This is going to be a very personal article. It is very late in the day, and I’m feeling a little punchy. Time to discover while I write

The Urge to Create

I’m no poet, but I know lots of people have talked about this. Humans, at least most of them I think, have some need to create. Not only that, but they often feel the need to create something meaningful and personal. I guess that I fall in to that camp. I want to make something that feels genuine to me, that feels like it has a part of me in it.

Games are Me

I play a lot of games. Big deal, so do a lot of people, games have been played for thousands of years. Why do games appeal to me? I think I really enjoy working things out. I like creating systems where there was chaos, and I like finding ways to do things optimally. Who knows why.

So naturally, when I want to create something that feels like it’s a part of me, games feel right. There’s also the meta aspect of games. Designing a game is a lot like playing one. You need to play/design things over and over again in order to figure out the best way to do it. This is one of the reasons there are so many board game design competitions or game jams (though they also provide incentive/motivation for completing the game). I like making games because it engages with me in some way I have trouble describing.

But why board games? Well, I’ve thought about that a lot. Part of it is a matter of scale. If I were to design a video games, I could upload it to Steam or itch.io and it would be there forever and anyone in the world could see it. But that’s all it would be. Just a game sitting in a digital box waiting for someone to pick it out among a see of others. With physical games, that’s kind of impossible. A board game exists ina physical sense. You know when it exists and you seeit being played. Yes, this could be done with video games as well, but the fact that it isn’t necessary (and probably makes production easier) means I would probably never do it. But there’s one other major factor.

Joy

I want to make people happy. I really want to. It’s the most important thing a person can do if you ask me. And what makes people happy, especially people like me? Games. And if I’m playing a board game with someone, I can see the joy on their face. I can see it and know that I did that. It’s the greatest accomplishment I can have as a designer. It’s all I want.

Conclusion

This was far closer to a journal than any sort of discussion on design, but I’m glad I made it. I don’t know how interested all of you are in it, but not all articles need to be technical here. This is my blog, I’ll do what I want!