the.com/game design
engineering fun with rules, feedback loops, and just enough frustration to feel earned.
means the craft of building the rules, systems, and choices that make a game meaningful to play, not just possible to play.
from grew out of toy making and tabletop rule-writing, then got formalized as arcades and video games needed people who understood systems, not just code or art.
not codingdesigners often never touch the engine directly.
core loopthe tiny repeated action a whole game is built on.
tetris ruledesigned to be learnable in seconds, unmasterable for decades.
playtestingmost design happens after the first version already exists.
for instance
tetris — alexey pajitnov, 1984, one rotating loop still addictive today.
dark souls — miyazaki's difficulty curve became its own genre, soulslike.
magic the gathering — richard garfield's 1993 mana system still copied everywhere.
portal — valve turned one verb, the portal gun, into a full arc.