From Gaming to Game Designing

By Vineet Raj Kapoor

Game Design and Development is a field for highly creative and passionate people. It’s for those who enjoy the development of a dream without knowing how people will respond to it. The field is quite like film making with the difference being that the audience here (the player) is going to interact with this dream and the response would be more direct than that of a film-goer. Unlike films, gaming is not a one-time experience that one can forget about. It is more about buying into your vision, and thus it takes much more involvement.

Applications/uses of Game Design

• Education/ Infotainment (e-learning)
• Learning (e.g. scrabble)
• Entertainment (popular console and arcade games)
• Franchise module (big movie franchises include games)
• Training (on use of machines e.g. airplane pilot)
• Simulation (e.g. disaster response)
• Therapy (for psychiatry patients)
• Experience (4D/ 5D setups worldwide)
• Visualization (for expensive operations e.g. military response or space satellite)

Game Design and Development as a career option

Let me state very clearly – All creative careers are about passion and involvement. It is just not about rewards alone. So only those who are risk takers and don’t worry about trying something 50 times to get it right, should opt for this field. No wonder, usually all creative people bloom late.

Skills/aptitude required for the job

Best is if you’ve designed games before getting into learning gaming. If you’ve not tried to rewrite rules for every game you play (be it cricket or anything) then you’re not a game designer at heart. However, gaming does require good programmers and designers who may not be game level designers so then one can concentrate on these areas. Also you must have passion for playing all kinds of games including card games, dice games, sports etc. Usually game designers are passionate about sports and are competitive at every game they play.

How can one become a Game designer/ developer?

If you have the analytical ability shrouded in your creative aptitude, you could be an ambi-brain person who can design games and other complex systems since your brain can process numbers and images with equal ease. Game Designing is one of the toughest tasks in the world.

Firstly, to become a Game Level Designer you must have a passion for game design. where you design the game itself, i.e. what happens on each level, and how things go about as well as the base story of the game. It is a stage that you reach due to your vast knowledge and passion that even exceptional technical skills cannot help you reach. This is usually the story designer. Also you must have passion for playing all kinds of games including card games, dice games, sports etc.

 The second option is Game Art Design (it's different from Game Design or Level Design), where you design all the Graphics, Interface, Textures and Lighting. You even Animate.
To become a Game Art Designer, you must have a good knowledge of 3D software as well as preproduction. Usually in Games the environment is created in 3DSMax and Character animations in Maya, only the models are made with fewer polygons and more textures. So choose a program that teaches you these softwares.  It would not matter whether the programme is called a game design programme or not.

The third option is to become a Game Developer/ Programmer. Now there are two paths to becoming a Game Developer. The traditional path has been C, C++ (now the path includes C#). However, things are changing fast and even leading games come to be made in Game Engines. The most prominent Engines are Unreal, Gamebryo, Cry Engine and Unity. The first three are easier and have better graphics facilities, but unity takes over when converting games for mobiles.

There are very few centres which have a course to cater to these needs. I believe DSK, Arena and AIGA have programs covering these. For e.g. there is a Program GAD (Game Art and Design) at Arena which covers all three paths. This is being run at Arena Chandigarh and some other centres only.

Pros and cons of the job

Game designing is a high risk job where you can remain anonymous all your life, or get instant glory. It is usually recommended only for brave-hearts.

 You get to be in the centre of action all your life. The days of your life are never going to be the same!

Growth prospects

Gaming is a new industry in India, and the prospects are good in terms of being able to work on games being made elsewhere. About our own IPs, we’re at the moment quite far from adequate. So barring a title here and there it’s going to be outsourced or collaborated games for the next few years.

The sector is growing at a rate of 30% (as per 2012 figures). However, industry estimates show that this would grow by an average of 38% over the next four years. What’s funny is that these figures don’t even seem to include Internet gaming, which is the biggest growth driver. However, if they’ve included it in PC then it’s faulty since Internet gaming is a huge phenomenon.

 (Chart prepared as per various sources including FICCI-KPMG report and NASSCOM report)

Pay scale:

The pay scale ranges from Rs 8,000-25,000 per month depending on the artists/ programmer’s background.

Some of the best institutes to study Game design

• Gobelins, France
• Vanarts, Canada
• DSK Superinfocomm
• Arena Animation (GAD)
• AIGA

Check with the above institutes on what they offer and also look at where you want to go. Then depending on that choose a course in Design, Programming or Game Designing. Mainly it’s about how you are able to join the dots differently from others. This is not a field for risk averse people. You can take any approach to get there as long as you keep making games and (mostly) failing at them, that’s the only way you get to make a game that would surprise the market.

How to be a good Gamer?

Shut out everything that distracts you – Internet, Mobile, TV, Video Games. Shut them out from your life. If you’re reading this, you’d had enough of what they could give to you. They are more dangerous than dope! Now that you have time, you’d be able to read and understand and implement other suggestions in this article into your life and become good at anything you do.

Any entrance exams to prepare for?

 Not yet. We’re not there yet, where we have a queue and we need a gate. Right now, the gaming field is wide open for the first few Indian companies to take shape.

About the author:

Vineet Raj Kapoor

Vineet Raj Kapoor is a Game Designer. He has been associated with the delivery of Game Design curriculum at Arena Chandigarh while remaining focused on making Games under the aegis of his studio. Currently, he is working with a UK based company on a 3D Game which is supposed to be one of the first mainstream 3D Games out of India at this level. Kapoor is also working on a card game “POW” (Prisoners of war) for 8-15 year old boys.