Yeah, I admit I totally missed the sarcasm. I think I ultimately agree with the point Maxwell was attempting to make, which is that “game writing” as we tend to think of it now — long cutscenes, or flowery speeches that interfere with the pacing of the game — is going to get more and more obsolete as we learn to better incorporate storytelling into game design. But he took such a torturous path to get there, with so many invalid assumptions, to the point that I have to read it and say, “Wait. Is this guy for real?”

And I agree that ultimately transparency is a good idea, which is why I said I didn’t want to be rude. But I have to say it did take me a minute to recognize the intent of your post. This is a VERY low-traffic blog, but I still get hit with enough spam bots that seem to be related to what I’m talking about, that it’s made me paranoid.

I was being sarcastic when I said he was tripping over his own words. You have to read between the lines to understand that Adam was frustrated by his past experience and in fact, as he admits, wants there to be more story in games. You and I both agree that he hasn’t quite grasped what a good writer can do.

I’m sorry you felt the post was self-promotional, but I always err on the side of transparency. It’s frustrating as a blog-reader to have to poke through someone’s about page and still not have a clear idea of what it is they do or offer. Better to expose bias than pretend you don’t have any.

And most of all, because his screed about how writers aren’t necessary is filled with typos and grammatical errors. Which is boneshatteringly awesome irony.

In the ideal case, you have a generalist who can do everything. That’s not often the case. These days, everyone’s role is substantially more specialized. I do no coding, art asset generation (beyond the prototype phase), music composition, or much of anything else beyond writing documents, and whiteboxing levels. But because I have some knowledge of the various other fields, I can interact with the specialists in those fields relatively fluidly. Without that knowledge, that communication would be a hell of a lot more difficult.

I think the weird thing is that game writing is a lot like making any other art asset - just because almost anyone *can* do it doesn’t mean they should. I can open up Photoshop and rejigger the HUD elements in the game to test something out quickly - but I’d never want to ship that stuff, because it lacks the attention to detail that the artist’s experience brings to the table. Same with the writing, same with the music - hell, even to some degree, same with the code.

So, yeah, it’s definitely about knowing your limitations - but that often requires being familiar with/good enough at something to actually be able to make a reasonable judgement about that. The thing with the whole designer/writer conflict - both sides think the other side’s job is easy, and as a result, that they’re disposable. But just because a job doesn’t require familiarity with an esoteric toolset doesn’t mean that it requires any less skill.

Seppo, I’d agree that it’s important for a game designer to have as broad a range of experience as possible, both to understand how the pieces of a game fit together and to be able to foster that communication that you’re talking about. But I also think that the “designers do everything” mentality is what drove a majority of the negative reaction to the original article. Generalization makes you better suited to be a long-term employee than a short-term one, and that’s true for anyone.

I’d hope that at least the lesson of that article isn’t just that “designers should appreciate and know how to talk to writers” but “writers should try to understand more about game design.” It’s also important to know your limitations, and accept that other people can bring skills to a project that you can’t. (That’s the general “you,” of course).

One of the basic things that I think makes the distinction easier to understand, for me, is that in my experience, it’s the designer who carries “the vision” of the project, and makes sure it can be turned into a reality. In that regard, the designer has to be a jack-of-all-trades, because he(or she) has to understand how the gameplay, art, writing, sound, music, and the technical limitations of the time all work together to make a compelling experience.

Sure, you *can* be a designer and have functionally no knowledge of programming/art/music/writing, but I would argue that in a medium that’s as integrated as videogames, you *aren’t* a good designer if you don’t have that knowledge, because you simply can’t integrate those things as well as someone who does have that knowledge.

For many years, I had what I thought was a serious problem: I know a reasonable amount about a lot of stuff, but was not a master of any of them. I’ve played many instruments for many years, and have a basic understanding of music theory, but I’m not a “musician.” I drew in my spare time for decades, but was never good enough to be an “artist.” I programmed a little in college, and was absolutely horrid at it, but eventually grasped the logical underpinnings. I’d certainly never amount to anything as a software engineer. Heck, I even minored in Film & Media Studies, hoping to find something in that umbrella that would allow me to use this broad knowledge to some reasonable end.

It wasn’t until well after I’d graduated that I finally figured out that game design is exactly what I’ve been looking for my entire life. On top of that, education as a Mechanical Engineer and experience with the actual regimented design process was extraordinarily useful, and for the few specific skills that are unique to game design, I quickly found a niche that I think I’m quite good at.

So, over the last six years, I’ve found that as a designer, the more knowledge you have, the better. The more breadth you have, the better you can integrate each of these things into your design. I can talk with a musician about the technical aspects of their composition, because I have that knowledge. I can talk to an artist about their silhouettes and color palette, because I have that knowledge. They can also talk to me in their language, and trust that I understand what they’re saying without dumbing it down (too much).

I don’t mean for this to be a huge, “Hey, check out all the stuff I can do!” post, but the point is that without this knowledge, I would have to operate blindly, hoping that I can talk to an artist and share the vision of the game - get them to internalize it to the point that they can really make it their own - without speaking their language.

Without experience in NaNoWriMo (I’m not going to pretend I’m a good writer, but I’m not a terrible one, either), I wouldn’t have the experience necessary to understand how *I* can integrate story into gameplay, or even talk to an external writer. If the writer has no game design experience, and I have no writing experience, then it’s going to be very, very difficult to get someone to really internalize the vision of the game. Because at least *I* can bring the “bridge” to the discussion, I’m on good footing. If you have two sides and no one can speak a common language, it’s really no wonder that the designers and writers have been at odds for the most part.

But yeah, when it comes back to it, it’s a shame that Maxwell wasn’t a better writer, or his post could actually have been interesting. Ah, well.