game design theory, concepts and techniques
It’s 10:15am on Saturday, and William Osman takes the Main Stage at Open Sauce along with Kevin, NileRed and Allen Pan. The four YouTubers, who are known for posting science-related content to their individual channels, frequently collaborate on a podcast called Safety Third. While Osman takes the lead on Open Sauce, having spearheaded the event since its debut in 2023, these four creators appear…
The latest controversial change to Disneyland was unveiled today, and it s a skeleton that moves in the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. And the issue isn t the new animatronic: the technology looks sophisticated and the scene is funny enough. The real problem is the storytelling. Fantasy author Brandon Sanderson breaks down storytelling into three pillars: plot, character and setting. While there…
Moleskine, the notebook company, today announced their new The Lord of the Rings collection. Posts on their website and social media show a set of notebooks and planners, along with merchandise (pins, patches, stickers and postcards) with colourful Lord of the Rings artwork. The problem? A small disclaimer on some of the images reads, Imagined by Moleskine, generated by AI. I have used Moleskine…
If you re looking to experience the thrill of the television show The Traitors, here are several game recommendations. I ve included some game design thoughts with each choice listed below as it compares to the gameplay of The Traitors. However, if you want to skip all that and just need, say, a Christmas present for the Traitors fan in your life, the whole list is at the top. Mafia/Werewolf The…
In my previous post in The Game Design of Taskmaster series, I wrote about the probability of two contestants making the same choice. This post will take a step back and focus on the concept of meaningful choices. A game is a system that responds to a series of choices made by the player. Here, I will use the term meaningful choices to refer to choices that affect the state of the game. This rules…
While games typically reward players for making the most efficient choice to accomplish a goal, there are a few tasks in Taskmaster that penalise contestants for choosing to do the same thing as someone else. These tasks are interesting because they require players to make their choices based on two criteria instead of one, weighing the effectiveness of choosing the most optimal method with the…
Indirect control is one of my favourite topics in game design, and it s no surprise that it can be found in the tasks in the television game show Taskmaster. But, first, what is indirect control? Game designer Jesse Schell describes indirect control in The Art of Game Design as giving the player the feeling of freedom, when in reality, the designer is only providing the player with very little…
Let s start with this statement: Taskmaster is not a game. It is a comedy panel television show, with a format that lends itself to incorporating game elements in the form of tasks. This means that the audience for Taskmaster is the viewer (the person at home watching the show), rather than the player (the comedian participating in the tasks). This critical distinction provides some interesting…
Taskmaster. The incredibly popular British panel game show pits five comedians against each other in a series of ludicrous tasks, and has gained a massive following around the world. Going into its eighteenth series this autumn, the original television series devised by Alex Horne has spawned international versions, multiple podcasts, a board game, a VR game and a very passionate fanbase, all with…