Magic: The Gathering Drive to Work Podcast - Drive to Work #314 - Getting a Job

Episode Date: March 18, 2016

Mark talks about how people can get a job in Magic R&D at Wizards.

I'm pulling up my driveway. We all know what that means. It's time to drive to work. Okay, so today's topic is addressing a question I get asked all the time. So the question is, I want to become a game designer. How do I become a game designer? So that's, it's interesting. One of the things that's very funny is a lot of my critics like to point out that I had no training in game design. And one of the reasons is when I was, you know, back in the day, it wasn't something you could study. It wasn't something you could go to college and actually learn about. I think games have definitely advanced quite a bit in the last 20 years as far as how the public thinks about them. So anyway, today's topic is sort of talking about if you want to be a game designer, what do you need to do to be a game designer?

And we'll talk a little bit about sort of what game design is and how one can become a game designer. I can talk a little bit about Wizards in particular. Okay, so the first question is, you want to become a game designer. So let's walk through what is necessary to become a game designer. So first and foremost, you need to understand games. If you wanted to be a doctor, well, you would study the human body. If you wanted to be an auto mechanic, you would study cars. If you want to be a game designer, you have to study games.

You have to learn about games. So first and foremost, you need to play a lot of games. This one is not necessarily hard, but I want to understand the context of it. It's not just a matter of playing games. It's not play the same game again and again. It is play lots of games. Play a variety of it. It's not just a matter of playing games. It's not play the same game again and again. It is play lots of games. Play a variety of games. And the key to being good at game design is understanding what makes games tick. Why do people play a certain game? Why is this game fun? Why is that game fun? And one of the reasons is you want to take an analytical eye. What that means is, you want to play games

and try to understand what part of the game is fun. Why are certain games a lot of fun and other games aren't fun? You know, what makes games tick? So the first thing I say is, you really need to dedicate yourself to games. So like my mentor, Richard Garfield,

I've never seen anybody who loves games more than Richard Garfield. He is constantly playing games. In fact, I feel like one of his quests in life is to have played every game that's ever been made. And he is fascinating. I know he studied. He actually has taught some classes on the history of games. I remember at GDC last year, I went to a talk talking about, it took

some classic games like Monopoly and stuff and talked about the history of it. And it is fascinating. It's really interesting to see where games came from and what games evolved from other games and how certain games shaped different games. And like, just watching the influences and saying, oh, this game introduced this concept and then it led to this. And anyway, fascinating material. So, first off, you want to be a game designer, play a lot of games.

Second, I would say, is also learn about games, read about games, learn about the history of games. You want to understand sort of what makes games tick. And the other thing that's very interesting to me is, um, the more games you play and the more different games you play, the more you'll start getting an understanding of a couple things. One, you'll start understanding not just what kind of games exist, but what excites you as a game player. Um, and what I would say is, um, you want to make sure you design your game for all types of players, not just the player you are. But I do think you are best with designing games

that at least are the kind of games that you really enjoy. I definitely, I've had friends for example who have got on and done game design of things that are something they would never want to play. It's really hard. It's hard to design and be good at making something that's not the thing you enjoy.

Magic is interesting because there's lots of different kinds of players, and we have to keep all of them in mind. And I need to make cards for types of players and formats that either I am not or do not enjoy. There's certain types of players that's not how I play Magic, and there's certain formats that's not the formats that I will choose to play but I have to respect that those are formats and types of players that play our game so I have to design for them. But I do love the game I make. I do love Magic. Magic is a very compelling game that is very fun for me. I think it's important that as you start to make games that you really make things that speak to you. It's kind of like when you're writing scripts in Hollywood.

What they say to you is, you have to pick topics you're passionate about. Don't pick topics that you think other people want to hear about, and thus maybe it will make the script sellable. No, you've got to pick things that you actually have a passion for. Because if you don't have a passion for them,

that will come through. Okay, so first and foremost, you want to be a game designer, play games. Play a passion for them, that will come through. Okay, so first and foremost, you want to be a game designer, play games. Play a lot of games, learn about games. And by the way, don't just play, like, I know a lot of German games, for example, are not in the U.S. in English and stuff. But one of the things that struck me about Richard, for example, was that he went out of his way to play games that weren't even available in the market he grew up in. He, for example, loved finding German games, and Germany's a great place. I've talked about this before, that

gaming in Germany is a very different animal. Although it's starting to inch that way in the US, but the thought of in Germany is that games are much like movies. They're just something people do in Germany, everybody plays games. That's just a way you entertain yourself.

And that there's a really big family game market because all, or most, most families in Germany do in fact play games. It's a very big game playing environment. And as such, they have a really wide wealth of different kinds of games. I remember the one time I went to Essen. It is fascinating just seeing, you know, like for example, they have lots and lots and kinds of games. I remember the one time I went to Essen. It is fascinating just seeing, you know,

like, for example, they have lots and lots and lots of games aimed at families and young kids and, like, games that are not testing things that you traditionally think of as being games. So anyway, have a breadth of games. Play a lot of games. Try to play variants of games. Oh, that's another important thing, is a good tip of learning how to be a game designer is don't be afraid to take a game,

play it. Always start by playing by how they tell you to play it. But then saying, you know what, are there changes I could make that would improve this game? And don't be afraid of making your own rules for games and having house rules. And, you know what there are a lot of games like this big story I talked about how I was in college I had a group of friends who we we used to get together usually on Saturday nights and we would play games and at first we played all the games we all owned and then we started going to the game store and buying new games and playing them and what we found was we always started by trying to play about the game as it was intended and then you said you know what we would start adapting it and what we found was with a good group of gamers you can make games fun if you're willing to sort of adapt the game and that even

games that at first we didn't really like the game we try to find the nugget of what was fun about it and adapt it and change it and one of the first ways I think people are game designers is adapting existing games and going, you know what? This would be a little more fun if. I mean, game design is all about this would be a little more fun if. There's a lot of iteration

that goes into playing games and that I think the first step of learning iteration is just playing somebody else's game and adapting it and making it what is fun for you. Okay. Play games.

That's important. The next step is, if you want to be a game designer, you don't have to just, or you're not supposed to just play games. You need to start making games. So, like, one of the things I remember, I went to a seminar when I was back down in Hollywood about how to be a screenwriter was the seminar I went to. And the guy goes, I'm going to tell you this big secret of how to be a screenwriter.

Okay, everybody, get out your pencils. You ready? Write screenplays. You know, and his point was, there's a difference. I mean, anybody, your goal is to be an accomplished, you know, script writer that sells their scripts. But if you want to be a script writer, write scripts. And that one of the things is a lot of people want to want to be a script writer, write scripts. And that, one of the things is a lot of people want to do something.

A smaller subset, do it. If you want to be a game designer, anybody can be a game designer. All you have to do is design games. And the key is, when you design games, is start, don't, I would recommend starting small. Meaning, you know, if you're going to write a novel, probably War and Peace isn't the first novel you want to write.

They talk a lot, like when I was writing screenplays, that like Pulp Fiction, you know, something that's really complex is not how you start. Because Pulp Fiction, you know, something that's really complex is not how you start. Because Pulp Fiction isn't told in order. It's a very interesting script, obviously, but it's very atypical. It's like sort of, if you're going to start painting, probably cubism isn't where you start, you know. And what I recommend is start simple. Make something. And so I have a whole series of podcasts about making games, 10 things every game needs. Listen to those.

Those are valuable. But the key is when you're first starting out, make something bite-sizeable. Make something that you can play, that doesn't take too long to play, that, you know, I want when you're first starting out to try to make smaller games as you're testing out the waters. Okay. Okay. And the thing about making games is there's a multi-part to it. The first thing you need to do is you need to figure out what kind of game you want. What's interesting about your game?

Where's the fun? And then you're going to have to do what I always talk about, which is the iteration, which is you have to physically make your game. It doesn't need to be perfect. It can be pretty rough. It can be on index cards. It can be on paper. You know, the earliest version of it doesn't necessarily need to be super polished.

And early on, what you're trying to do is you're just trying to figure it out. That's fine. Whatever you can do so you can play test. But what will happen is, as you move along in making your game, what will happen is, you move along in making your game what will happen is you will want to become more early play testing

or early game design just kind of figuring out the nuts and bolts the details of it figuring out the basic structure what kind of game do you want to be sometimes there's research because usually there's some flavor to your game. I mean, this is all in the 10 things.

But you might want to, you know, if you're doing a certain flavor, you want to do research in that flavor so you make sure you capture correctly. The thing I will say is what you want to do, there's some general guidelines of designing when you're first starting out. general guidelines of designing when you're first starting out. Number one is try to the best of your ability to make the game you're making. Don't worry about quality of pieces, but worry about actually capturing what you're trying to do. You want to... So a big thing about game design, and this is amateur, professional, doesn't matter, is it's an iterative process, which means

you're going to make something, you're going to play it, you're going to learn from those things, you're going to have feedback, then you're going to make changes. So early on, you know, your initial playtesting is going to be with your playtest group, the people that are actually making this. And in those early playtests is going to be with your playtest group, the people that are actually making this. And in those early playtests, you can be kind of rough because the people involved understand the roughness of it. You will get to a point where you want to start bringing in other people, where you're getting outside. You're getting sort of the general public feel.

I mean, they might not be the general public. But as you get to more playtesting where it's more, you're trying to get a sense of people what the game is like. You need to get the components closer, closer to real, not necessarily as polished as the actual printed thing would be, but enough so that the people playing it understand the components and what's going on to it. If there's a flavor component, they need to see enough of the flavor that they get what the flavor is and they can enjoy the flavor. And remember, I talked about this in, not too long

ago, a podcast about making the original Magic, you know, back in Alpha, Beta. And Richard had little cards cut out of cardboard with, you know, pictures Xeroxed on them. And they were compelling. They weren't amazing cards. They weren't professionally printed, but they, they actually have a little bit of charm to them and it captured a little sort of sense that he was going for. And that's all it took. Those little tiny cards, little cardboard cards with, you know, Xerox cartoons from Calvin and Hobbes or whatever on them, uh, were compelling and people got compelled by them.

So anyway, make sure, probably I'll do a podcast at some point about making it. The point of this show really actually isn't about how to make your game. It's more about what you need to do to become a game designer. So, I will say, when you're making the game, make sure you understand all the different components, what you want to have, what your flavor is. Make sure that you are listening to the feedback you are getting. A lot of people will playtest, keep getting the same notes, and then don't make changes based on

those notes. And if, like one of the things I talk about all the time is if everybody is making the same note to you is everybody is saying that, um, if everybody is saying that you, um, you need to change something and that's a continual note you keep getting. Well, something needs to change. I mean,

maybe one of the things I say all the time is players are very good at identifying what isn't working. They're not always good at identifying what would work. So you want to listen to criticism and understand that it's very easy

for people to recognize problems. It's harder for them to solve the problem, but it's easy to recognize it. And if a lot of playtesters are saying the same thing, okay, you've got to listen to that.

That's meaning something. Anyway, the one final note I will say is make sure as you advance in playtesting that you're playtesting with people that aren't emotionally connected to you. The people who care about your well-being will soft pedal what they're saying to you because they don't want to hurt your feelings. And a lot of what you need when you're doing your later playtesting is really blunt, honest criticism. You know, someone's got to call the baby ugly.

And it's hard for somebody who cares about the parent to call the baby ugly. And you need people who are willing to say, hey, I don't like this or that and this sucks or whatever. You do need to hear that. Okay, so number one, I'm talking about how you need to study games. Number two, you need to make games. That part of being a game designer is making games. And whenever you get to some place,

if your goal is to be a game designer, well, in fact, let's get into that right now. So there are two paths to becoming a game designer. There is a much easier path and there's a harder path. So we'll start with the easier path. The easier path is that you're not selling yourself, you're selling your game. So the first path is what you do is you make a game and then you sell the game. Now there's a couple different ways that you sell a game. First off, you could make a full

prototype version and you could sell the game to a game company. You can sell the game to somebody who makes games. I will let you know that this path is of,

like I was saying, I'm talking about sort of the, there's two paths to getting a job as a game designer. First has to do with creating a reputation of making games that people know. The second is sort of finding somebody and proving that you have the needs to sort of become a game designer. Or become a professional game designer. So in the first path, which none of this is easy, so when I say the easier path, it's relative.

So the first path is start by making a game. The reason a game... and sell the game. Like I said, there's two ways to sell a game. One is to sell it to a company that makes games. That is very difficult. For example, I work for Wizards of the Coast. We make games. Do we take outside submittals? We don't.

You know. Or especially not ones that we don't, you know, initiate. And so it's hard selling your game to somebody else. It can be done. There are plenty of examples of games that were sold. But more common in that

is what we call self-publishing, which is you make a game and then you make it yourself. You publish it yourself. And we're now in the age where the tools to self-publish are better than they've ever been. Now, self-publishing has a lot of risks to it. ever been. Now, self-publishing has a lot of risks to it. The biggest risk is a financial risk, which is you are making all the components to the game. Now, with stuff like Kickstarter and things, there are some ways even financially to sort of, you know, get people to believe in your idea and enough people will give you the money that you can then produce it. So there's some ways. There's even revenue now to sort of make a cool game, sell the idea of the game, get people interested,

get the money, and then make the game. That's possible. Or there's some of you have to have belief in your game and you have to sort of put the investment to make the game, to physically put down the money, make the game, and then try to sell the game that you've made. There are a lot of different avenues, but what I'm trying to say is the first way to become a game designer

is to make a game, and then people will be able to judge you based on the game you've made. I know, for example, that if you came to Wizards and said, I want a job as a game designer, the first question we would ask you is, and have you designed any games? And if the answer is yes, the next question will be, could we see them? It's even better if we already know about them and already know what they are. One of the ways definitely to get a job as a game designer

is to create a reputation as someone who makes games and who makes good games. There's a place called Board Game Geek that I would check out. It's a website that talks all about games. It rates games, does reviews of games. It's a very good place to sort of see a listing of most games, I guess. But it's pretty thorough. They're pretty thorough. And you also can learn about games that you would maybe never know about. There's a lot of really fun games. And here's the harsh reality is there's a lot of really good, very well-made games that fail. And they

fail for a couple reasons. One is they're nichey, meaning the people who would appreciate them is a small number of people, and there weren't enough people who appreciated that kind of game. It could have just been advertising. It could have just been, hey, it's a great game, but not enough people were made aware of the game. It could have been the price point that they were able to make it at was too high for people to want to pay that. If you mass market things, you can bring down the price points. But if you're self-producing, sometimes it's a little more expensive when you self-produce. And sometimes you have a game that like, well, maybe if mass produced, you could get it low

enough, you could sell it. But at self-publishing levels, it's just too expensive. The components are too much. are too much. But whatever, the issue at hand is that you can make a reputation for yourself by actually making games. That is the route that most professional game designers I know went. That is the route that they started by making games. Okay, that said, that is only one avenue and not the avenue I went down. So let's talk about the other avenue. The other avenue is get yourself known as somebody who understands games. And the way to do that is, it's trickier. The way to do that usually is through something like

writing or something in which you're able to, podcasting, something in which you're able to, podcasting, something in which you're able to communicate to people that you get it, you understand games, you understand how they tick, and that you're able to take this knowledge and then put it in a place where people can see that you have the knowledge.

Now for Magic, there are certain games, Magic being one of them, that is big enough that we have a lot of people who make it. Magic is, there are a few games, most of which are video games, Magic is kind of exclusive, and I think it's the only game big enough, or one of the few, there's a few others, that really can create enough revenue to have the kind of size of people making the game. A lot of people work on magic.

And because of that, magic is always looking for people. So let me get a little bit into wanting. Some people may say they want to be a game designer. What they're really saying is they want to be a magic game designer. So we'll talk about that for a second. If you want to work on magic, the thing that is true is we need to see that you understand the game.

It's not necessarily... So this is where... Magic's a little different than all the stuff I was talking about. Normally, if you want to get a game designer, a job as a game designer, you've got to make games. People can look and see your games. So a lot of people extrapolate from that

that the way to become a magic designer is make your own magic sets. Now, I do think that's awesome. I am a big fan of doing that as a means to hone your skills. I do think if you want to be good at making magic cards, hey, make magic cards.

The problem for us is we can't look at unsolicited material. So while I think making your own custom magic sets, and I have a series that I write on my column. I do one issue or one column a year. It's called Nuts and Bolts. And it's a column all about, hey, you want to make your own magic set?

Well, let me give you a lot of technical guidance on how to make a magic set. And it's full and full of really hard and crunchy technical advice on how to make a magic set. I it's full and full of really hard and crunchy technical advice on how to make a magic set. I want people to make their own magic sets. I think that it is a fun thing to do. A lot of people talk about what is my favorite way to play magic, and that's making sets.

I love making sets and playtesting new ideas and stuff. I think that's awesome. But if you want to get a job in magic, the tricky part is we can't look at unsolicited material. And what that means is we're not going to be able to judge you based on how well your cards are, because we're not going to look at your cards.

But we will judge you based on the knowledge you're able to demonstrate from that. So, for example, one of the designers we have right now is a guy named Jules. designers we have right now is a guy named Jules. Jules, one of the ways we got to know Jules was he started writing a column about game design. Now, being one of the things I know he did is he

with other people made their own set. Now, I didn't read the articles about that set because I'm not always the honest with this material, but I read his other articles. I learned and got a sense of he really understood how magic ticked. And I got that from reading about him talking about it. Now, another way into R&D, we talk about design and development. Design, I'm looking more for, can you wrap your brain around how the game works, how

it functions, because I want you to be able to make your own cards. works, how it functions, because I want you to make your own cards. From a development standpoint, they're looking for people that have proven that they have the ability to put the game through its paces. And so a lot of development,

it gets its recruits from the Pro Tour. Just people that have proven that they know how to deck build and they know how to take cards and find weaknesses and sort of, a lot of doing good development is doing good play testing good deck building of sort of figuring out okay if this was the cards that the players had how would they abuse these cards how what what kind of environment would it make um and so um one way to get into rnd is doing well on the Pro Tour and demonstrating your skills there.

Another one is being very public. We, like I said, something like writing articles and things. We also do this thing called the Great Designer Search. I've done two of them so far. One of these days I'll do a third one. I'm wanting to get to a spot where a couple things one is I want to make sure when I hold it oh so let me explain what a great designer search is

I did a podcast on this with Ethan as my guest so what it is is I was told that I was allowed to hire a design intern I didn't know where to find a design intern it's not a skill I don't have the pro tour is really good for finding development interns not as great as for hiring design interns so what I did was I said I don't have, the Pro Tour is really good for writing development interns, not as great as for writing design interns.

So what I did was, I said, can I find them however I want? And they said, sure. I go, can I run essentially a reality show, much like, you know, The Apprentice or Project Runway or a show in which I'm testing people and looking at those skills and then we finally hire somebody. And the idea was the winning, the person would win a six-month internship. and then we finally hired somebody. And the idea was the person would win a six-month internship.

And so we got people, you know, both times, you know, over 1,000 people applied, and we whittled it down, and then we got, for the first one, I think we had 15 finalists. We were going to have 16, but someone dropped it last minute. We had 15 finalists, and the second one, we had eight finalists. And then we did 5 different challenges. There was an initial challenge to get in, sort of initial, so

there were sort of 6 challenges. There was the initial stuff to get in, and then 5 set challenges. And then each time we'd do challenges, and there would be judges, and judges would give notes, and then we'd kick out what we considered the weakest player, you know, final or finalists. Until we narrowed down to three.

And then the three got brought in to Wizards, and we had a live competition with them, and we did interviews. And then the winner, in each case, got a six-month internship. In fact, in the first one, not only did the winner get a six-month internship, the runner-up got a six-month internship.

And two other people, so Alexis Jansen won. Ken Nagel came in second. They both got six month internships in R&D. Graham Hopkins came in third. He ended up getting a six month in digital. And then Mark Globus also got a job in digital. So four people in the top 15, and there was a guy, Noah got an internship as well in development. So five people ended up getting either a straight up a job or internship. Of those, four of them turned into full-time jobs, all of which are still at the company, by the way. I mean, Ken obviously is on the design team. And then in the second one,

the first and second, Ethan Fleischer won. He got a six-month internship. Sean came in second. He got an internship not in design, but in digital edition. And then Scott Van Essen didn't then get the job but would later get a job. And now all three of them currently work. Also, John Lauchs, who was a top eight finalist, also got a job at Wizards. He doesn't work there anymore.

So four of the eight eventually got a job at Wizards. Scott Van Essen, by the way, was also in the first original 15. So you can count him either direction. I tend to count him the second one because he got his job after being in the second one. But anyway, in each case, there were four plus people that got internships or long-term jobs out of each of them. So people always ask when we're doing the third one. I want to make sure a couple things. One is I need to be able to run it.

It takes a lot of time and energy. And I need to make sure that when the dust settles, that I have an internship for somebody, that there's the potential for that internship to turn into something. What I don't want to do is run it, get somebody, have them be an intern for six months, go, you're awesome, but I can't give you a job. I want the potential for if you win, for it to turn into something if you shine. And like I said, a lot of my current designers, like right now on my design team, I have Ethan Fleischer and Sean Main and Ken Nagle, all of which were finalists, you know, in, in

great designer searches. So, okay. So, um, there are a lot of ways to, I mean, getting a job in R and D is very difficult. One avenue is definitely, um, getting a job at wizards and then there's a lot of opportunity at wizards to um get your foot in the door at an r&d um there's if you work at wizards there's lots of opportunities to interact with magic we do play tests where people in the company are welcome um there are such things like hole filling and there's seminars there's all sorts of ways for somebody who's at Wizards to sort of test some of their magic chops and show us what they're capable of

so that's another avenue now my one caveat is if you get a job at Wizards even if your long term goal is being in R&D if you do not succeed at the job you were hired for you will not get to R&D one of the things that's really important I should address is if you get a succeed at the job you were hired for, you will not get to R&D. One of the things that's really important I should address is if you get a job at Wizards,

no matter what your long-term plan is, your short-term plan has to be to be the most awesome person at the job you were hired for. Because if you get hired for a job and do poorly at that job, that is not going to be good for your chances to advance anywhere else in the company. So if you do come to work for Wizards, whatever job you get, excel at that job. Be awesome at that job. But there is opportunities if you work at Wizards to help make magic and to demonstrate to us. There are definitely people who they started at Wizards doing something else and eventually worked their way to working in R&D. Dan Emmons doesn't currently work anymore, but he was a designer that started elsewhere in the company

and then slowly worked over and became a full-time designer. Okay. So, oh, and if you want to work at Wizards, there's a job board we have where we post all our jobs. It's something where you can go

and look at. I don't know the address off the top of my head, but if you go to Wizards, there's a job posting bar where we post all our jobs and explain in detail what we're looking for and what the prerequisites are and what the skills we need, what education you need. Okay, so what else

do you want to become a game designer? I know at Wizards, by the way, having an undergraduate degree is it's not that you have to have one, I guess, but it's highly, highly, highly recommended, and it's already hard enough to get a job in R&D, and undergraduate degree is really important. So what exactly, people ask me this all the time, okay, I'm going to college, what do I study? I want to be a game designer. What do I study? And the advice I give is the most important thing you can do for wizards is create a set of skills

that are unique, that let you have something different to offer. That one of the things I keep saying to people is if you look at the history of people in R&D, we come from all over the place.

I was a TV writer. Bill Rose ran a, or I'm sorry, Charlie Coutinho ran a chemistry lab. I think Bill Rose did finance. Henry Stern was literally a rocket scientist. You know, Richard was a math professor.

You know, people have come from all sorts of different walks of life and all sorts of different jobs and that part of part of what we're looking for in R&D is just a breadth of experience and a breadth of just skills that are valuable that you can bring to the table that would do something that just offer us something that we don't normally have. do something that just, offer us something that we don't normally have. So, now, once again, I'm sort of differentiating between getting a job at Wizards versus getting a larger job as a game designer. If, one of the things that's available now, that was not available when I was going to school many years ago, is you are now able

to study game design. There are now actual, there are actual places that have game design studies. Some of them tend to lead, lean a little bit toward video games. I think a lot of times when you talk about game design, a lot of people, their first meaning is video game design. Now, that said, I think that the core of what makes games games is true in both video games and analog games, what I'll call non-video games. And I think if you understand how to make a game, those skills will apply. There are definitely some different skills for making a video game from making an analog game. There are definitely some different skills for making a video game, for making an analog game. While there's a lot of overlap, especially in the game design portion,

there's a lot of fundamental differences. There's a lot of technical things. If you want to work for a specific game, whether it's Magic or a different game, the advice that you have there is also, not only do you want to playtest games, that's good, but you want to become proficient in that game. If you want to get hired to make a GameX, you really need to understand how GameX ticks,

which means you need to play a lot of GameX. You need to play a lot. You want to work for magic? Well, I need you to understand magic. One of my biggest problems when I've had designers come in that are good game designers but not magic designers is they tend to constantly reinvent the wheel, which means they do a lot of things and go,

oh, that was a very interesting discovery you made, but we made that eight years ago. Or we tried that many years ago. You want to have a good working knowledge of how the game ticks, especially something like magic. The older the game is, the more you need to understand the history of the game that you're making and what has and hasn't been done before.

Because there's not a lot of value of making things that are just, oh, that is really interesting, that's an awesome mechanic. And back in 1999, it was very popular, you know. So I think that the, I think that one of the things is, I'm trying to be very broad here and talk about a lot of different kinds of game designs, but one of the things I will say is, while I love people having a breadth of knowledge,

I also feel like, oh, you actually can study video games now. You actually can study, or not just games, game design. There's different colleges that have game design. I've had a chance to talk a little bit. One of the things that's very interesting is, when I Google my name from time to time, I will find especially 10 Things Every Game Needs shows up very often in

syllabuses for game design courses. The fact that that is true, I'm very honored by that. As a writer, it's cool to do something and you can see people make use of it. And like I said, one of the things that I've tried to do as a game designer is be a source, a resource for people who want to learn game design. And so part of that, I would also say is not only do you want to study games, you might want to also study game design, game design theory. I'm not the only one that writes about game design.

There's other people that write about game design. There's awesome books. I often talk about Jesse Schell's book called The Art of Game Design, which is a thick tome but a very good read. There's a bunch of different books out there now on game design Brian Tinsman by the way wrote a book called what was it called look at game design

Brian Tinsman you'll find it his book was a lot more about how do you sell your game sort of like how do you break into the business his was a little less technically about how you design things a lot of my stuff is a little more about actually how to make the game not how to get a job

this podcast is a little different I'm being a little more practical on how do you get a job and I do think that having some knowledge and going to school and studying I think that's pretty cool that's something relatively new the idea of,

I got a degree in game design is definitely new, but it's very cool, and it's another avenue. So let's say you're going to school and you're not studying game design specifically. Here are skills that are really important that I recommend that you learn, things that R&D I know looks for, and I think most game companies will look for. Number one is the ability to analyze. A lot of what makes a good game designer is your ability to look at something and figure out what is and isn't working. And so studying things in which you analyze, and it doesn't matter if you're analyzing games, just learn the skills of analysis, of how to look at things and how to break things down and how to evaluate.

You know, there's a lot of skills to understanding how to do analysis and how to evaluate things. That is really important. You want to have basic analysis skills. You also want basic evaluation skills, which are connected but slightly separate. So evaluate is learning how to look at things and how to sort of pick up information and understand. Evaluate is learning how to look at things and how to pick up information and understand. Analysis is understanding how to take that information and knowing how to apply it. The thing has this problem.

Well, maybe we did this thing. You could make it better. You need evaluation. You need analysis. The next thing you need is communication. If you have really good ideas, if you can't communicate those ideas to other people. Like so much of what I do in R&D is I sit in meetings. I talk to people.

A lot of what I do is I have to convince people that I have to first have ideas and then I have to convince other people of my ideas. And the key to doing that is communication. And there's two types of communication. I mean there's many types but there's two major types which is there's verbal communication and there's is communication. And there's two types of communication. I mean, there's many types, but there's two major types,

which is there's verbal communication and there's written communication. Both are very important. Both are very valuable. You will both be in meetings and things in which you're defending your ideas that's written, that's verbal, and you'll be writing things down

and documenting things, and that's written. You want to get a lot of communication skills. You also want to, I'm big on creativity. I believe that's a skill that's also pretty valuable, of just being able to figure out where to look for things, for new ideas. And I've done a whole podcast on creativity.

I've done an article. And my belief in creativity is the ability to connect things that other people have not connected before. Saying, oh, what if thing A and thing N, which have nothing to do with each other, what if you could connect this in some ways? What if we could take something learned from a different field of study? What if we could, you know, what if we could take two popular things and combine them? You know, creativity is taking things that people don't normally associate together and putting them together. I think learning the skills of how to be more creative is valuable. In general, what I'm sort of saying

is if you're going to go to school, it doesn't matter necessarily what you study. And you don't have to study game design to get a job as a game designer, especially at Wizards. But you need to study skills that will make you... So here's the big one. When you go for a job, and this is 100% true at Wizards, one of the biggest mistakes people make when they interview at Wizards, especially in R&D, is they spend a lot of time telling us why they would love the job, why they're so excited to work for us, why this would be a dream job for them. That's wonderful, and it's not a negative that you're excited to work here.

It's a positive. But what's more important to us is not what we will do for you. It is what you will do for us. Why should we hire you? Why would you being an employee for us make us better, make R&D better, make magic better? That what you're selling is not your enthusiasm. What you're selling is your competence.

You're selling your influence. You're selling why you being hired would be beneficial for us and I think a lot of people spend a little bit too much time sort of going over how excited they would be and here's the problem everybody's excited

that the people we're talking to to work on magic they are fans of magic we are not hiding people that go I've never heard of magic what is this magic no we are hiring people who are fans of magic

so the idea of working on something that you are a fan of is exciting. So everybody's excited. And it's not that I don't want to hear enthusiasm. It's not that I... It's not a negative thing. Being enthusiastic is great. But it is not going to set you apart.

It's not... Like, a lot of people come to us and, like... Like, you... One of the things to remember when you are doing anything, a pitch of any kind, and some of them, I think a job interview is, in a lot of ways, a pitch in which you're selling yourself, you get one strong message. That's one thing I learned when I pitched.

One of the things I should do a podcast on pitching. That's a fine idea. Anyway, one of the things you learn when you're pitching is that you get one major message. You get a few minor messages, but one major message. That if you try to diversify your message, it gets muddled. And what you want is one strong, clean, clear, simple message. And that message, when you are taking a job interview, I'm going to give you the message right now, which is, you will be better off if you hire me. I will make your life easier.

I will be a wonderful employee. I will improve whatever product we're making. The message you want to give is, I am going to make things easier for you. I will improve. You want to hire me. Things will be better for you if you hire me. That I will help.

And a lot of job interviews explaining why they should hire you why you would be good for them and remember that that's when you're eventually the final stages here trying to get a job remember that that's very important um so i'm almost at work we have a i had a lot of traffic today. My major point is if you want to be a game designer, you need to cover the basics, understand games, have designed games, and you need to figure out

how you can communicate to other people that you understand games. And like I said, the cleanest and clearest way to do that is make games and publish games and have had games that, you know, if I want to prove I understand games, playing with you a game I've made that impresses

you know, if I play with somebody a game they've made that impresses me, wow. Nothing's going to do a better job of me going wow, they understand games. Like I said, hiring for magic is a little quirkier because I can't look at the magic stuff you made. I can talk to you about it,

and I've gotten really, really good at understanding people who understand how magic is made. One of the things that I love is when I talk to somebody that gets it, that understands what makes magic tick. And the funny thing is, it's not a secret. I'm about as public as public can be about what I think makes magic tick, as well as what makes games in general tick. And the funny thing is, it's not a secret. I'm about as public as public can be about what I think makes magic tick, as well as what makes games

in general tick. And I've written a lot of material and done a lot of podcasts and answered a lot of questions on my blog. If you want to learn about game design, and magic in particular, there is material to do. But you've got to do your homework. One of my ongoing themes in my podcast is

you've got to do your homework. And that if you themes in my podcast is you've got to do your homework. And that if you want something, part of it is understanding what you're trying to get. You know, like I said, if you want to be good at games, study games. If you want to be good at magic, study magic. If you want to get a job, study the job. Know who the people you're going to interview with. Have some idea going in what you can expect. If you have any ability to talk to other people that work at the company and just, you know, do some interviews so you can understand just what makes them tick, that is valuable.

But anyway, you want to be a game designer, the answer is the impetus is on you. That's, I guess, the final takeaway, which is a lot of people want to be game designers, and it is not a field that you can easily step into. I also should point out it's not a field that's particularly lucrative. I'm not saying there aren't jobs that pay well, but it is not, there's not a lot of those jobs. And so a lot of people, if you're getting into game design, it should be because you love designing games, and that there is a great reward for doing for a living what you love to do. And so if you want to be a game designer and you love designing games, And that there is a great reward for doing for a living what you love to do. And so if you want to be a game designer and you love designing games, hey, there is space for people who are good and love at designing games. But my lesson of today is you need to put in your time.

It's not like you're just going to say, okay, I love games. Let me be a game designer. You're going to become a game designer because you study games, because you've studied game design, because you've done game design, because you've studied the industry and the people and the companies that you've done your homework. That if you want to be a game designer, you need to put in the time learning how to be good at game design and then proving to people that you're good at game design. And that is not easy, but it's something that can be done if you put in the time and energy to do it. Okay, well, I've just pulled into my parking spot, so we all know what that means.

It means it's the end of my drive to work. Instead of talking magic, it's time for me to be making magic. Thanks for joining me today, guys. Bye-bye.