Semantic Based Design Concepts

The following concepts help you to understand your game and the player from a logical and semantic perspective. You can think of this as trying to visualize and understand your game from a top down perspective.

Common questions that a semantic approach can often be helpful to answer:

• What are the goals of this project?
• What does the player hope to accomplish?
• How should we organize our enemies?
• How many attacks should we give the player?
• How many different types of enemies do we need?
• How many different types of damage should we support?
• What is the purpose of this level?

Scenario based design concepts, which you can read about next, often focus on what you already have to work with, or on trying to understand the player's perspective on things. Semantic based design is more often concerned with the big picture. Neither is better than the other, just different.

Goals

The grand pappy of semantic concepts. What is the player's goal. What is your projects goals. What is your studios goal. Try to know these things.

Intentions

While goals are generic, intentions are specific. It is how you plan to accomplish your stated goals. Can be useful, but not when the game is frequently changing.

Mechanical Knowledge

Mechanical knowledge is the knowledge of HOW the player needs to do something. The more mechanical knowledge that your game requires, the more likely that your player will ignore a particular feature.

Holistic Knowledge

Holistic knowledge is the knowledge of WHY the player needs to do something. The more holistic knowledge that your game requires, the more likely that your player will not be optimal in their strategies.