Rob Wells and Chris McCoy guest lecture report

 

During Rob and Chris’ guest lecture they talked about their experiences in the gaming industry and a variety of things. Rob Wells talked about what it’s like to trying to get a job in the gaming industry, addressing what to put in the CV, the cover letter and what to point in your portfolio and how important it is to network properly. Chris McCoy talked about what it is like being a games designer, talking about games design document (GDD), how to go about researching things you’ll need or want to know for making the game and how to communicate with both colleagues and fans.

 

One topic I found interesting of the lecture was Chris McCoy’s opinions on the games design documents and how they fit into game development. Chris brought up the point that the games design document isn’t the be all and end all of what the game is to be and what needs to be done, it’s also a guideline and can be changed if needs be. I started thinking about this and have to agree with Chris as I believe that the games design document isn’t the final say on what the game will be. As you make the game you might come across things that won’t work and things that will work better than other things, but if you don’t change it because the games design document sates otherwise you run the risk of creating a bad game.

 

This leads into something Chris said that games design documents are pretty much redundant when being used within the studio. As they need to be changed frequently and also needs to be altered for each department so it clearly shows what people need to do. However games design document are great for publisher so you can show what your game will be and it’ll be impressive to show you have everything in order.

 

Guest lecture reference:

Wells,R. McCoy,C.2015.Life as a Games Coder & Being a Games Designer.GAM5000 Games Design. Friday 1st May, University of Bolton.