Introduction

Sid Meier's most famous work is one of my favorite strategy games: Civilization.

In Sid Meir's Memoir, he talks about the key moments of his career and shares funny and interesting anecdotes that make it a real pleasure to read.

There are also a lot of Game Development tips and lessons throughout the book. I'm gonna make sure you can get them all in this article.

If you need more details or want to enjoy a nice story, I invite you to get Sid Meir's Memoir.

You can read the article on my blog if you prefer a version with more quotes from Sid -- and a table of content.

Sid's long career (in very short).

Sid started as an engineer in accounting programming. During a trip to Las Vegas, he associated with Bill Stealy to create the MicroProse game studio. He started creating flight simulation games in his free time.

He worked more and more at MicroProse, only leaving his first job when money was not a problem anymore. They were making the copy themselves on floppy disks. They even sold them to the small stores across the country, one by one.

In the beginning, Sid was doing everything. Visuals, programming, sound, music, game design. In later games, they hired artists and sound designers. This allowed Sid to focus on programming and game design.

At some point, they sold the company, and both Bill and Sid quit. Soon after that, Sid created his game studio, Firaxis, where he still works.

Game Design Tips

Keep the player focus on what's yet to come.

Like cliffhangers in series, tease the player enough so that he wants to see the next turn/level/corner. Reward him for getting there, but focus your attention on the next thing to do.

There's a popular quote among Civilization's players :

Just one more turn.

Losing comes later, after the rewards have been established.

In 1985, he released Silent Service, a strategy naval war game. He demonstrated it to a major buyer, the AI crushed him in an instant. As you can guess It did not let a good first impression. You must be sure any kind of player can win the first minutes of your games and get some rewards from it. Once that's done, the player can lose and not be disappointed anymore.

Interesting Decisions are all about investment.

Sid is very well known for the following quote : 

A game is a series of interesting decisions.

What we actually like in video games, are the interesting decisions, that you already take in everyday life.

A decision needs to have some kind of impact (or at least the player should believe it has). The player needs to have some investment in the choice and feel like its his personal choice.

A Game Designer does not create the Fun, he Finds it.

We should have some knowledge about human psychology (humanity's flaws). Then, use this knowledge to find what makes our gameplay experience fun.

For example, what makes the battle system in Civilization so compelling?

The system is partly random, you can estimate the outcome, but you can't be sure of it. When launching a battle, you see the soldiers fighting but have to wait a few seconds to see the final result. Chances of winning are faked. If you're told you have a 50% chance of winning, then the game will let you win half the battles. If you have 90% of winning, you will lose very rarely.

We know humans love surprises, it's a very strong feeling. The waiting of the result amplifies the effect. But they don't like unfairness, losing 2 fights in a row with a 50% chance of winning seems unfair to a human.

We can say the system is fun because :

No wrong answers, and more than one right answer, but not too many.

While working on Sid Meier's Pirates, he stumbled upon a common problem of textual adventure games. For a given puzzle, there is only one solution. For example, to open a door with a key, you have only one good answer "Unlock door with key" and a lot of wrong answers "Open door with key", "Use key to open door", etc...

Each decision we take consumes a bit of our willpower. An important decision consumes as much as an insignificant one. A scientific article seems to confirm this concept. We call this Decision Fatigue.

I think we can agree that our goal is to limit decision fatigue and only propose important decisions to the player.

Another phenomenon; The more choices are presented to us, the more it costs us. We don't want to miss anything interesting, and we got frustrated if we can't see the outcome of every choice.

Nowadays, AAA is all about open worlds with endless places to be, dungeons to explore, side quests to complete, collectibles to get... endless choices. I observed that it's common practice to quit or ignore all side content and focus on the "main path".

We need to control how much content is available at all times and guide the player. It's nice to have a lot of content and let the player choose his own way. It's not good to burden the player with endless small choices to make each time he's looking at the map for his next move. It's even more true in games that are more about action than mental skills.

Don't forget to design what happens in the head of the player.

I think the best example we can find is with pixel art games. The idea of pixel art is to represent things (items, characters, animations) with the least amount possible of pixels.

If you look closely, it does not really look like a coat, a helmet, or even legs. But players look at it from afar, and can easily imagine how it really looks "in their head".

In your games, you don't have to justify everything. Why this pirate has a horrible scar on his face? The player will find himself, maybe it was during a battle, or during a fight with a shark.

You don't have the budget for voices? Just write texts on the screen and let the player imagine the voice of the characters.

When designing, be sure you have some places where you let the player imagine things.

Make sure the player is the one having fun.

While creating Sid Meier Railroad Tycoon, Sid added floods that sporadically destroy bridges. His colleague Bruce, found it very unfair. Sid insisted but realized it was something fun to create for him, not something fun to play for the player.

In my opinion, it's a trap we can easily fall into. Stay in control and keep the ability to judge if it really has its place in your game or if it's just something you wanted to try.

Always give the player a fighting chance.

To continue about these floods in Railroad Tycoon, he agreed it was unjust. The player could not fight back, it felt like a betrayal and it's frustrating.

To resolve the problem, he added two types of bridges :

This way the player has control over the risk and the flood actually became a source of genuine reward.

Simple plus simple equals complex.

Don't try to design a very complex system from the start. Design small and simple systems that will interact in a complex manner.
For example, a lot of games use the rock-paper-scissors design. It keeps a certain balance while giving you choices.

Avoid brilliant and effective AI.

It's undeniable that when you're playing against AI, you need a fun one, not a clever one. And most of the time the player gets fun from actually being able to predict the AI behavior and beat it.

But I can think of two examples where we should try to have brilliant AI.

Games do not need to be realistic.

Like many of his games later, Sid based Formula 1 on reality. Even in this kind of game, we don’t need a real driver with a backstory.

What games need is:

A combination of emotional and psychological hooks that make you believe, however fleetingly, that you yourself are the driver.

The most elementary, defining feature of gaming is its interactivity

In a "Dinosaur RTS game" that he never released, he removed all the micromanagement actions. The idea was to let the AI do most of the "boring" stuff. The problem: the player did not have anything interesting to do anymore.

Be sure to focus on what your player is doing in your game, but don't remove too much control from him.

When should you use Real-time versus Turn-based?

Let's summarize the characteristics of both designs :

Now think about your game, and choose a design depending on the characteristics you want.

Be gentle with the player ego.

We have to offer a moral clarity to our players and eliminate the painful quandaries, because unlike other forms of storytelling, they are personally standing in for our main character.

Their ego is on the line, and we have to be gentle with it.

I'm reading that he thinks the player should feel like he is playing the good guy.

A lot of games have shown us that it's not the case, players like to play the bad guys. On the other hand, you have to keep in mind that ego issue. It's probably not fun to play a character that's being ridiculed or that doesn't match your values.

Be Reductive in a Balanced and Polite way.

In Civilization, each civ has its own unique buildings, units, and perks. For example in Civ 6, Norway has bonuses for naval units, naval raids, and pillages.

Imagine the number of unique perks needed to "truthfully" represent Norway. They chose the best ones for a satisfying game experience, based on historical facts.

Moreover, you are not playing the Norway nation, but the leader Harald Hardrada of Norway. It's a subtle but important distinction to avoid some backlash -- "Are you saying that Norway people are savage pillagers?".

It's delicate to craft art about historical events. The more famous your game is, the more important it is to manage that. At Ubisoft, we have entire teams working on this specific subject. And we still have problems like NPCs wearing the wrong type of shields for the time.

Let's list a few rules to deal with historical figures and events in a historically accurate game :

Game Development Tips

Not every culture view games the same way.

We see and create games through the lens of our culture.

[...] not every culture viewed games the same way, and that there was definitely such a thing as an American game. What would a truly international game look like, I wondered, with no cultural bias, and universal appeal?

If you target a specific culture it might be a good idea to keep that in mind. But I believe we should create games the way we see them through our own culture and personal experience.

It's always refreshing to play games from a different culture (compare the Street of Rage with Aurion : Legacy of the koriidan, the first professional game of Central Africa that I discovered during indiecade).

Implement and try instead of pondering for hours.

It will depend on your skill in programming, and the scope of the design you're thinking about.

But in any case, don't lose too much time trying to figure out if it will work out. Playing is the best way to know. You should not be afraid to make mistakes.

When balancing a value, double it, or cut it in half.

Say you're trying to find the perfect movement speed in your FPS game. Instead of adjusting it by small amounts, directly double it or cut it, and observe the result. If it's way too slow, just double the speed again and repeat the process.

This method is actually inspired by the binary search algorithm.

One good game is better than two great games.

It's better to make one good game than making two great games into one. You will be creating several games. Avoid applying all your ideas into one game if it seems like it would be better off in another game.

The rule of third.

Civ designers pursue a rule of thirds. One-third of the previous version stays in place, one-third is updated, and one-third is completely new.

In my experience, at Ubisoft it's more like 90% reused or updated and 10% new.

Seek joy elsewhere, because you never know where inspiration will strike.

As designers, part of our job is very rigorous and analytical. But the other part is based on creativity, which we fed with our everyday experiences.

One of the first games ever created was based on tennis, and I bet the designer did love playing tennis.

Of course, you can get inspired by other games. But be careful to avoid serving the same plate every time and bring about your own unique designs. Make sure you read, learn, and seek joy elsewhere. You never know where inspiration will strike.

See technology in terms of progress, rather than limitations.

I'm wondering if we still have limits nowadays. It seems like there are no limits anymore unless you're talking about realism and size. A lot of new technologies aren't widely applied to video games yet. It might be because of price, comfort, and the lack of interest from developers.

However, some of them have a huge impact on the design of games. Pokémon Go is a huge hit that used Augmented Reality technology, you don't see that in every mobile game.

I feel like a lot of developers have no desire to transform the media. I develop games to play with a pad or keyboard. I keep the exotic techs for small and funny projects. It's not a bad thing to keep doing what you love -- There are games that are still released on retro consoles and people enjoy it.

But let's keep updated about new technologies and think about what we can achieve with all this new stuff.

Teamwork Tips

Feedback is fact.

Feedback is fact insofar as it reveals how our game makes people feel, but after that, it's our job to come up with the right solution to that problem.

My take on this: Feedback is not a debate.

You received feedback you disagree with? Thank them without trying to find excuses or explain yourself. Ask questions if you need to and find the source of the problem. If it is actually pertinent for you, resolve it.

Feedback is free and only there to help you make a better game. Don't lose time arguing over it to convince people that they should not feel that way.

When giving feedback, look into the heart of what the game is really about.

When prototyping or giving feedback to another developer, look right past the details into the heart of what the game is really about. Don't focus on insignificant bugs or graphical glitches. You know they are there temporary and will be fixed eventually.

Sit in all the chairs.

I already met some people with this versatility; Experts in their domain, and familiar with their colleagues' disciplines.

I studied computer science for 5 years. First, it helps me interact with programmers. It also alters my design process in a positive way. I am organized, rigorous and I prefer designing complex game systems more than stories. And of course, I can create games or prototypes on my own, which is very useful.

For example, I'm sure "artists game designers" have their own advantages too. They can draw the design, make it appealing but clear. Much better than the ugly-cold squares filled with text that I use.

In a team, avoid sharing the same duties.

Learning teamwork is hard, and making video games is usually a team effort.

The dichotomy between someone else's talent and your own is a cause for celebration, because the further apart you are, the more you can offer each other. But the opposite is also true. I know where my own talents are, and I find that sharing those duties usually falls somewhere between inefficient or frustrating.

I want to combine other people's unique expertise with mine, and create something that none of us could have made alone -- not compromise on the same task until it's less than the sum of its parts.

At Ubisoft, each game designer is the owner of specific features. For example, I was responsible for the procedural quests on Ghost Recon: Breakpoint. The game designer works on the design; the lead or director validates it before starting the production.

Good game designers listen to the rest of the team to improve the design. But you don't have to compromise; you're the only one responsible for it, and that makes it more manageable.

Imagine if the whole 200 people on the team had to agree on everything?

One of the drawbacks is that it's harder to link the different game systems together. You're so busy with your feature that you don't know how the development is progressing on the other ones. You can feel a bit on the side, or be in total disagreement with how the other game systems work.

Sid's Opinions

Cheating can be fun.

Sid despised cheats in games because it makes the gameplay easier and removes the fun from the game.

But the designer in charge of releasing Civ II ignored Sid advice. He shipped the game with an accessible cheat menu. After seeing his son played with cheats, Sid changed his mind, and agreed it can be fun sometimes.

In my opinion, we should give the opportunity to break or tweak the game, via cheat codes or modding tools. It can be hard to accept that players tempered what you've designed, but a lot of games proved it was very fun to do it. I've started "creating games" with the world map editor of Warcraft 3. It's also on this game that I've enjoyed my first cheat codes.

While modding tools should be available from the start, cheat codes should be earned.

For example, after winning the game at least once, playing by the rules. The player still enjoys the game as we intend to but is able to destroy all the rules they respected so far.

Micro-Transactions are hated but effective.

Sid tells us that even though micro-transactions are hated, they are really effective and bring back a lot of money.

I hate them too. I never buy from these stores, I would be a poor designer on this subject.
Not that I don't like the content they are offering. But I don't want to pay for optional content that I should have been able to deserve by playing.

Of course, in most games, you can gain some decorative content by playing. But it's rarely the sought-after stuff. A counterexample is Overwatch, you can unlock almost everything by playing.

On the other side, I like DLCs because you actually buy more gameplay content, not optional skins. You usually buy DLCs because you love the game and crave more, not because you must to enjoy the game.

Big studios like Ubisoft actually sell different packages for the same game. The premium package includes all coming DLCs. There are several advantages for the developer :

But we should stay vigilant: the original game (without any DLCs) must be complete.

Players are paying for something that does not exist yet. They will be very upset if the content is of poor quality.

Suspend reality, not examine the pain of real moral dilemmas.

Sid gives us his opinion on what he wants to create in his video games, you decide what you want to create in yours.

I've always felt that our role as game designers is to suspend reality, not examine the pain of real moral dilemmas. 

There's a place for that in art, certainly --and videogames do count as art-- but it's generally not a place where people want to spend their time after a long day at the office.

[...] games are expected to sustain their audience far longer than any other art form. [...]

Not many people are willing to wallow in life's toughest moments for that long [...]

I agree that most games should be relaxing. But video games have matured, and are not just a relaxation tool anymore. Moreover, some games examine the pain of real moral dilemmas and are still able to make relaxing and fun gameplay. There is an audience for this kind of game nowadays.

Violence is not necessary.

As good games should have an impact on the player, he wants to avoid putting too much violence in his games. It can have a negative impact on our players, even mature people that can tell it's fantasy.

Video games are an art form, and it's never a good idea to stifle creativity. I can say with personal certainty that gamers are mature and intelligent people, and we have the ability to distinguish between fantasy and reality.
But when it comes to the creations that happen to inspire me, I don't think violence is necessary. The world is often a very negative place, and I'd rather push it in the opposite direction whenever I can.

There's an argument to be made that by exposing the unpleasant reality of violence, you can inspire others to push against it, too, but this generally requires a removed perspective, rather than the inherent first-person nature of games. It's hard to claim our products are immersive, but somehow insist that the experience has no impact.

A game with no impact is simply a bad game.

Again, it's his opinion. Feel free to disagree and use violence as a tool to impact the player the way you want (thinking about The Last Of Us 2 here).

Compelling games should illuminate our deepest fears about ourselves.

Maybe the thing that makes Civ so compelling is that it illuminates our deepest fears about ourselves. It's hard to play out a fantasy of worldwide domination without occasionally wondering whether you're really the best person to put in charge after all.

In the right context, a game is not just a vehicle for fun, but an exercise in self-determination and confidence. Good games teach us that there are trade-offs to everything, actions lead to outcomes, and the chance to try again is almost always out there.

Connect people through their shared experiences.

An interesting way of seeing our role as artists.

Gaming is for everyone--and not just on an individual level, but as a whole. It's for everyone together. I haven't always known what appeals to people who aren't specifically me, but I have always been interested in finding out, and when it comes to games I thinks addiction is usually just another word for the intense connection we feel toward a work of art.

As an artist, my job is to foster that connection in a constructive way -- and if I'm lucky, to connect people to one another through our shared experience.

Games are not just a diversion.

Sid created his first game, Hostage Rescue, on an Atari in BASIC with the help of magazines. You play as a "Helicopter" trying to save hostages from terrorists. They shoot missiles at you, you shoot missiles at them. But each time you shoot, hostages can die. The headcount is accusingly displayed at the bottom of the screen.

His mother tried the game, was very focused, very into the game, avoiding missiles with her own body.

But at some point, she dropped the controller and turned the face away. She couldn’t play anymore, her heart was racing and it was too much for her.

Games aren’t a diversion. Games can make people feel, like great literature or other forms of art. Maybe even more thanks to the interaction that is a core element of games.
I already read several times about this revelation moment; It seems like a common event we all share.

People are generally uncooperative by nature.

Not scientific proof but a good example to consider.

CivWorld had a number of problems, the biggest of which was the generally uncooperative nature of real people when put to the test. [...] for the most part everyone chose to let their friends suffer.

Funny Anecdoctes

The Bingosaur.

[...] I gave up all pretense of realism and invented a dinosaur that could spit poison. As a friendly nod to our producer at EA, Bing Gordon, I named my new species the Bingosaur.

Gandhi bug is Fake.

The rumor was that Gandhi has a very low "Violence" stat. And that at some point when his violence stat decreases, instead of staying at zero or going negative, it becomes a very high number (because of how numbers are read in computer programming).

This high violence stat he then has would be the reason why Gandhi is using a lot of nukes in the game.

I've learned in Sid's book that the famous Gandhi bug does not exist. Gandhi has no predispositions to use nukes. It just seems so unrealistic that Gandhi would use nukes that players found excuses and invented this legend.

Final notes

If you need more details, or just want to enjoy a nice story, I invite you to get the book.

Feel free to let me a comment, I'm eager to read it.

Sources

Sid Meier's Memoir book
GDC Classic Game Postmortem: Sid Meier's Civilization
Sid Meier's Psychology of Game Design

This article is funded by my supporters

My biggest thanks to :
damien and Móey Mei