Game Development Documents
GözdeÇetin
• documentation does have a legitimate
place in the creation of modern computer
games, and it is the designer’s job to make
sure those documents are created,
maintained, and used effectively.
Document Your Game
• As a game designer, you will be primarily
concerned with what is commonly called the
design document.
• However, there are many other pieces of
documentation used in the creation of
modern computer games.
Concept Document, Pitch
Document or Proposal
• This document is shown to the money, the suits,
the decision makers, in order to convince them to
spend a lot of money on the idea, thereby
funding its development
• Writing a concept document can be quite a lot of
fun, since the writer gets to focus on the most
exciting parts of the game and does not have to
worry about all the messy details of actually
implementing the game.
Competitive Analysis
• The competitive analysis is another document
used in trying to sell your game.
• The competitive analysis then lists a number
of other games that have shipped in the
recent past that are similar to the proposed
game, and then describes how each of these
games performed (via average review score,
quotes from various reviews, and sales figures,
if available).
Design Document
• The design document’s goal is to fully describe
and detail the gameplay of the game.
• The design document needs to describe how
the game functions so that someone working
on the development team can see exactly
what he needs to create.
Flowcharts
• Flowcharts can be used to chart the areas the
players progress to and from in the game.
• Flowcharts can be either handmade or
developed using various flowchart creation
tools, such as Visio.
Sample Progress Flowchart
Story Bible
• A story bible, is a good place to document a
game’s potentially extensive back-story.
• On the other hand, even with a complex
game-world, you may not need a story bible at
all.
Script
• Dialogs and the accompanying descriptions of
the situations during which the dialog occurs
(stage directions) should be contained within
the game’s script.
For instance, here is an example of a script that
could be used for a cut-scene in an adventure
game:
• When the PLAYER approaches PAUL and SANDY after resurrecting
the TREE OF PLENTY, PAUL will be visibly thrilled at the player’s
arrival. He immediately bursts into effusive praise for the player’s
accomplishments:
• PAUL: That’s just the solution we have been praying for! You have
saved our great Tree, and nothing we can do could ever thank you
enough. Please accept this token of our appreciation...
• PAUL tosses a BAG OF FLIMFLAMS at the player’s feet. SANDY steps
forward:
• SANDY: [Apologetically] We know it’s not much, but . . .
• PAUL: [Interrupting] It’s all we have!
• SANDY: [Cowering] Please do not hate us for our poverty. . .
• If players have branching conversations, the
script will need to take on a special form.
• Here a script might use small amounts of
pseudocode, using IF-THEN-ELSE or SWITCHtype syntax to communicate when the players
would hear different pieces of dialog.
Returning to our adventure game
example
• IF
The player asks about “FLIMFLAM”:
PAUL: A FlimFlam is a drop of dew, fallen from the morning sky,
carefully wrapped in a baby leaf from the Tree of Plenty. It has
special curative properties for Humanoids, when rubbed on the back
of the neck.
• IF
the player asks about “TREE” OR “PLENTY”:
PAUL: The Tree of Plenty has been my people’s source of life since
before any of us can remember. Without the shade it provides, my
people grow exhausted in the noonday sun. Without its leaves,
we have nothing to eat. Without its strength, my people are weak.
• DEFAULT
if the player asks about anything else:
PAUL: I do not know of what you speak, stranger. We are not the
most intelligent of peoples; we are not as wise as a great traveler,
such as yourself.
• Games that feature a lot of branching
conversations, such as Deus Ex, often include
a scripting language specifically for
implementing the dialog.
Art Bible
• The art bible is often composed primarily of
concept sketches and other resources that
artists can refer to as they are working on
creating various visual assets for the game.
• The art bible is usually not compiled or written
by the designer, but instead by the lead artist
working with his team.
The Game Minute
• The game minute is typically a one- to threepage document that describes in detail a short
section of gameplay.
Storyboards
• Storyboards are an established film and
television device for sketching or mocking-up
shots before they are actually filmed.
• Sometimes when people get overly excited by
storyboarding a game it can be another case
of movie envy, where developers actually
wish they were filmmakers.
Technical Design Document
• A technical design document (TDD) is the
sister specification to the design document.
Whereas the design document focuses on
how the game will function, the technical
design document discusses how that
functionality will be implemented.
• The document may include the overall code
structure, what major classes will be used,
descriptions of the rendering architecture,
details of how the AI will function, and any
amount of other implementation-side
information. Pseudocode is appropriate,
though not required.
Schedules &
Business/Marketing Documents
• Business-oriented information is neither
appropriate in the design document, nor does
it belong in any of the other documents we
have discussed, except for the concept
document.
• It is best to separate out such marketing plans
and business data into distinct documents,
where the people concerned with such
information can best review it.
No Standard Documentation
• Some teams may split the design document
into two documents, one containing only
gameplay information and the other
containing only story and level progression
descriptions.
• Some development teams may create only a
design document, having no need for a story
bible.
The Benefits Of Documentation
• Beyond making the suits happy, good
documentation really can help make your
game better, regardless of whether you are
developing it alone in your basement or with a
team of thirty other developers.
Thank You.