- Sid Meier, Firaxis
- Bill Roper, Blizzard North
- Brian Reynolds, Big Huge Games
- Bruce C. Shelley, Ensemble Studios
- Peter Molyneux, Lionhead Studios
- Alex Garden, Relic Entertainment
- Louis Castle, Electronic Arts/Westwood Studios
- Chris Sawyer, Freelance
- Rick Goodman, Stainless Steel Studios
- Phil Steinmeyer, PopTop Software
- Ed Del Castillo, Liquid Entertainment
Louis Castle, Electronic Arts/Westwood Studios
Louis Castle is the general manager and co-founder of Westwood Studios, one of the most successful game development houses in the world. Westwood is best known for its Command & Conquer franchise, as well as Blade Runner, Monopoly, The Lion King, Earth and Beyond, and others. In early 2003, Westwood Studios become integrated with its parent company and publisher, Electronic Arts.
Castle provides some advice on creating successful computer games:
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Know your audience. Spend the time to figure out who is likely to buy your product and research competitive or similar products. If none exist, spend time playing the best-selling and respected titles on your platform of choice. Be your best and worst customer.
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Make design a deliberate process. Abstract the activities, emotional beats, and just about everything you can think of. Use the abstractions as filters and compare them to your favorite products. Design in any form is a deliberate action that requires planning, execution, and ongoing analysis.
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Listen to others. The more exposure you can get and the sooner you can get it, the better your chances are to realize design flaws before you're committed to them. Be able to give up your best idea if it doesn't work in the context of your vision. Don't "make it fit."
Asked to comment on the key differences when creating a game for a console versus a PC, Castle has these comments:
How can you acquire a "dev kit" to work on a console game?
Chapter 21 thoroughly discusses the various ways to break into the industry, but Castle offers some sound advice here: