The Art Of Computer Game Design

This developing revolution has nothing to do with the rapid technological developments of the last few years. While technological improvements will surely continue, we are no longer hampered primarily by the limitations of the hardware. Our primary problem is that we have little theory on which to base our efforts. We don?t really know what a game is, or why people play games, or what makes a game great. Real art through computer games is achievable, but it will never be achieved so long as we have no path to understanding. We need to establish our principles of aesthetics, a framework for criticism, and a model for development. New and better hardware will improve our games, but it will not guarantee our artistic success any more than the development of orchestras guaranteed the appearance of Beethoven. We are a long way from a computer game comparable to a Shakespeare play, a Tchaikowsky symphony, or a Van Gogh self portrait. Each of these artists stood on the shoulders of earlier artists who plunged into an unexplored world and mapped out its territories so that later artists could build on their work and achieve greater things. We computer game designers must put our shoulders together so that our successors may stand on top of them. This book is my contribution to that enterprise.

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