Who is a game designer and what does he do?

We used to think that designers are people who draw something. But in this case the word designer can be misleading.

The main thing a game designer does is to create the concepts of future games, think out the gameplay and mechanics and also the characters. He describes his ideas and prepares documentation for the developers. A game designer may also develop prototypes to demonstrate and test ideas. It helps to understand, whether the concept is worth realizing or something else needs to be improved.

Let’s find out what a game designer does, because it’s a very important profession in gamedev industry.

The duties of a game designer include:

Coming up with ideas for new games.
Working out game mechanics, gameplay.
Calculating and balancing the game. For instance, a game designer must determine how much damage a particular weapon does, how much HP various characters should have, and other parameters.
Developing prototypes for testing.
Can perform the tasks of a scenarist: come up with a plot, texts, character dialogues, but this is not the main duty of the game designer (usually on projects the scenarist is a separate employee).
May create sketches.
Draws up documentation (terms of reference, etc.).

Supervises the process of game development – this is one of the game designer’s main duties. In a way, he performs authorial oversight, checking that the developers accurately implement the concept they came up with. If they think something needs to be changed in the game, they consult on it.

In some companies the game designer makes presentations, negotiates with investors, conducts analytics after the project release. He can also be involved in testing the product and other tasks. The scope of his duties largely depends on the scale of the company and the project itself.

However, the main thing the game designer is occupied with is the detailed thinking of the game: the plot, characters, gameplay mechanics, setting, graphics. He is able to create a brand new game world. At the same time the game designer should understand if the game will be interesting to a great number of people. Also he should think over the ways of monetization, that is making money on the project.

You may say that game designer is a fan of games with commercial vein. He is passionate about different games, with interest keeps track of new products and critically evaluate them: what is excellent, and what can be improved. At the same time, a game designer understands marketing, he has to make commercially successful projects.

In large companies there can be specializations, which determine what a game designer does and what his or her duties are. For example, the level design is worked out by the level designer. A narrative designer deals with scenarios, dialogues and stories. The balance and economy is calculated by the game designer and mathematician. The UX/UI game interface is designed by a UX/UI designer.