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I'm looking for quotes from known game industry professionals (designers, developers, etc.), relevant to the topic of game development.

Please one quote per answer and cite your quotes with a link to a primary source, if possible. (and a link to the person's bio wouldn't hurt).

Hopefully this will become a collection of great quotes that can be referenced (e.g. in presentations) or, in my case, possibly to write on the board at my game dev club meetings to prompt discussion.

Also please no duplicates from the Stack Overflow question "Great programming quotes".

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closed as not a real question by Tetrad♦ Oct 21 '11 at 19:19

It's difficult to tell what is being asked here. This question is ambiguous, vague, incomplete, overly broad, or rhetorical and cannot be reasonably answered in its current form. For help clarifying this question so that it can be reopened, see the FAQ.

12 Answers

up vote 13 down vote accepted

A game is a series of interesting choices.

-Sid Meier [Bio]

[Source]

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I always thought this was Sid too, but Tetrad has a reference saying otherwise. – tenpn Sep 3 '10 at 14:41
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The source referenced is from 1999, while the article Tetrad referenced is from 2003. Not to mention, in the context of the article Shelley which in context attributes the principle to Sid. – Jason Kozak Sep 3 '10 at 18:20
up vote 10 down vote

"Focus groups tell you what people like, but they don’t tell you what people want."

-Ron Gilbert [bio]

-[Source] (a collection of great game design-relevant quotes)

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See also: Halo 3 balancing talk, GDC 2010. From the linked summary: "You want players to play, and you shouldn’t argue with them. Look for their reactions, NOT their solutions. “I don’t like x” is useful, “I don’t like x because of y” is great, and “You should do x” is useless. Trust the player’s gut (intuition) but don’t trust their reasoning as they do NOT have the same mental context you do as the designer." – Neverender Apr 5 '11 at 0:35
up vote 9 down vote

"Story in a game is like a story in a porn movie. It's expected to be there, but it's not that important."

From Programming God, John Carmack (Source)

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Sometimes it's true, but not always. You can also have a basic plot but tell it really well (like Uncharted 2) or just have a game that is all about the story (MGS4) – Bart van Heukelom Sep 3 '10 at 22:27
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Obviously a good story is important to drive the narrative; however if at any point during game development the priority of the story (or any other aspect of the game such as graphics) supersedes FUN, then you're in trouble... This is just my preference, but I find games that intermingle and drip-feed story elements into gameplay (such as Portal) are far more immersive than games that pull control away from the player for 30-minute cutscenes (such as MGS4). :D – Bluestone Sep 4 '10 at 1:59
that's my all-time favorite game dev quote! :) – LearnCocos2D Sep 4 '10 at 22:00
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Right, that's why Serious Sam did better than Mass Effect -_- – BlueRaja - Danny Pflughoeft Sep 7 '10 at 20:57
up vote 8 down vote

I've always liked this one from the foreword of the incredible book, Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar..

"A single-player game is really a movie that you create in cooperation with the player, where the lead actor doesn't have a copy of the script."

From Valve Front-man, Gabe Newell

The whole book is a collection of beautiful resources and stories that detail Valve's development process.. Highly recommended to artists, designers and programmers :)

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Gabe is the man, got a signed copy of this just for visiting their HQ in Bellevue and doing some playtesting! – Kyle C Apr 4 '11 at 22:15
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Great game-play is a stream of interesting decisions the player must resolve.

From an interview with Bruce Shelley, Age of Empires senior designer.

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It's amazing how often people forget this - and end up with really dull games. – Rushyo Sep 2 '10 at 13:21
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"Do weird and difficult things."

-Masaya Matsuura [bio]

-[Source] (a collection of great game design-relevant quotes)

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up vote 6 down vote

Video Games are bad for you? That's what they said about Rock 'N' Roll.

Shigeru Miyamoto, shame on you if you don't know him.

[Source and more Quotes from him]

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up vote 4 down vote

"What game is worth doing that’s not creatively risky?"

-Tim Schafer [bio]

-[Source] (a collection of great game design-relevant quotes)

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Most of them... – Dan Olson Sep 4 '10 at 1:32
up vote 4 down vote

"The only legitimate use of a computer is to play games."

Wise words from Eujene Jarvis (Defender, Stargate, Robotron, Smash TV, etc).

[Source]

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...and to make them. – AttackingHobo Sep 4 '10 at 0:50
up vote 3 down vote

John Romero's about to make you his bitch.

While it's not a quote of a game professional, it's definitively the star example on how to not make game PR, and how easy it is to hype expectations to a startling and spectacular failure.

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And the tag line "Suck it down". What a fail. (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Romero) – Justicle Sep 2 '10 at 23:17
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For those that managed to miss this (and trust me, it was for the best), this was part of the marketing push for Daikatana, which is basically likely Duke Nukem Forever except it did get released and was terrible. – coderanger Sep 6 '10 at 20:49
up vote 3 down vote

"When it's done"

Various. Positive example - Blizzard. Negative example - 3D Realms.

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Blizzard being mentioned as a positive example, reminds me of this quote by the CEO Kotick: "The goal that I had [...] about 10 years ago was to take all the fun out of making video games." Creating a corporate culture of "skepticism, pessimism, and fear". (Source: gamespot.com/news/6226758.html?sid=6226758 ) – Hendrik Brummermann Sep 9 '10 at 17:25
up vote 0 down vote

Play Style Matters

From Warren Spector of Deus EX fame and of the soon to be Epic Mickey. Is my favorite

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