Are you looking for practical, ready-to-use ideas to help you design more innovative and unique video games? “David Perry on Game Design: A Brainstorming Toolbox” is a brainstorming and strategy guide for game designers, filled with inspiration-generating tips that challenge you to create better games. Using their years of industry experience, David Perry and Rusel DeMaria provide a wealth of ideas and possibilities to help you improve the entertainment value, quality, and success of your games. Designed to be used as a reference guide and brainstorming tool, the book is not software or technology specific, and it covers every aspect of video game design, including game types, storyline creation, character development, weapons and armor, game worlds, goals and rewards, obstacles, and more. You can work your way through the book from the beginning or focus on the topics that interest you. Filled with checklists and step-by-step brainstorming tools to help you flesh out your ideas, “David Perry on Game Design” will inspire and challenge you to find inventive solutions and improve the entertainment value of your games, making them fresh, innovative, and fun to play.
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26 reviews for David Perry on Game Design: A Brainstorming ToolBox
4.0out of 5
★★★★★
★★★★★
6
★★★★★
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★★★★★
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★★★★★
Jonathan Stickles –
David Perry on Game Design: A Brainstorming Toolbox is one of the most amazing books I’ve ever seen, and that sentiment is mirrored by absolutely everyone I’ve shown the book to, without exception.
This is what the subtitle says: a game design brainstorming toolbox. It is a giant tome of a book, the width and height of a textbook a thousand pages long, and contains lists of information on what feels like absolutely everything: boss battle mechanics, SWAT radio codes, feelings you can give with music, time manipulation mechanics, ways to protect a location, possible causes of death, modern explosives, 20s slang, mini-game mechanics, quest ideas, character archetypes… every page is exploding with ideas, and the density of information in the book is extremely high.
The only way to even begin to appreciate and wrap your head around the nature and value of this book is to have a copy in front of you and flip through it. A couple minutes of that has been enough to make most other game designers I know immediately resolve to buy a copy. If you’re a game designer looking for a tool and a reference to aid in brainstorming and idea generation, I can’t recommend this book highly enough.
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★★★★★
Svarog The Mighty –
This is a book of lists. If lists help you to world build this book is for you. This book is huge and has numerous subjects covered but its a book of lists. I’m not joking. Its like reading a phone book.
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★★★★★
d.choock –
Good book to look in from time to time for ideas and inspiration. And it is really thick book 🙂
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★★★★★
Amazon Customer –
This is an excellent book on game design. You can tell the author has a lot of industry experience and a passion for game design. This book is massive and well worth the price. It covers just about every genre of video games and includes many examples to help you through the design process. What really makes this book stand out from the others dealing with this same topic, is that it goes into an explanation as to why you should do something and then gives you plenty of examples to work with. I suggest that everyone who is interested in game design check this book out.
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★★★★★
T. emma –
The book was pretty good I would have liked to see more on game balancing. The book has a lot about story background, characters, list and lists of names of things, great exercises but I was interested in know things like how to created an interesting level through game play as well as story, and how to keep game rules simple to learn hard to master. Overall good book but is focused more on story telling than game design.
Helpful(0)Unhelpful(0)You have already voted this
★★★★★
Hectate –
This book reads more as a reference of game design ideas than anything that might actually teach you how to brainstorm ideas yourself. Granted, it’s always handy to keep around as a reference; maybe something in there can spark an idea – but this isn’t the book that will strictly teach you anything that you might not be able to figure out yourself. I enjoyed reading it, but I haven’t gone back and used it much since. Of course, I’m just a hobbyist. Maybe a professional game designer would find it more useful?
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★★★★★
Pier-Luc Dubois –
The content of this book is really interesting, but gosh, it’s such a huge book. Don’t expect to bring it around with you. You could break a lot of things with that book.
It’s basically a massive brainstorming encyclopedia about game design. You really ought to get this book if you’re often thinking about games you’d like to develop.
5/5
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★★★★★
Fred C. –
I should have read the title a bit more closely before buying this, the part after the colon is telling. I grew up playing David Perry’s games so I thought this would be a good buy but I just ended up with a giant tome of lists.
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★★★★★
A. Navarro –
Great. A huge book of possibilities. This is a tool for generating ideas, finding alternatives, asking questions and exploring them. Excellent first chapter too “What is a game and why do we play?”, since these important questions will determine every other choice that follows. Perry understands that models are just models, whether it’s a systematization of story structure or game mechanics, they’re procedures for getting predictable results. Instead he places his emphasis on ideas, a good idea could be developed under a variety of systems or combinations of systems or lack of a system or levels of inspiration, but it is highly unlikely, antithetical, to work in the opposite direction and go from system to original idea. As the title says “brainstorming toolbox”.
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★★★★★
John Smith –
Oh man! I brought this and I didn’t read the reviews. There is one here that is spot on. Its just half a book of lists. Lists of things everyone knows, Ethnicities ? Did you know there are English people ? There are Irish people ? There are Scottish people and Spanish people ? If not this may be the book for you.
A long list of US Police Codes ? A year by year listing of Cars ? Tanks and Weapons ?
A whole chunk on the Industry, Copyright and Trademarks. None of which falls under the banner of ‘Game Design’
Dave Perry is a industry legend a real hero of mine. Earthworm Jim and others. He really knows how to design games so it is a wonder why he didn’t put some of that information in this book.
I was thinking 900 pages of talking about games, how to design different features and types of games and their dynamics – none of which is to be found here. Ultimately this book is utter tosh. Its just a lot of generic information compiled in a large professional looking book and by Charles River Media a good publisher with far better books on programming and the craft.
I am returning this because its not what it says on the tin. I am glad I purchased it from Amazon because they are always top notch when it comes to customer service.
Buy a different book with your money, I intend to.
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★★★★★
Cliente Amazon –
Gran libro, recomendado como fuente de inspiración y toma de recursos. Útil para todo metido en el mundo del diseño de juegos.
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★★★★★
Fabio –
Game Design: A Brainstorming Toolbox è il miglior libro di gamedesign esistente. Un libro enciclopedico (e pesante da portare in giro), da leggere in modo sequenziale o da approfondire come ricerca occasionale in caso di dubbi o in fase di brainstorming. ATTENZIONE: solo lingua inglese.
Jonathan Stickles –
David Perry on Game Design: A Brainstorming Toolbox is one of the most amazing books I’ve ever seen, and that sentiment is mirrored by absolutely everyone I’ve shown the book to, without exception.
This is what the subtitle says: a game design brainstorming toolbox. It is a giant tome of a book, the width and height of a textbook a thousand pages long, and contains lists of information on what feels like absolutely everything: boss battle mechanics, SWAT radio codes, feelings you can give with music, time manipulation mechanics, ways to protect a location, possible causes of death, modern explosives, 20s slang, mini-game mechanics, quest ideas, character archetypes… every page is exploding with ideas, and the density of information in the book is extremely high.
The only way to even begin to appreciate and wrap your head around the nature and value of this book is to have a copy in front of you and flip through it. A couple minutes of that has been enough to make most other game designers I know immediately resolve to buy a copy. If you’re a game designer looking for a tool and a reference to aid in brainstorming and idea generation, I can’t recommend this book highly enough.
Svarog The Mighty –
This is a book of lists. If lists help you to world build this book is for you. This book is huge and has numerous subjects covered but its a book of lists. I’m not joking. Its like reading a phone book.
d.choock –
Good book to look in from time to time for ideas and inspiration. And it is really thick book 🙂
Amazon Customer –
This is an excellent book on game design. You can tell the author has a lot of industry experience and a passion for game design. This book is massive and well worth the price. It covers just about every genre of video games and includes many examples to help you through the design process. What really makes this book stand out from the others dealing with this same topic, is that it goes into an explanation as to why you should do something and then gives you plenty of examples to work with. I suggest that everyone who is interested in game design check this book out.
T. emma –
The book was pretty good I would have liked to see more on game balancing. The book has a lot about story background, characters, list and lists of names of things, great exercises but I was interested in know things like how to created an interesting level through game play as well as story, and how to keep game rules simple to learn hard to master. Overall good book but is focused more on story telling than game design.
Hectate –
This book reads more as a reference of game design ideas than anything that might actually teach you how to brainstorm ideas yourself. Granted, it’s always handy to keep around as a reference; maybe something in there can spark an idea – but this isn’t the book that will strictly teach you anything that you might not be able to figure out yourself. I enjoyed reading it, but I haven’t gone back and used it much since. Of course, I’m just a hobbyist. Maybe a professional game designer would find it more useful?
Pier-Luc Dubois –
The content of this book is really interesting, but gosh, it’s such a huge book. Don’t expect to bring it around with you. You could break a lot of things with that book.
It’s basically a massive brainstorming encyclopedia about game design. You really ought to get this book if you’re often thinking about games you’d like to develop.
5/5
Fred C. –
I should have read the title a bit more closely before buying this, the part after the colon is telling. I grew up playing David Perry’s games so I thought this would be a good buy but I just ended up with a giant tome of lists.
A. Navarro –
Great. A huge book of possibilities. This is a tool for generating ideas, finding alternatives, asking questions and exploring them. Excellent first chapter too “What is a game and why do we play?”, since these important questions will determine every other choice that follows.
Perry understands that models are just models, whether it’s a systematization of story structure or game mechanics, they’re procedures for getting predictable results. Instead he places his emphasis on ideas, a good idea could be developed under a variety of systems or combinations of systems or lack of a system or levels of inspiration, but it is highly unlikely, antithetical, to work in the opposite direction and go from system to original idea. As the title says “brainstorming toolbox”.
John Smith –
Oh man! I brought this and I didn’t read the reviews. There is one here that is spot on. Its just half a book of lists. Lists of things everyone knows,
Ethnicities ? Did you know there are English people ? There are Irish people ? There are Scottish people and Spanish people ? If not this may be the book for you.
A long list of US Police Codes ? A year by year listing of Cars ? Tanks and Weapons ?
A whole chunk on the Industry, Copyright and Trademarks. None of which falls under the banner of ‘Game Design’
Dave Perry is a industry legend a real hero of mine. Earthworm Jim and others. He really knows how to design games so it is a wonder why he didn’t put some of that information in this book.
I was thinking 900 pages of talking about games, how to design different features and types of games and their dynamics – none of which is to be found here. Ultimately this book is utter tosh. Its just a lot of generic information compiled in a large professional looking book and by Charles River Media a good publisher with far better books on programming and the craft.
I am returning this because its not what it says on the tin. I am glad I purchased it from Amazon because they are always top notch when it comes to customer service.
Buy a different book with your money, I intend to.
Cliente Amazon –
Gran libro, recomendado como fuente de inspiración y toma de recursos. Útil para todo metido en el mundo del diseño de juegos.
Fabio –
Game Design: A Brainstorming Toolbox è il miglior libro di gamedesign esistente.
Un libro enciclopedico (e pesante da portare in giro), da leggere in modo sequenziale o da approfondire come ricerca occasionale in caso di dubbi o in fase di brainstorming.
ATTENZIONE: solo lingua inglese.