Game Design Library

GDL is a human-curated list of articles on various game design topics. Find game-design tips/advice on specific genres/aspects. You can use the search, or browse tag-specific pages to find the articles you want. Built in Tropical.

Contributing

Interested in adding a link to Game Design Library? Fantastic! We accept any and all contributions, so open a PR as soon as possible! Even if you're not sure what all the fields/values should be, we can provide direction.

• Open up data.json, copy-paste the last entry, and update the copy with your new link
• For tags, look at existing tags to get an idea of what kind of tags might make sense. Typically, we tag by genre, or "meta tags" like game analysis
• For the blurb, try to summarize the item and explain it in a few words, and use words that someone searching for that item might enter into the search box.
• Re-run Tropical against the GDL repository and make sure it builds correctly (open up index.html and check if everything looks good)
• Commit, push, and open a PR

Tags

Tagging is complex and ever-changing, here are some notes on some tags that might not make obvious sense at a first look:

• game analysis: items that take an in-depth look at a title or a particular mechanic
• cross-game analysis: items that compare several games with an attempt to find broader trends
• reference: exhaustive reference-type material that catalogues lots of things about a particular facet of design
• RPG vs. JRPG vs. CRPG: try to tag RPG for generic things, JRPG and CRPG for things specific to those sub-genres.
• formulas: items that extensively discuss and/or provide formulas for use
• theory: the fundamentals of game design