Game Design Document Template for Beginners

A template for beginners with advices and examples.

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Game title: subtitle

Introduction

In the first one or two sentences include the game’s title, art direction, niche, genre, platfrom, story, setting, gameplay features, and the edge that makes your game unique.

(title) is a (art direction), (niche) (genre) for (platform) about (story), set (setting), featuring (gameplay features).

The title is one of the most important elements of the game. It has to be unique and easy to remember, write, read, pronounce, and search for. The best performing titles have subtitles, they include at least one non-dictionary word, and they are usually about 3-4 words and 17 characters long altogether. A good title should imply what the game is about and what the player will be doing most of the time.

The art direction is what defines the whole look and feel of the game. It helps to understand the gameplay, improves the narrative, generates the expected emotions, and encourages the player to explore the world.

The niche of the game is there to further refine the genre.

The genre of the game should be as specific as possible. Refer to existing game classifications from magazines and awards as an inspiration.

The platform or platforms of the game can define almost every aspects of it.

The story highlights of the game should be included if the game is story-focused, otherwise they are optional.

The setting creates the mood, gives context to the characters’ actions, affect how they act and what they say. It shows when and where the game takes place, it may also include the environment, climate, weather, or social and cultural surroundings. In games the time setting is usually a longer time period such as the past, present, or future. In special cases the place can be a certain building, or just a single room in a building, but most of the times it’s a continent, country or city.

The gameplay features will set the game apart from others and provide goals to which the subsequent documentation and implementation should aspire. Adding one or two key features to the introduction will definitely improve it.

The edge is every exciting, shocking, fascinating or intriguing bit of information that’s going to set this game apart from the other games in the genre.

Examples:

  • Subnautica (title) is an underwater (niche) adventure (genre) game set on an alien ocean planet (setting-edge).
  • Surviving Mars (title) is a sci-fi (niche) city builder (genre) all about colonizing Mars and surviving the process (genre-edge).
  • Aztez (title) is a highly stylized (art direction), brutally satisfying beat ‘em (genre) up set in the world of the Aztec Empire (setting-edge).
  • Cuphead (title) is a classic run and gun (niche) action (genre) game heavily focused on boss battles. Inspired by cartoons of the 1930s, the visuals and audio are painstakingly created with the same techniques of the era, i.e. traditional hand drawn cel animation, watercolor backgrounds, and original jazz recordings (art direction-edge).
  • Tooth and Tail (title) is a Real-Time-Strategy (genre) game featuring Single Player, Online Competitive Play, Split Screen, Replays, and more (gameplay features).
  • Warframe (title) is a cooperative free-to-play third person online action (genre) game set in an evolving sci-fi world (setting).
  • Infinifactory (title) is a sandbox (niche-edge) puzzle game (genre) by Zachtronics, the creators of SpaceChem and Infiniminer.
  • Wreckfest (title) is a demolition derby themed (setting) racing (genre) game with soft-body damage modeling, sophisticated driving dynamics and in-depth vehicle upgrading, featuring both demolition derbies and more traditional track races (gameplay features-edge).
  • A Hat in Time (title) is a cute-as-heck (art direction-edge) 3D platformer (genre) featuring a little girl who stitches hats for wicked powers (gameplay features-edge)!
  • Kabounce™ (title) is a fast-paced multiplayer (niche-edge) pinball (genre) game where you control the ball (gameplay features-edge).
  • Defender’s Quest (title) is a Tower-Defense/RPG Hybrid (genre-edge) tightly focuses on three things: tactical depth, customization, and story.
  • Darkest Dungeon (title) is a challenging gothic (niche) roguelike turn-based RPG (genre) about the psychological stresses of adventuring (story-edge).
  • No Man’s Sky (title) is a game about exploration and survival (genre) in an infinite procedurally generated universe (setting-edge).

Description

In a few paragraphs describe the game as if you were pitching it to potential players. Encompass all the crucial elements by explaining what the player does, sees and has to overcome. Avoid specifics such as mouse-clicks and keystrokes, but don’t be too vague.

Examples:

  • Fallout: You can shoot everything in this game: people, animals, buildings and walls. You can make called shots on people, so you can aim for their eyes or their groin. Called shots can do more damage, knock the target unconscious or have other effects. When people die, they don’t just die - they get cut in half, they melt into a pile of goo, explode like a blood sausage, or several different ways - depending on the weapon you use. When I use my rocket launcher on some poor defenseless townsperson, he’ll know (and his neighbors will be cleaning up the blood for weeks!)
  • Planescape Torment: Fireball can go hide in the fucking corner when you unleash your arsenal. Jam your hand into an opponent’s body, rip out his soul and tell it to kill its owner. Make a gesture, and summon a blanket of crawling, biting insects to turn your enemy into a happy meal. Send your foes on a field trip to hell without a permission slip. Taunt someone to death. Summon your darkest shadows from across existence and send them into battle to feed on your opponent’s physical strength. Your succubus ally can kiss your opponents to death - they die with a smile on their face.
  • Bioshock: Things grow inside you. We’re part of you now, you think you hear them say. You step away from the med bench. The diagnostics screen presents a revolting before and after. On the left side, the before side, you see yourself. What you were. Human. And on the right side… what you are. What you’ve become. The only way you’ll survive, the only way you’ll…
  • Football Manager 2019: Simulation gaming perfected. Create your unique footballing story by taking charge of the club you love. Complete control of this stunningly realistic game world is yours - every decision in your hands, or yours to delegate. Your call, your way, your story. Everything you’ve ever dreamed of!
  • Rust: The only aim in Rust is to survive. To do this you will need to overcome struggles such as hunger, thirst and cold. Build a fire. Build a shelter. Kill animals for meat. Protect yourself from other players, and kill them for meat. Create alliances with other players and form a town. Do whatever it takes to survive.
  • ARK Survival Evolved: As a man or woman stranded naked, freezing and starving on the shores of a mysterious island called ARK, you must hunt, harvest resources, craft items, grow crops, research technologies, and build shelters to withstand the elements. Use your cunning and resources to kill or tame & breed the leviathan dinosaurs and other primeval creatures roaming the land, and team up with or prey on hundreds of other players to survive, dominate… and escape!
  • Aztec: Aztez is a unique hybrid of beat ‘em up and turn-based strategy set in the world of the Aztec Empire. Deploy your Aztez (elite close combat warriors) in the metagame and enjoy a highly technical real-time combat event that has consequences in the empire. But choose your missions wisely, as you have limited deployments! A great enemy approaches the Valley Of Mexico, and it will require all of your skill and cunning to take them on and change the course of history…
  • Cuphead: Play as Cuphead or Mugman (in single player or local co-op) as you traverse strange worlds, acquire new weapons, learn powerful super moves, and discover hidden secrets while you try to pay your debt back to the devil!

Features

List all the unique features of the game including the ones from the introduction as a bullet point list of items. They can also appear on the back of the game box or on a sell sheet. Listing too few features might sell your concept short. Listing too many waters down the concepts’ strongest features.