An Improvement in Brainstorming Game Ideas

I have used brainstorming exercises in my game design classes for many years. When I first started, the goal was to fill the board with ideas within one class period—and we did. But it wasn't that helpful. Brainstorming is recommended in Richard Lemarchand's Playful Production Process, and so I used it in my 2023 and 2024 game studio preproduction classes, following his helpful rules. These exercises can result in unexpected items, but it seems like every time, no matter my framing, the participants failed to grasp the point of the exercise: game ideation. Instead, what overwhelms the list is inspiration for theme, setting, or characters, but these are not game ideas.

I saw a different possibility when I watched Joe Baxter-Webb's video on ideation methods. The video recommends seven different approaches for ensuring that one is pursuing worthwhile game ideas. One of the approaches is to describe a game in terms of "Action Action Goal." An example he gives describes Into the Breach: destroy the kaiju and upgrade my mechs so that I can save the cities. It struck me that this simple formula might help my students stop listing things like "bacon" which everyone likes but which is not a game idea. 

I explained the structure and goals in class yesterday, and in twenty minutes, my small group of students came up with forty game ideas. The very first one was only a goal, but with a little prompting, it was revised into action-goal. The next was fully robust in its action-action-goal structure. A few of the entries were quick "Yes, and..." entries, where someone riffed off of another idea, but most were standalone ideas.

Forty is much less than previous teams have made, and that's a good thing. Everything on the list can be turned into a game, although many of the actions seem to describe narrative events rather than player actions. For example, one of the concepts was to "embarrass" someone else, but turning this into a player action would require some interpretation. 

Each student brought an original game idea to class, inspired by Baxter-Webb's video, and I hoped this would warm them up for the exercise. However, I am not sure that items on the list represent the games that the students actually want to make. I say this in part because, earlier in the week, I had them do a short analysis of a game they enjoy, but in the brainstorming list, I don't see elements of those games. In retrospect, I could have been more transparent, telling them that they should expect to be doing creative ideation in class. To me, this is clear from the preparatory exercise, but that's because I have the whole class plan in my head already.

As I was writing this, I looked at my blog for old brainstorming notes and came across my notes from Justin Gary's Think Like a Game Designer. My plan for Monday's class was to have my students start greyboxing, but I realized last night that we should some more time narrowing down what we want to make. I think I may review the notes from Gary's book more carefully and have those as a back-up plan to help the students figure out what they want to make.