Supporting Game Design with Evolutionary Algorithms
Game Developer
AUGUST 13, 2024
Evolutionary algorithms can optimize game parameters by simulating various scenarios -- enhancing design, especially for complex games.
Game Design Game Designer Simulation 
Solo dev Esteban Hernandez spent 7 years on Creo God Simulator: “I’ve learned perseverance”
PreMortem.Games
FEBRUARY 5, 2025
Esteban Hernandez , the solo developer behind MKSM Design , has spent almost seven years bringing Creo God Simulator to life. What started as a passion project has grown into a full-fledged god game blending city-building, resource management and player-driven storytelling. How did you get the idea for Creo God Simulator?
Simulation 
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How do you Choose the Best Game Design Software for your Project?
Big Games
JANUARY 30, 2024
Game design software does play a pivotal role in bringing the digital world to life, which allows game developers and designers to create immersive and engaging experiences. The world of game design is a captivating landscape brimming with possibilities.
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Game Design Fundamentals: Information Channels
Ask a Game Dev
DECEMBER 29, 2022
So what does this have to do with game design? As a game designer, you’ve got to convey a constant flow of game information to the player, and you want to avoid overwhelming them with it. If you want to be a game designer, you should keep this in your pocket as a tool to use when the time is right.
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A Crash Course in Board Game Development
Brand Game Development
SEPTEMBER 9, 2019
Join my community of over 2,000 game developers, artists, and passionate creators. I tend to use the word game development as a catch-all term for everything that is associated with making a game – that includes game design, product development, marketing, promotion, Kickstarter/crowdfunding, fulfillment, and selling.
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6 Ways to Find Play-Testers for Your New Board Game
Brand Game Development
APRIL 27, 2020
Play-testing is the most important part of board game design. It’s how you turn rough, raw ideas into polished, ready-to-play games. Two groups that come to mind are the Tabletop Game Playtesters Guild and Card & Board Game Designers Guild. Visit your local game store. Final Thoughts.
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Tape to Tape by Excellent Rectangle is the world’s first hockey roguelite
PreMortem.Games
MAY 10, 2023
Canadian indie game development studio Excellent Rectangle just launched their debut title Tape to Tape on Steam Early Access. Combining the world of ice hockey with a roguelite may seem like an odd match, but for game designer Hugo Julien and his fellow co-founders Jean-Nicolas and Mathieu Fortin, it was a natural choice.
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Dev Diary: 03/31/17
Brand Game Development
MARCH 31, 2017
Also, the game doesn’t have a defined win condition yet. Some game designers – and I count myself among them – consider to be win conditions pretty important to games. I’ve pushed a rough version of the game out to Tabletop Simulator for my use only.
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Solo dev Vladyslav Pidiashenko “I hope IHAS will inspire players to better their lives”
PreMortem.Games
OCTOBER 30, 2024
“ I’ve been working on a game for close to 3 years at this point and the whole idea of IHAS has transpired through these years of development. At first, I was planning to make a walking simulator-horror game. A year later, I started to add puzzles and worked out a story and a few key philosophical concepts for the game.”
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The Best Careers in Math You Never Thought About
Real Programming
NOVEMBER 28, 2024
Game Designer Game design is a math-intensive career. From creating realistic physics simulations to designing engaging game mechanics, math plays a crucial role in crafting immersive experiences. Opportunities in the growing gaming and entertainment industries.
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We. The Refugees: Ticket to Europe by Act Zero is a redemption for its maker
PreMortem.Games
JANUARY 22, 2025
About the budget for the game: “It’s hard to say because me and my partner (Game Designer, Maciej Staczyk) have done a lot of unpaid work. In order to pay off his employees the studio started working as subcontractors on games like simulators. They experienced real tragedies, not me.
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Mystery investigation specialist EQ Studios “All our murder scenes are fictional”
PreMortem.Games
DECEMBER 8, 2023
This decision gave rise to The Painscreek Killings , a walking simulator detective game with a strong narrative focus. “We We welcomed the different ideas and incorporated them into the full game.” “We were short on talent and experience”, says Tomi. We started with something small – to find out the identity of the killer.
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Timing is Everything in Board Game Development
Brand Game Development
JUNE 23, 2017
I’m going to talk the importance of timing when you’re developing a board game. They include early game design, game tweaks, artwork, sample production, the game review process, Kickstarter preparation/campaigning/wrap-up, manufacturing, fulfillment, sales, and the marketing.
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We. The Refugees. Ticket to Europe by Act Zero is a redemption for its maker
PreMortem.Games
MARCH 17, 2023
About the budget for the game: “It’s hard to say because me and my partner (Game Designer, Maciej Stańczyk) have done a lot of unpaid work. In order to pay off his employees the studio started working as subcontractors on games like simulators. They experienced real tragedies, not me.” The Refugees.
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Marvel Snap is a testament to the power of ruleset design
Keith Burgun
DECEMBER 7, 2022
However, I quickly noticed that this was not your average mobile card game. And almost all of the things that make it “not your average mobile card game” are good old fashioned game design: bold, systemic decisions made surrounding the ruleset. In most CCGs, cards are typically extremely inefficient.
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How To Play-Test the Rules of Your Board Game
Brand Game Development
DECEMBER 11, 2017
Board game development is a very individual process. Every single developer has different methods for creating their games. This article is the sixth of a 19-part suite on board game design and development. Need help on your board game? Don’t be afraid to learn and change your game design.
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Harvest Island is a mix of farming and horror “I figured it’s a unique premise”
PreMortem.Games
OCTOBER 18, 2023
Harvest Island is a single-player farming simulator that allows players to farm, fish and pet all sorts of animals to their heart’s content. Something truly horrifying… Creator Kevin Le, working under the name of Yobob Games , carefully chose to combine a farming simulator with horror elements, after doing market research.
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5 Lessons I Learned at a Play-Testing Convention (Protospiel Atlanta)
Brand Game Development
OCTOBER 27, 2017
Of course, the flip side of this is that having your game examined by serial play-testers, game designers, and the occasional publisher makes for a far better test than 10 or 15 with your family, online through Tabletop Simulator, or even at your local game store. I think fostering creativity is that important.
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What is a Tabletop Game? This is Everything that Goes into Making a Board Game.
Brand Game Development
NOVEMBER 19, 2018
There are a lot of moving parts that go into making board games. Game Design. All games start with ideas. A designer usually starts with the simplest possible prototype – often either pen and paper or on an online testing tool such as Tabletop Simulator. until the game feels great.
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Building Hope shows what it takes to provide shelter for millions of refugees
PreMortem.Games
APRIL 19, 2023
Building and managing It prompted Ağaçdoğrayan to start his own game development studio Gyroscoping Games. Here, a core team of 3 people and quite a few outsourcing partners, work together on Building Hope – Refugee Camp Simulator. It’s a city-builder game that revolves around building and managing a refugee camp.
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Let’s say someone becomes a game developer, but realizes the gaming industry is not for them for whatever reason. What opportunities there for game developers, particularly designers, outside of the video game industry? I imagine one of them is your former job at the gambling industry.
Ask a Game Dev
DECEMBER 22, 2023
You are correct in that it is possible to transfer that body of knowledge over to the other gaming industry that is casino machines. Beyond that, here are some other roles that game design skills could transfer to. Tabletop, board, or card game design. It's still game design, just not in video games.
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VR and Galaxy's Edge
Game Design Aspect
JULY 22, 2020
In this article, game designer Sande Chen discusses the use of virtual reality in creating the theme park Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge. Years ago, I was interviewed by Disney Imagineering for an internal documentary on design. I pointed out that level designers of video games are often inspired by amusement parks.
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Forging Socio-Emotional Connections in Games
Game Design Aspect
JUNE 2, 2022
In this article, game designer Sande Chen relates important lessons learned from the design of that game company's games, Journey and Sky. The conversation really tied in with a previous panel topic at CIMFest, Designing Non-Toxic Game Communities. In Sky, Chen wanted to simulate social consequences.
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Why are there games without dedicated stealth mechanics that put in random stealth sections? Theres a fair number of times those situations either lack tools for the player to properly plan their route and identify threats (lack of a proper cover mechanic/corner look for example) or they lack proper detection for enemy units leading to immersion breaking behavior (no noise detection leading to a full sprint directly behind someone not being detected) and those types of things seem integral to a stealth style of game. While they can obviously be done well when done poorly they can feel like a very frustrating or out of place moment in an otherwise very good game.
Ask a Game Dev
JANUARY 28, 2025
Stealth doesn't tend to work super well as a mini-game - there's so much context to stealth and awareness that humans are intimately familiar with it, so most implementations of stealth tend to be very expensive in order to try simulating that kind of behavior.
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On the topic of “what the player is doing”, what do you feel about so called walking simulators? How does the design of a game where the player is largely is moving from point a to b is defined?
Ask a Game Dev
JUNE 21, 2024
Even in walking simulators, there's still the active element of moving around the environment and examining each item. The player retains agency in exploration games, even though there aren't too many other overt actions to take. Consider a "walking simulator" like The Talos Principle.
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Top Unreal Game Development Companies in 2024
Logic Simplified
APRIL 1, 2024
UE5’s features and functionality have further expanded to include experimental new features for rendering, animation and simulation. The potential for building epic games on Unreal by game app developers and creators across industries has increased. Research: Research is important to the game design process.
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How to Develop Visually and Physically Accessible Board Games
Brand Game Development
JANUARY 8, 2018
This article is the tenth of a 19-part suite on board game design and development. Need help on your board game? Join my community of over 2,000 game developers, artists, and passionate creators. Accessibility is a big issue in board gaming. Here’s an online tool you can use to simulate colorblindness.
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How to Learn Complex Material Quickly
Brand Game Development
MAY 12, 2017
Want to learn game development? Use BoardGameGeek’s database , blogs such as Stonemaier Games Kickstarter Lessons , Dice Tower videos , design books such as the Kobold Guide to Board Game Design , and even academic research papers (which you can find on Google Scholar ).
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A comprehensive guide to in-demand roles in film and games
CG Spectrum
JUNE 10, 2024
3D Modelling 3D Animation FX Concept Art 2D Animation Game Design Game Programming 3D Modelling: Shaping Virtual Worlds “3D modelling is a rewarding career where you get to bring concepts and 2D imagery to life, sculpting personality and story into characters, objects, and environments. What does an FX artist do?
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What is the best way to integrate a Cocos Creator project into a React mobile web app?
Cocos
JULY 8, 2024
I made a React TypeScript web game designed for mobile, which includes pages like the main menu, select character, and the core-game page. I also created a core-game project using Cocos Creator 3 and built it as a mobile web app. Are there any better way to integrate the Cocos core-game into my react web app?
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Wishlist STARS REACH and its living world
Raph Koster
JULY 3, 2024
To go beyond that, you have to simulate. But what is really going on is that we are pulling the evolved version of how the simulation worked in UO and SWG into 3d space. Meteors falling from the sky and leaving craters The approach in Stars Reach As the video describes, we are doing a cellular automata approach.
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How AI is Taking Over the Gaming Industry and What It Means for You with Adnan Chaumette
Game Dev Unchained
MAY 1, 2023
By leveraging machine learning algorithms, developers can create more accurate simulations of real-world physics, weather patterns, and even crowd behavior. Furthermore, the incorporation of AI-generated content in gaming can also have a significant impact on the educational and training sectors.
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The Future of Art & AI in Game Production
iXie gaming
MAY 24, 2023
More Realistic Gaming Online gaming companies stand to benefit significantly from the application of artificial intelligence (AI), particularly in the areas of simulation performance, graphic quality, and realism. The predictive skills of AI allow game makers to construct very realistic and immersive virtual gaming environments.
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People are Weird, Markets are Weirder…Especially with Board Games
Brand Game Development
AUGUST 17, 2020
If I had to make a few guesses, though, I’d say: Solo and 2-player games are going to be massive. Board games will overall surge in popularity, but not necessarily the ones that would sell out at cons. Virtual cons will fizzle, but Tabletop Simulator and Tabletopia will flourish. The point is: key your eyes open.
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How to develop a rich and immersive game world?
Logic Simplified
OCTOBER 23, 2023
However, creating a realistic gaming world needs planning, storylines, aesthetics, characters, visuals and sound design, as well as meticulous attention to detail and a thorough understanding of specific gameplay mechanics. But before that, let’s first understand what an immersive games world means.
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Birth of Byways: A Peek Into My Early Board Game Development Process
Brand Game Development
NOVEMBER 10, 2017
Dev Diary posts are made to teach game development through specific examples from my latest project: Highways & Byways. This week, I posted the first article in my 19-part suite on game design. It’s called How to Design the Core Engine of Your Board Game. Remember: this was before the game had a purpose!
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How to Create a Game-Ready AAA asset
Logic Simplified
AUGUST 5, 2024
The gun has metallic surfaces and I wanted that successfully simulated. I had to thoroughly learn Substance Designer. Substance Designer creates complex textures, which we call materials, and Substance Painter applies those materials to the model itself. If you’re looking for perfection, then this is the stage for it.
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The Key Differences Between 2D and 3D Animation in Game Development
Big Games
MARCH 28, 2025
Uses techniques like key framing, rigging, motion capture, and simulations to show movement. Immersive Worlds – This style provides a more immersive experience, especially in genres that require dynamic environments, such as action games, RPGs, or simulations. The environment is added with depth and volume for realism.
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What’s New In Unity 2023 – All You Need To Know
Logic Simplified
JULY 24, 2023
Improved HDRP Asset Import Times in Unity 2023 HDRP stands for “ High Definition Render Pipeline ”, a rendering technology designed by Unity to generate high-quality images in real-time applications, including games, simulations and interactive experiences. The latest update, Version 2022.2.11
Why Harvest Island is Different from the many Farming Genres
Yobob Games
AUGUST 9, 2022
In fact, there’s one game that comes close to it and it’s rune factory, but that’s a flip of a coin because the main goal of rune factory is to farm and get marry just like the other farming simulator. What I mean by a story driven farming simulator is that you have a centralized plot: beginning, middle, and end.
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The Role of Computer Science in Video Games
Game Designing
SEPTEMBER 30, 2023
A computer science degree teaches computer languages which is essential when designing games. Game designers must know various coding languages to create levels, interactions, progression, etc. Computer science in gaming will help you develop games. They turn the designer’s vision into a reality.
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Godot for AA/AAA game development - What's missing?
Mircosoft Game Dev
JANUARY 15, 2023
Many games still use this approach nowadays (after all, if it’s not broken, don’t fix it) but, increasingly, game design has been moving from “individual stages” to “open” or “continuous” worlds where the boundaries between levels disappear. Creating games this way is, as a result, more challenging.
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Schedule for GodotCon 2018 in Pozna?
Mircosoft Game Dev
OCTOBER 7, 2018
A quick set of patterns, tricks and rules that I like to keep in mind when I'm developing a game in Godot Engine. Talk: Nonconventional games: Godot in medical simulation | Ilaria Cislaghi ( QbieShay ). Godot is a powerful multipurpose engine that can be used for pushing the boundaries of medical simulation.
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Sandbox vs themepark
Raph Koster
SEPTEMBER 1, 2022
We used the term actively on MUD-Dev back in the day, making the distinction between simulation and “stagecraft.” MUD2 had far more simulation than MUDs did in the 90s … or any MMOs today! A key inspiration in the mid-90s was a game called DartMUD , which featured farming! UO had that for simulation reasons.
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