I ordered this book a while ago and it arrived in the mail last tuesday. It’s not a technical book but, as the title says, about game design. The book covers three main topics: design theory, design process and design production.
The design theory chapter is for the most part an overview of game genres, both currently popular ones (first person shooter, strategy, …) and genres that are less popular these days in the mainstream commercial game world but still have a large following in the indie scene (platform, scrolling shooters, …). An in-depth look is taken at two hot issues: 2D versus 3D and single player versus multiplayer. Next, the design process is covered. This chapter starts with game and character concepts, inspiration and brainstorming. After that, it moves on to level design, game physics and 3D modeling techniques. The final chapter, design production, offers an overview of the entire game development process and some ideas to publish your game.
The book contains lots of images and examples from well-known games, wich makes it easy to read and understand. Most of the concepts and ideas are explained with examples. Overall, I highly recommend it to all game developers, both beginning and experienced ones.