Update: Richard Garriott: "Most Game Designers Really Just Suck"

[TotalerKrieger]

While his credibility is hindered by the sheer arrogance of his statements, I think Garriott's core argument is valid. While I know very little about game design itself, I often find many recent games, even those I enjoyed, to be rather shallow and lazy in terms of the ideas explored or game mechanics pioneered. There is a definite lack of artistic vision and creativity in the modern games industry. It is sort of like games are in a rut similar to the early "talkie" era of film.

Peter Molyneux, for example, while often found out to be an embellisher and outright liar, IMO, had a clear artistic vision for each of the products he created (except maybe Fable 3). They have almost always failed to achieve this vision in some way, but it clear that new ideas were at least attempted (technological/financial/time constraits have held back most of his games IMO).

 

[Weaver]

I actually agree with him. A lot of designers now-a-days are bloody horrible save for a few. If every designer was a Sid Meier, a Will Wright or a Shigeru Miyamoto games would be a lot better.

 

[viking97]

Can I be honest here? He doesn't sound all that off the mark. I don't really know that I'd say Mr. British is one of the greats, (never played a game of his) but yeah his comment about medal of honor seems about right. Many games do seem to created with changing one aspect about another game in mind.

 

[Jzolr0708]

Did our good friend Richard Garriot forget about Tabula Rasa, a game so poorly designed and boring that it makes Desert Bus seem action packed?

 

[Frozengale]

Here's a little bit of clarification from Garriot himself. He posted a rebuttal on Gamasutra's article about this

While I appreciate those of you who read the whole thing, to see better the whole context, even still, this article is skewed to make a sensationalist slant. My point was, that game design is the hardest, but also the most valuable skill to build in the industry. That every company lives and dies based on the talent of its game design team, and that as an industry we are not doing so well creating the talent we need in this industry, because educational systems have not caught up in this area as well as programming and art. I was not trying to toot my own horn, rather state that game design is hard. Ah well.

 

[axlryder]

Phrasing aside, I'm inclined to agree. A lot of game design just seems half-hearted these days. I don't even mind highly derivative, but there's a general lack of creativity and thought put into a lot of games.

Also, I get the feeling that he was more trying to say "I'm one of the best game designers I know. Isn't that shitty? There should be more good ones".

 

[ThriKreen]

I kinda agree with him. It's the homogenisation of the roles that is a huge problem. Instead of people being allowed to excel in one arena and really push the boat out in it, they have to spread themselves too thin and dabble in everything.

Actually I think he's saying the opposite - it's the specialization that's the problem, and having a wider berth of skill would do people better in the long run.

An art or sound person would want to make great visuals or audio, but that doesn't necessarily translate into a great game.

A writer would want a great story, but might end up making really bad exposition dialogue, as they're more interested in pushing the story than letting the player get involved and immersed into the environment.

A programmer would like to make a great game engine, but again, that's just the engine, need to make things to show it off.

A designer would MIGHT make good gameplay mechanics, assuming he doesn't just recycle existing stuff, but might not leverage the other aspects of the game to supplement what he's doing.

Someone who is well versed in all those disciplines though, can mix and exploit them to produce truly memorable scenarios.

The closest role could think of nowadays are technical artists (like me!) since we often have to talk to almost every department - what does the writer intend, how is the designer utilizing the environment, making sure art is filling the requirements, and making sure programming is having it work as intended. Don't touch sound as often though. But we're usually in a support role, not making the game.

 

[Senare]

Yes, I think that he is absolutely right in that the educational system has not quite caught up with how to educate good game designers. Having a game design degree means something for sure, but there is so much else that must come together to make a good game designer - so much that it is almost better spent time to push yourself to churn out games, exchange ideas and learn on your own than to en-roll a college. (I think the best way is to do both, but the latter will mean more in terms of skill.)

 

[Garland]

I thought Humility was one of the virtues...

 

[DiamanteGeeza]

I've worked in this industry (not as a designer) for well over 20 years, and although he over simplified the issue, and delivered the message in a horribly insulting way, he is partly correct. It has nothing to do with laziness, though, and more to do with the fact that designing a good game is really hard, and the vast majority of people - whether they like playing games or not - simply don't have the natural ability.

Designing a game, or even placing things in a level, is very rarely something that can be learned if you have absolutely zero skill in that area (in the same way not everyone can learn to be a good racing driver or a good soccer player). You have to have the right sort of brain wiring (in the same way that a programmer or artist does), and have the passion to nurture that wiring into something that can create ideas and level designs that become good, and overcome your failures and learn from them - it's very unusual to lay out a level the first time and get it right. It takes a long time and a lot of skill, as well as natural ability. These university courses that 'teach' people how to 'design games' are just a way of making money, and produce very little decent output unless that person already had it within them to begin with.

Another problem is where many designers come from. It's typically that, say, Bob from QA has been with 'x' developer for lots of years and wants a promotion and get into game development. Oh! I know, let's make him a level designer. I've worked with some great level designers and scripters over the years, and I've also worked with terrible ones, but none of them have been in the least bit lazy.

There are other factors, of course: technology limitations, publisher limitations, license restrictions, time constraints, bad tools, and so on.

In summary: he is partly right. There are designers that suck. There are also designers (more than just 3 that he named) that don't suck, and some that are really, really good. But it's the same thing for programmers, artists, producers, studio heads, technical directors, and so on... some suck, some don't. One other thing to note is that it's quite hard, when interviewing, to know if the designer in front of you is any good or not. Artists have portfolios that give you a clue, programmers can take tests, but for a designer? There's not much you can do to vet them other than take their word for successes on their resume.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

It's been 20 years since the guy made anything worth mentioning.

20 years and a lot of failures. Of course you can attribute the MMO explosion to UO... if you want to go that route. But all in all, the guy is loony. After his space trip was announced I got the feeling he thought he was better than everyone else on this planet. This interview shows that I was right.
Gasbag ego. I've always wondered if he and Peter Moleneux get together on occasion...

 

[DiamanteGeeza]

The other problem is that the only jobs you ever really see advertised the majority of the time are for coders and artists. What about EVERYTHING else that goes into making a game? That is the reason games to tend to have such poor stories, for example. The companies don't hire writers (and if they do it's from the same tiny circle) they just leave it to coders who have spare time to knock together some dialogue.

There are plenty of adverts for the other disciplines involved, but mainly in our industry magazines.

It's interesting that you bring up writing because, just like designing, writing a good story and good dialog is hard! It's not usually programmers who end up writing the dialog; it often falls to... the guy on the team who is most vocal about watching lots of movies. And, in the same way that playing lots of games does not make you a game designer, watching lots of movies does not make you a good writer.

That's why, for so many years (and mostly still today, although we're slowly getting better), the stories of games make no sense, are impossible to follow or care about, and have utterly atrocious dialog! It's something many of us in the industry are horribly embarrassed about, but much of it comes down to money (again). A good writer is expensive, and just because they've written a good movie script doesn't mean they're going to write a good game story. So, finding someone who can do both is hard and even more expensive! The budget of a game rarely has much (if anything) put aside for hiring writers (a big mistake) because publishers want to squeeze development costs down as much as possible (another big mistake) and, decent budget for a writer is usually the first to go. If it was even there in the first place.

It's really sad and is slowly starting to change, but not quick enough.

 

[synobal]

Dude has to make a game with in the last ten years I think to be able to criticize people. This just come off as an old guy complaining about those youngsters to me.

 

[Revnak_v1legacy]

Seriously guys, what is it with this site and getting more focused on personalities than points? The guy's right, we can't just keep blaming publishers when the fact of the matter is that a huge segment of the blame should fall squarely on the designers. Just taking a short glance on some of the obvious follow the leader indy games should be enough to show us that it's not just publishers that desire to keep making the same shit a million times over. There really are designers who's real ambition is to make a game like CoD but- and all that that entails, and that is something that does need to be dealt with as well. Game design shouldn't be about recycling game mechanics with just enough changes to call it your own, but so far it seems to be about that. It should be about using mechanics both new and old to achieve a desired effect, and using critical thinking when considering how and when to apply them.

 

[Scars Unseen]

I'm amused that people expected someone that calls himself "Lord British" to be humble.

 

[marurder]

"I've met virtually no one in our industry who I think is close to as good a game designer as I am,"

Dare him to say that before the kickstarter goal was met.

That said, as the poster 2 posts above noted. The quote was edited. Which is pretty sleazy of TheEscapist.

 

[Zen Bard]

I was with Garriott right up until he cited Peter Molyneux as a "good designer".

He was at one point. But now Molyneux exemplifies everything Garriott criticized about the industry.

And what? No love for Sid Meier or Jordan Mechner?

 

[Baldr]

This is coming from a man who creating a game with a overhead map instead of a full world. I can't even give him credit for Ultima. Ralph Koster took Ultima and made more amazing than anything Garriott did.

 

[Jumpingbean3]

Rich, people who live in glass houses should not make games like Ultima 9.

 

[romxxii]

As someone who is fairly unversed with Mr.Garriot's shenanigans, has he always been that much of a pretentious dick?

The guy calls himself Lord British, so pretty much yeah.

I mean yeah I can agree with the base idea of what he means as sometimes I too believe a lot of the designers out there must be dead in the brain or at the least asleep on the job.

But this just doesn't seem like a good way to present yourself.

I think we can all agree that it's not his statement on shit design that's offensive, it's his arrogance at being the yardstick for good game design.