Working Hard? Hardly Working? Why settle for one when you can do both?
Oliver Richard Clarke-McCullagh
Having graduated Oxford Brookes University with a 2.1 (Honors) in Computer Science (BSc), I have yet to put my qualification to use in a professional capacity. I have however been working on experimental and conceptual games in order expand my portfolio
I spend my free time playing games, both video and table-top, on my own and with friends. I find this is not only a good way to relax and bond with others; but it also acts as good market research for the approaches of other developers, as well as for the current and ever changing trends within the industry
The most important part of a game's design is to match the aesthetics to the game-play, for it is ultimately the synergy between the game-play and the aesthetic design that keeps players immersed in a game. As such I start any project with a robust set of game-mechanics, around which the aesthetics are designed. This approach does result in many projects looking relatively unappealing for a good portion of their development and testing, but results in a more cohesive product on the whole.
The longest and hardest part of project's development is always the testing and tuning. I usually find myself focusing more on testing the technical aspects of the product, rather then the more heuristic qualities, such as the feel of the movement, or pacing of progress. The testing of Level Design is particular difficult, as your experience as the designer of the level can be vastly different to that of the players. To overcome this issue, I have close friends play test my games at regular intervals, and other less close friends to play the near finished versions.