Andrew Rollings and Ernest Adams on Game Design

Chapter 2. Game Concepts

This chapter addresses the earliest stage of game design: getting and refining an idea for a game. Your goal at this point should be to write the high-concept document that we described in Chapter 1, “What Is Game Design?.” To do this, you don't have to have all the details worked out yet. But you do need a clear understanding of what your game is about, and you must answer certain essential questions. When you've answered those questions to your satisfaction and have written down the answers, you have turned your idea into a game concept. At the end of this chapter, we've included a worksheet to help you out.