Hi! This is my first post, so if I'm in the wrong section, please forgive me I'm actually doing a game design for a prototype game in order to complementing with a thesis. I worked as a game artist but it's my first time doing game design, also I know a little about programming. I'm using currently Unity. Recently, a friend of mine found a template for game design By Mark Baldwin, so I'm currently studyin it but I do not understand some of the sections, so if you guys can help me with this I will be very thankfully. I copy/paste the template here, hoping you can explain with more details this sections. Perhaps I already know this, but with other name (ex. level of detail it's the same as Mip mapping). But, I'm not sure, so here they are: 4.2. Feature Set (what it's about?) 4.7. Project Scope – A summary of the scope of the game.(what it's about?) 8.1. Visual System (what it's about?) 8.1.3. Rendering System (it's like Frames Per Second?) 8.1.5. Lighting Models (what it's about,it's like lightmapping or baking textures?) 9.5. Support AI (what the difference with the other sections like AI Enemy or AI NPC?) 10.3. Development procedures and standards (it's like a pipeline?) 11.2. style Guides (what it's about?) 12.2. Installer (what it's about?) 12.3. Update software (what it's about?) 13.1. Detailed Schedule (about what, the entire project?) 13.4. Localization Plan (what it's about?) 13.5. Test Plan (what it's about?) Thank you very much for reading this and for your pattience ------------------- THE TEMPLATE --------------------- 1. Title Page 1.1. Game Name – Perhaps also add a subtitle or high concept sentence. 1.2. Copyright Information 1.3. Version Number, author, date 2. Table of Contents – Make sure this includes all the subsections to make finding material. If practical, hyper linking the document will help here. 3. Design History – This is a change listing quickly describing each major version and changes. 4. Section I - Game Overview 4.1. Game Concept 4.2. Feature Set 4.3. Genre 4.4. Target Audience 4.5. Game Flow Summary – How does the player move through the game. Both through framing interface and the game itself. 4.6. Look and Feel – What is the basic look and feel of the game? What is the visual style? 4.7. Project Scope – A summary of the scope of the game. 4.7.1. Number of locations 4.7.2. Number of levels 4.7.3. Number of NPC’s 4.7.4. Number of weapons 4.7.5. Etc. 5. Section II - Gameplay and Mechanics 5.1. Gameplay 5.1.1. Game Progression 5.1.2. Mission/challenge Structure 5.1.3. Puzzle Structure 5.1.4. Objectives – What are the objectives of the game? 5.1.5. Play Flow – How does the game flow for the game player 5.2. Mechanics – What are the rules to the game, both implicit and explicit. This is the model of the universe that the game works under. Think of it as a simulation of a world, how do all the pieces interact? This actually can be a very large section. 5.2.1. Physics – How does the physical universe work? 5.2.2. Movement 5.2.2.1. General Movement 5.2.2.2. Other Movement 5.2.3. Objects 5.2.3.1. Picking Up Objects 5.2.3.2. Moving Objects 5.2.4. Actions 5.2.4.1. Switches and Buttons 5.2.4.2. Picking Up, Carrying and Dropping 5.2.4.3. Talking 5.2.4.4. Reading 5.2.5. Combat – If there is combat or even conflict, how is this specifically modeled? 5.2.6. Economy – What is the economy of the game? How does it work? 5.3. Screen Flow 5.3.1. Screen Flow Chart – A graphical description of how each screen is related to every other 5.3.2. Screen Descriptions – What is the purpose of each screen? 5.3.2.1. Main Menu Screen 5.3.2.2. Options Screen 5.3.2.3. Etc. 5.4. Game Options – What are the options and how do they affect game play and mechanics? 5.5. Replaying and Saving 5.6. Cheats and Easter Eggs 6. Section III – Story, Setting and Character 6.1. Story and Narrative - Specific details like scripts and cut scenes may not be in this document but be in the Story Bible. 6.1.1. Back story 6.1.2. Plot Elements 6.1.3. Game Progression 6.1.4. License Considerations 6.1.5. Cut Scenes 6.1.5.1. Cut scene #1 6.1.5.1.1. Actors 6.1.5.1.2. Description 6.1.5.1.3. Storyboard 6.1.5.1.4. Script 6.1.5.2. Cut scene #2 6.1.5.3. etc. 6.2. Game World 6.2.1. General look and feel of world 6.2.2. Area #1 6.2.2.1. General Description 6.2.2.2. Physical Characteristics 6.2.2.3. Levels that use area 6.2.2.4. Connections to other areas 6.2.3. Area #2 6.2.3.1. etc. 6.3. Characters 6.3.1. Character #1 6.3.1.1. Back story 6.3.1.2. Personality 6.3.1.3. Look 6.3.1.3.1. Physical characteristics 6.3.1.3.2. Animations 6.3.1.4. Special Abilities 6.3.1.5. Relevance to game story 6.3.1.6. Relationship to other characters 6.3.1.7. Statistics 6.3.2. Character #2 6.3.3. etc. 7. Section IV – Levels 7.1. Level #1 7.1.1. Synopsis 7.1.2. Introductory Material (Cut scene? Mission briefing?) 7.1.3. Objectives 7.1.4. Physical Description 7.1.5. Map 7.1.6. Critical Path 7.1.7. Encounters 7.1.8. Level Walkthrough 7.1.9. Closing Material 7.2. Level #2 7.3. etc. 7.4. Training Level 8. Section V - Interface 8.1. Visual System 8.1.1. HUD - What controls 8.1.2. Menus 8.1.3. Rendering System 8.1.4. Camera 8.1.5. Lighting Models 8.2. Control System – How does the game player control the game? What are the specific commands? 8.3. Audio 8.4. Music 8.5. Sound Effects 8.6. Help System 9. Section VI - Artificial Intelligence 9.1. Opponent AI – The active opponent that plays against the game player and therefore requires strategic decision making (example, Civilization or Chess, how is it to be designed? 9.2. Enemy AI – Villains and Monsters 9.3. Non-combat Characters 9.4. Friendly Characters 9.5. Support AI 9.5.1. Player and Collision Detection 9.5.2. Pathfinding 10. Section VII – Technical – This may be abbreviated with most in the Technical Bible. 10.1. Target Hardware 10.2. Development hardware and software 10.3. Development procedures and standards 10.4. Game Engine 10.5. Network 10.6. Scripting Language 10.7. etc. 11. Section VIII – Game Art - This may be abbreviated with most of the content in an Art Bible. 11.1. Concept Art 11.2. style Guides 11.3. Characters 11.4. Environments 11.5. Equipment 11.6. Cut scenes 11.7. Miscellaneous 12. Section IX - Secondary Software 12.1. Editor 12.2. Installer 12.3. Update software 13. Section X - Management 13.1. Detailed Schedule 13.2. Budget 13.3. Risk Analysis 13.4. Localization Plan 13.5. Test Plan 14. Appendices 14.1. Asset List 14.1.1. Art 14.1.1.1. Model and Texture List 14.1.1.2. Animation List 14.1.1.3. Effects List 14.1.1.4. Interface Art List 14.1.1.5. Cut scene List 14.1.2. Sound 14.1.2.1. Environmental Sounds 14.1.2.2. Weapon Sounds 14.1.2.3. Interface Sounds 14.1.3. Music 14.1.3.1. Ambient 14.1.3.2. “Action” 14.1.3.3. Victory 14.1.3.4. Defeat 14.1.4. Voice 14.1.4.1. Actor #1 lines 14.1.4.2. Actor #2 lines 14.1.4.3. Etc.

4.2. Feature Set - what gameplay elements does your game contain.
4.7. Project Scope – look at the subsections.
8.1. Visual System - again, look at the subsections.
8.1.3. Rendering System - it's asking what system you'll use, and which basic features it has.
8.1.5. Lighting Models - this could be about lightmapping or baking textures, but it also applies to the actual light objects in your game. How many, and of what type?
9.5. Support AI - look at the subsections...
10.3. Development procedures and standards - procedures would include your development methodology, your milestone system if you have one, etc. Standards might include a reference to a code standard, asset naming standards, etc.
11.2. style Guides - These are references for artists to refer to when creating assets so the style is consistent.
12.2. Installer - this is the program that installs your software.
12.3. Update software - patching, distribution of patches
13.1. Detailed Schedule - a schedule for development of the entire project
13.4. Localization Plan - plans for distributing the game in different languages, support for non-QWERTY keyboards, that sort of thing.
13.5. Test Plan - Literally a plan for testing. You should have a list of features and functionality that need testing and a set of criteria to measure them against. You will also need to formulate time into the schedule for this testing while allowing for the fact that some tests will fail requiring further development work and then repeated tests.