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The Art of Game Design: Chapter 8 and 9

    Chapter 8 in the book The Art of Game Design is all about the actual production process that is followed after brainstorming is complete and a team has an idea for what game they will be developing. One of the topics that this chapter focuses on are the ideas of software development, waterfall and a more circular idea designed by Barry Boehm. As a computer science major, I have encountered both of these ideas through my time in college and in the busniss world. Both theories have their positives and negatives, but the idea of "waterfall development" is a much stricter way of approaching software development when compared to Boehm's approach.
    With a waterfall approach, this does not leave any room to go back and revisit the original idea and add or remove core features. This approach was used in the development of many old forms of windows, which also coincided with how the software was sold. For example, Microsoft's windows operating systems. Windows has usually been sold as iterative software launches, with each new version of Windows bringing new features that are left out of older versions. Development followed the waterfall approach, starting with the developers figuring out what features would be included in windows 98, all of the features in the previous release being updated and improved along with new features being added. Whereas windows 95 losing support, requiring customers to purchase the newest version of windows. This has been replaced with a development cycle that more closely follows Boehm's approach. 
    With the release of Windows 10, many people, including myself, were surprised when Microsoft announced that this version of Windows would be the last major release for a very long time. Up until this point, a new version of windows was released every few years, how could Microsoft change their model to only create one version and focus on it for many years? This is where the idea of the loop comes into play. With every major update, new features are added to windows, and many core features are rebuilt or replaced entirely. Such as with the Windows Creators Update that was released last fall, many features were added that increased the efficiency of windows while adding support for many tools that creators use every day, such as native drawing tablet support. Once a version is released, the development team is allowed to go back to the drawing board and evaluate why customers are using windows, and what features would best support that use. This allows them to make a product that grows and develops with time and will be the best version of windows that will ever be released. This shows how important it can be to go back to the drawing board and how it isn't always a bad thing to take your time and re-approach an idea from a different angle. Most evident of this is the re-release of the Edge browser that is due for early next year, the development team is permitted to throw out the old Edge browser and rebuild it from the ground up; and will result in some users actually utilizing Microsoft's new browser. 


Image Source: The Verge
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