Eugene Shevchenko, Game Designer, Gameloft

1. Game Designer's point of view:
Want to be a better developer — play!
Eugene
Shevchenko,
GAMELOFT

2. Disclaimer
All the trademarks mentioned belong to their owners
and are used in this presentation only as the
educational example

3. •
5 years of experience
•
WAP, Browser, Mobile games
About the speaker:

4. How long are you in gamedev?
•
Just going to
•
Less than 2 years
•
2+ years

5. Why?
Link Link
●
Game dev is far away of
your dreams of it
●
Games can be usefull in
learning

6. Profit?
Game Consumer Game Developer

7. Experience takeaway
Most important
everyday skills:
●
Communication
●
Systems view
●
Time management

8. Communication
•
Wording makes
a difference
•
Context is important
•
Be constructive!
Clipart
Senseless and merciless

9. COMMUNICATION:
Don'ts
•
Never rage
•
Listener is not idiot
•
Bring details only when
asked

10. COMMUNICATION:
What to play?
Chinese whispers
/ Telephone
MMORPG raiding

11. COMMUNICATION:
My experience
Guild Wars 2:
●
Party dungeons
●
One awful player
●
But she is a girl,
everybody loves
●
Challenge:
not to butt-hurt

12. System view
•
Complex – is the unity
of simple
•
Any methodology
of software
development is
systematic

13. SYSTEM VIEW:
Don'ts
•
Don't overcompicate (KISS)
•
Don't try to 'fix', when you
don't understand

14. SYSTEM VIEW:
Games
Construction set Minecraft

15. SYSTEMS VIEW:
My experience
Dark Souls 2:
●
You have to learn
under the stress
●
You have to
remember everything
●
More challenge?

16. Time management
•
Skill of completing
task due to date
•
Skill of making
precise estimations
•
Skill of building
pipelines with others

17. TIME MANAGEMENT:
Don'ts
•
Don't do everything at the
last moment
•
Don't waste time on
unimportant (prioritize
and optimize)
•
Don't hesitate to add
'Producers coefficient'
to your estimate

18. TIME MANAGEMENT:
How to evolve?

19. TIME MANAGEMENT:
Games
Planning poker Darkest dungeon

20. TIME MANAGEMENT:
My experience
Albion Online
●
You can do
everything
●
Pick one or level-up
for 10 years
●
Challenge: stop
collecting trash

21. OTHER TOOLS:
English

22. OTHER TOOLS:
Drawing
Frank Ching,
Prof. Emeritus at
the University of Washington
„The active seeing [..] can
often lead to better
understanding and more
vivid visual memories.“

23. OTHER TOOLS:
Gamer’s diary
•
Note important /
interesting stuff while
playing
•
Develop the rules
of noting

24. OTHER TOOLS:
Engines

25. Summary
•
Communication, Systems view & Time management are
the most important skills for a game developer
•
To practice Communication:
play MMO's with the people you don't like
•
To practice Systems view:
play hardcore, complicated games with a 10+h tutorial
•
To practice Time management:
play sandbox games and try to progress inside
the time frame

26. QUESTIONS?
Thank you!