The Art of Game Design | Jesse Schell, Christopher Alexander and the Architecture of Video Games

The Art of Game Design is a book by Jesse Schell, which aims to establish a language for the design of games. Inspired by Christopher Alexanders a pattern language, it presents a series of lenses that allows designers to shift their perspective on creation when they might be going astray. This video summarizes many of the findings of Jesse schell, as well as the vernacular many other designers have established in design. However, what Schell alludes to , and what Alexander more explicitly explores, is the understanding that there is an even higher purpose to design than just the creation of games or architecture. It is about the creation, perpetuation and persistence of life.

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- The Art of Game Design Jesse Schell

- A Pattern language Christopher Alexander

- Game Feel Steve Swink

-A Theory of Fun, Raph Koster

- Game Mechanics Advanced Game Design

-Advanced Game Design : A Systems Approach Micheal Sellers

-The Nature of Order Christopher Alexander

- The Nature of order in Game Narrative Jesse Schell

- Jonathan Blow The Medium is the message

-Brian Sutton Smith The Ambiguity of Play

- At home in the universe Stuart Kauffman

-The Web of life Fritjof Capra

-From Bacteria to Bach and Back Daniel Dennett

-I am A strange loop Douglas Hofstader

- Hearts and Minds Frank Lantz

[baptistelasbats]

Your words at 18:00 are gold. Video games are not meant to be fun, neither deep, nor to promote challenge, exploration, creation or socialization. All those goals can be reached by the medium, but none are intrinsically more important than the others.

Gameplay, writing, realisation and story are all tools serving goals, and can only be judged on the way they contribute to the goal of the game they're in. The first thing creators should do when imagining their games is to set the list of objectives they want to reach, and then to make sure that all the parts of their games, and especially what the player does, contributes to reach those goals.

The incapacity of building games around a creative vision, the focus on the tools rather than objectives and the underground assumption gameplay can only be judged on its value to create fun is what leads so many AAA titles to feel so dissonant and forgettable. Hopefully it will change.

[phyliamorus]

As a designer, I think of design, no matter the medium, is an active process of human beings to engage with / manipulate nature, environments, objects to ultimately express life, or as you say, "perpetuating humans". Reflection, is the other side of the coin, and together with design create a loop of processes through which we fulfill our fundamental need of self-expression, individually and collectively. Somehow, extroverts and young people more likely to engage in the former, and older, or introverted people tend to engage in the latter more frequently. But both processes should be engaged back to back in order to fulfill and strengthen each other and make our expressions as human beings more complete.
Yours is an excellent essay connecting these different fields of work by into a coherent picture of purposedful human activity.

[tristanneal]

I have a degree in Genetics and Cellular Biology, and one of the central tenants we were taught is that form = function. It is absolutely true that the shape, appearance, and form of something reflect its function. The separation between the two is definitely a human construct

[manuchi_herrjea]

Your videos are already amazing by themselves, and after each one there's an immense amount of beautiful material to keep digging in. I have no idea how you're making so many at such a speed. Absolutely love your channel.

[hemangchauhan]

That book covered a lot of ground, its fascinating!

[Ishallseeyourdemise]

That's some high quality, thought-provoking content. I learned a lot. This deserves a lot more views.

[Visigoth_]

💛💛💛💛 I feel like a tool... but I can't help but *gush* with happiness at how much I enjoyed this video.
Long-form analysis and deep thought towards game design really sucks me in.
Great job 👏

[randomutubr]

Man, what a great video. Very thought provoking.

[ariamohebi]

I agree with the comment at the bottom.
"The Game Overanalyser love it"

[mangirdasbalciunas]

I actually never leave comments in YouTube, but you deserve one. I love topics and deep insights from your videos as well as soothing voice. Although, as I noticed in one of the comments, that it would be good to highlight important points and keep consistent structure of content between videos, because it is very interesting to follow the topics, it may be a bit hard to take away main ideas/points and retain them. Keep up the great work and thanks for valuable content :).

[DoomCatcher]

Your videos deserve way more views, do you have anymore content in this book? I read it years ago and found it very useful and I'd like more complimentary content

[DimTheDim]

Awesome thoughtful content, wow! Thank you

[AndresCiambotti]

It would be amazing if you could do a video analysis like this but on Chris Barney's 'Pattern Language for Game Design'. Thanks for this great video essay on Schell's great book!

[elisavbizau]

A bit of music in the background might create a more pleasant atmosphere. An idea. Love yours vids man. much love

[yoshikischmitz]

RE: 8:50
1. It's important to keep in mind Christopher Alexander is *not* talking about art. He's talking about structures people live in - rooms, buildings, and towns. Art can be as purposeful or as purposeless as it wants to be. But a building where people live in has a material responsibility to its inhabitants well-being that imo doesn't have a strong parallel in art.
2. It's clearly stated in A Pattern Language that the pattern language they came up with is just *one possible* pattern language, and one suited only to the culture and geography they are familiar with. They make it clear in The Timeless Way and APL that new pattern languages need to be developed by the people of the land where it'll be used.

[danielvutran]

Holy shit - I love this Chris guy, I'd love to talk about him or with him about Yogic ( Which is what he is trying to or may have found in his Journey )

[NIMLYN]

Hey, I really like your videos. I love the deep dive into very low level topics in game design and how you draw the connection between different frameworks, opinions and philosophies.

However there is one little thing that makes me space out while watching. I find it difficult to follow your train of thought. Sometime it is hard to understand, what you are leading up to and what the structure of this video is.

I believe it would help me if you show a little excerpt in the beginning where you say, what this video is about, what the structure is and a rough outline of the conclusion. During the video you can show when a new chapter starts. This would help guide my attention and keep me engaged. (maybe that's just me though).
For reference, have a look at GMTK or Extra Credits, they do a really good job here.

But again, i like the videos a lot! Good job!

[whitelion]

Great video, maybe you could've added a light music background to keep people interested.

[uziao]

thank you very much from Brasil, I am a poet and editor and i am creating a digital interactive narrative with 2d topdown view rpg style :)

[FlareGunDebate]

Blow is a good programmer but his creative work is sophomoric and his views underdeveloped. Even this talk "The Medium Is the Message" is lifted directly from Marshall McLuhan. Alan Moore made a similar observation decades ago about comic books. Blow's thesis is completely baseless too. The reason TV got better in the 80's and 90's was a byproduct of antitrust laws passed in the 70's that broke up monopolies. It's well documented. Sorry this is a awesome video I just don't want Blow being lumped in with these actual thinkers. Thanks for the great work.