The Many Game Designer Variants

Can you tell the difference between a Mission Designer and a Level Designer? How about a World Designer from a Narrative Game Designer? They seem so similar to each other it’s hard to tell the difference.

It seems like there is no shortage of Game Designer variants these days!

A Game Designer title won’t cut it when you can be a Mission Designer or a Narrative Game Designer; I could go on.

But when we’re talking about Game Design, it’s important to separate the family of Game Design and the title/role of a Game Designer. Game Design is designing interactive experiences, whereas a Game Designer has markedly different responsibilities from a Level Designer.

The Video Game industry is vast and still establishing itself. Unlike the Film Industry, which has established roles and guild standards, gaming is more technical, with requirements varying wildly from project to project.

This article will compare the many different sides and specializations of Game Designers working in the industry.

As a note, these observances are based on my insights into the industry, and the implementation of these roles can vary wildly from studio to studio. Rather than mention that specifically in each section, remember these are broad applications of these roles. When looking at a job posting, use that description rather than the generalities laid out here.

General Game Design Roles

Game Designer

Let's start with the fundamentals. A Game Designer works on designing features and game mechanics for a game. They will iterate on ideas to ensure the features are fun, add value to the game, and are engaging for the user. Mapping out designs in documentation, working with other disciplines like programmers and artists to implement features in the game, and refining the features after they are in-game to ensure they fit the intended vision.

Game Designers often take on responsibilities from any other roles listed in this article, whether doing some level design or tuning some economy. When a team gets larger, or the game's needs get very intense, you'll see a switch from Game Designers doing everything to specialists working on individual areas. Game Designers are great at wearing many hats but specialize less than the other roles on this list.

Senior Game Designer 

A Senior Game Designer has several years of experience and shipped at least one game. Senior Game Designers will often be responsible for teaching and assisting more junior members of the team with reviews, soft mentoring, and leadership direction. Senior Game Designers will often be responsible for a particular design section.

A Senior Game Designer is the Swiss Army Knife of Game Design, able to jump on and tackle any issue by breaking down the challenges into sections and working an issue out with different stakeholders.

Everyday Tasks would be the same as Game Designer, with the addition of mentoring and reviewing more junior game designer work. 

Lead Game Designers

When moving into a Lead role, the nature of work often changes. While the work changes from studio to studio and game to game, usually, when moving into a Lead Game Designer role, you execute less task work and focus more on the direction of the other designers you're responsible for. This can mean you're writing less documentation, and focusing more on carefully overseeing work. This also usually involves more direct management of other designers, including performance management and mentoring.

Principal Game Designer

This role is less common than a Lead Game Designer, but on larger, more established projects, sometimes there will be a need for multiple Leads. When this happens, the Principal Game Designer acts as a leader of leads. The Principal Game Designer facilitates consistency across the team and ensures all the areas are adequately supported. Some projects will use a Game Director for this role.

Game Director

Like the Film Director, a Game Director oversees development against a particular vision. They will need to grapple with the idealism of the Game Design team against the constraints of hitting a deadline at the highest quality possible. The Game Director will be keenly aware of the bigger picture with roadmaps, product goals, and upcoming risks while leaving the details to the area specialists.

Scenario Design Roles

While the Game Designers are working on the mechanics of a game, these roles create scenarios to use those mechanics. I'm opting to call this the Scenario Design family since the kinds of interaction here are all different focuses of scenarios presented to the player for them to react to.

Level Designer

Levels can take many different forms, but the most common use is the game space that the player character interacts with. Levels are the playspace the users explore and navigate in the game. For example, this could take the form of creating maps in a first-person shooter or puzzles in a . Level Designers take the game mechanics and create opportunities to use those mechanics for immersive or challenging experiences.

Level Designers often work in game engines like Unity or Unreal. This can involve using basic blockout geometry to map environments and obstacles or set dressing environments with props created by 3D artists.

Scenario Designer

I'm grouping the Mission Designer, Quest Designer, and Encounter Designer roles together because they are mostly different focuses of the same overall goal: create scenarios where the user must use their abilities to overcome a challenge.

Mission Designers are responsible for creating set objectives and opportunities for the player. Contrasting with the Level Designer, who's often more broadly working on the environmental game challenges, Missions try to utilize the structure already laid out. Missions are usually more structured challenges and encounters for the user to overcome.

A variant of the Mission Designer is the Quest Designer. This can be the same role, only remapped terms (like Blizzard does), or Quests can be more tied into the Systems for recurring actions. Think 'Slay 5 Boars' rather than complete these long missions.

Another variation is the Encounter Designer. You'll often see this listed in action games. Encounters are another type of scenario design where the user needs to overcome a specific challenge.

Narrative & Story Design

Narrative and Story Design isn't just limited to expansive RPG epics! Many games put a high emphasis on their narratives.

Narrative Game Designer

Narrative Game Design can take many forms but usually form the bridge between Game Mechanics and Story. This often involves writing content and setting up the story for scenarios that play out as part of a player's journey.

World Designer

World Designers are responsible for creating the backstory and lore for the game. This involves setting a tone, gathering references, and writing lots of content. World Design is very important on games where the user can delve deep into exploring content. It's also essential for World Designers to be consistent and thorough.

Systems Design

Systems Designer 

System Designers are a specialized form of Game Designer that focuses on the meta-game. This usually consists of things like progression systems game loops, and can include things like the First Time User Experience.

Live Content Designer

A Live Content Designer is a dynamic, fast-paced role where you maintain a game after it has launched. This involves making new live events, updating old content, testing out alternative content to see if it improves the player experience, and all kinds of tinkering.

Economy Designer

A Game Economy is a complicated thing. It requires a lot of scrutiny and work to make sure there are no Circuit breaks or unintended loops. An Economy Designer needs to carefully manage what the user is earning and what they are required to spend on to progress. A Game Economy is an ever-shifting environment with changes in a far-off part of the game having all kinds of changes. The Economy Designers need to be very dialed into all elements of changes to prevent breaks.

Social Games Designer

A Social Games Designer is specifically targeted at designing the systems that allow users to interact. This can be things like empowering players to make in-game friends, communication systems, guilds, etc. Social Game Designers will often focus on improving the quality of life for users in their interaction with the community. There's also a heightened focus on removing the toxic negative experiences that can come through in communities to ensure users are not being bullied or harmed by others.

Other

Quality Designer

Quality Designers have one foot in Game Design while primarily focusing on Quality Assurance. Unlike Game Designers who will design and iterate on user-facing features like mechanics or systems, Quality Designers will focus on creating testing tools, test plans, and overall processes that improve the stability and quality of a game. Consider that as a Quality Designer, your user is often the rest of the Testing team that works with the tools and systems you create.

Producers

Production roles vary a lot in their responsibilities and skill sets. I include them in this list because some large companies, like Electronic Arts, use the term producer for employees who would most commonly be called some form of Game Designer at other companies. 

If you're interested in learning more about Game Producers, check out the full post here!

Plenty More Game Design Varieties...

We are just scratching the surface of the Game Designer variants out there. It's an absolute multiverse of skills and experiences, so making a concise list is difficult. 

Did we not cover your Game Design Specialty? Let us know below!