[game_edu] Brenda Braithwaite's game_edu rant at GDC

[Bill Crosbie]

I've been following the discussion from GDC but this is the first time I've
had some time to weigh in. I know I will be reiterating some points made by
others. Please bear with me.

The discussion is great. I just want to make sure that this doesn't become
the equivalent of the Hecker/Nintendo misunderstanding.  Brenda is a great
designer and fantastic educator. She took the position she did to provoke
discussion. By that measure, her  rant was remarkably successful.

It seems that there is concern that computer science is trying to take over
game design, or that we are harkening for a return to the 'old days.'  I
disagree. What was put forward as a desire for coding knowledge can be
stated more generally.  I want to redirect the question of being able to
code in a specific language to the process of thinking rigorously about
algorithms in a way that is translatable to a computer.

This area of research is called computational thinking. Google has compiled
a great set of resources about the topic at
http://www.google.com/edu/computational-thinking/

Ian alluded to this when he said that as a designer who understands
programming he could alter his designs in a way that saves the team effort
(and by extension, money). I spent most of my GDC in the company of the
technical artists. This idea of what is inexpensive vs expensive to
implement arose in those discussions as well. I'm going to go out on a limb
here, but I suspect that much of the programmer vs. art divide is rooted in
the question of complexity of implementation of various ideas. Not
understanding what is barely possible compared to what is easily
accomplished.

Ultimately procedural thinking is another problem solving tool. By extension
the idea that designers should be able to code is to say that they need
another tool in their toolbox to be effective at what they do.  It is not
necessary for game designers to implement low level, close to the hardware
concepts. That's what your core engineering team is for. It probably is
necessary for them to understand the issues that drive programmers nuts so
that they can effectively communicate with the programming team.

Finally, if the notion that you need to teach some element of coding in your
game design programs is making you nervous, I want to let you know that
while at GDC I overheard game writers advocating for the need to understand
and prototype their own systems in code. Similarly the technical artists
were discussing how, while they are not engineers, understanding scripting
is critical to improving workflow across the art team.

Our medium is digital. No matter how many layers of abstraction we pile on
top of it, at its core, it is all voltages and logic gates. It is not
possible for the computer to meet us half way. (cf.
http://xkcd.com/568/panel 2)  Anything we can do in our programs to
build up talented designers
that embrace this reality will serve them well in their careers.

Bill
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