Hi everyone, I'm a new member from Spain, so I'm sorry for my english. I'm an engineering student, and I have some doubts that I would like to solve with your aid. Thank you! Firstly, I'm reading the Rollings & Morris book "Game Architecture and Design" at the moment. · The first step in a game development is to create the treatment (the idea, of course). · Then, in the "Core Design" chapter, the authors explain how to make the "Game Specification", in which should be, for instance: "Features, gameplay, interface, rules, level design". · Two chapters later, called "Detailed Design", they talk about the "Gameplay Specification". So, where is the difference between "game spec" and "gameplay spec"? Are they two documents apart? Or instead, are the "gameplay spec" included into the other? I suppose that "game spec" specifies more aspects (gameplay, levels, players, physics...and so on), in which is included the gameplay itself. But in a "development timeline" case study only appear the treatment and the "gameplay spec". It doesn't speak about the "game spec", more general than "gameplay spec". Thank you very much :-) [Edited by - Nene on August 12, 2005 4:38:35 AM]

Game specifications is a short description of each feature you will have in the game, but you will discuss them here somehow deeper than in the treatment...

The Gameplay Specifications handles in detail how your game mechanism will work, for example how one unit measures against any other unit, how a character will get quests, how he can solve them...for more take a look in the appendix of the book. There you will find some examples of all he has wrote about.

Hey friend, thank you for your answer. But I already have some doubt..

Just as you have told, the game spec is like a treatment but more extended. So it may be ommited because the full game design will be the gameplay spec, doesn't it? Then.. what's the function of making three documents if we can do it with only two docs (treatment and gameplay spec)?

In the other hand, I have been taking a glance at the Appendix. There, you can see an example of Racketeers. They say that it is an extended treatment, and the next step is to produce the full gameplay specification to the template shown in chapter 2 (this template in chapter 2 tell about Game Spec, not Gameplay spec). Then, where is game spec here? What's the difference between this extended treatment and its imaginary game spec???

Thanks a lot.

[Edited by - Nene on August 12, 2005 8:52:33 AM]