unique Design Challenge of Pinball Simulations
August 26The Bill of Players' Rights
July 28You Must Play Façade, Now!
June 28A Letter from the Cockpit
June 3Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! VI
April 29A Few Remarks on Creative Play
April 1The Act - Emotion Control With Single-Knob Gameplay
February 23What's On the Designer's Bookshelf?
January 26Educational Games Don't Have to Stink!

2004

December 22How Many Endings Does a Game Need?
November 15Dramatic Novelty in Games and Stories
October 18The Perils of Bottom-Up Game Design
September 15A Perfect Short Game
August 6Kicking Butt by the Numbers: Lanchester's Laws
July 9Postmodernism and the Three Types of Immersion
June 11Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! V Français
May 10Designing with Gameplay Modes and Flowboards
April 2The Best of the Game Design Workshops
February 20Random Thoughts on Mobile Games
January 16What Evil Lurks in the Hearts of NPCs?

2003

December 2Inside a Game Design Company
October 22Hardware Designers: Talk to Us!
August 27Not Just Rappers and Athletes: Minorities in Video Games
August 6Tuning Puzzle Games for Non-Puzzle Gamers
July 2In the Beginning Was the Word
May 23Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! IV Français
April 30Defining the Physical Dimension of a Game Setting
April 1More Sex(es) in Computer Games
January 27What Kind of Designer Are You?

2002

November 8The Designer's Notebook Turns Five: A Look Back
October 9The Role of Architecture in Videogames
July 27Stop Calling Games "Addictive"!
May 31Technology Inspires Creativity: Indie Game Jam Inverts Dogma 2001!
February 8Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! III Français
January 7Balancing Games with Positive Feedback Français

2001

October 19The Day the "Fun" Became Real
August 8My "Next" Games: Families, Psychology, and Murder
July 3Replayability, part 2: Game Mechanics
May 21Replayability, part 1: Narrative
April 9Brian Moriarty on Text RPGs and Skotos Tech
February 2Dogma 2001: A Challenge to Game Designers

2000

December 22Designing Need-Based AI for Virtual Gorillas
November 21Sex in Computer Games, part 3: Dramatic Signficance
October 5Sex in Computer Games, part 2: Explicit Sex
September 15Sex in Computer Games, part 1: Seduction
August 1Casual versus Core
July 6Breaking the Rules Français
May 19Death (and Planescape: Torment) Français
March 31Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! II Français
February 29Some Thoughts on Archaic Language
January 26Letter from a Dungeon

1999

December 29Three Problems for Interactive Storytellers Français
November 9It's Time to Bring Back Adventure Games Français
October 22I Can't Keep Up!
September 24Designing and Developing Sports Games
August 20Reflections on the Colorado School Massacre
July 16Simplification Français
June 18Tolkien, Beethoven, Vision Français
May 28The Slippery Slope of Advertising
April 9Shut Up And Design! Français
March 12Let's Put the Magic Back in Magic Français
February 12How to Be Weird
January 15Interstate'76 and the Principle of Harmony

1998

December 18How to Get Started in the Game Industry, Part 2
December 11How to Get Started in the Game Industry, Part 1
November 20Creating Opponents For Wargames
October 16A Symmetry Lesson Français
August 14The Virtual Reality Gorilla-Rhino Test
July 17In Memoriam: Danielle Berry
June 19Cartographic Cartwheels
May 22Gulliver and Game Design
April 24Implementing God in the On-Line World
March 13Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie! Français Português
February 13Games for Girls? Eeeeewwww! Farsi
January 16Not Just Another Scary Face

1997

December 5Why "On-Line Community" is an Oxymoron, or, Flatfoots on the Infobeat!
November 28Dr. Livingstone, I Presume?