STAFF PROFILE: STEVE, GAME DESIGNER (cont.)
So in September 1997 my life changed completely when I started work for Rare. I was initially a games tester but a short time later I was promoted to designer and have since been privileged to work on Banjo-Tooie, Perfect Dark and Grabbed by the Ghoulies in that capacity. In a fun sideline I've also got to stand in the on-site recording studio and blather on in all manner of silly voices for the majority of Rare's recent titles.
What do you do day to day?
That pretty much depends on what phase of development the game is in. In the early stages there's a fair bit of gazing out of the window at the flora and fauna (trees, pheasants, squirrels, etc.) while thinking up ideas. This progresses to typing up all the worthy ideas, having discarded and tried to forget about the rubbish ones, into detailed design documents and sketches, before passing them on to the artists and engineers. The point being that the artists and engineers transform these words of wisdom into actual gaming magic.
All the while the designers try to ensure that the game navigates its way along the right course without running into too many obstacles along the way. Custom in-game editors are created to enable the designers to add and tweak the content of the game. This involves all manner of things from setting up levels and baddies (the official technical term for those in-game things that try to kill you and generally ruin your day) to balancing gameplay to writing dialogue. All the while, design documentation continues whenever new software needs to be written to facilitate new features. The latter days of the development cycle are by far the busiest and eventually all content is added and tweaked, the bugs are fixed and everyone goes home. Time from start to finish? Ooh, two and a half years on average. |
