A wide-ranging introduction to how games are made, balancing insider rigor with accessibility.
Platz offers a primer on the craft and business of modern video games.
Trying to understand video game creation can feel like an adventure set on hard mode. Whether you’re a veteran creator, a newcomer to the process, or simply curious, this manual explores what motivates players, how studios operate, and why some titles, like Baldur’s Gate 3, thrive while others, like Atari’s infamous E.T., end up with their own landfills. Drawing on the experiences of 15 industry professionals who have worked for Sony, Disney, The Pokémon Co., Mojang, and others, the chapters feature interview excerpts, case studies, and detailed definitions of the many kinds of developers and what they do. Beyond design and storytelling, the volume addresses the logistics of the business, from monetization challenges to ethical concerns, while examining how poor planning, overambitious timetables, and last-minute additions can derail a project. Dense and comprehensive, the guide defines the jargon of studios and design roles, describes genres like shooters and role-playing games, and even includes some gaming slang. Each chapter ends with a “Prepare for the Boss Battle,” a review of practical references or tools. The text includes thorough citations throughout and an extensive index for further reference. The book’s central conceit is both clever and fitting for the industry it covers, bringing back the strategy-guide style (featuring sidebars in the margins and vibrant illustrations) that has largely been lost to internet wikis and FAQs. This is especially helpful in enlivening the technical explanations of game development, using familiar and engaging layouts to help the lessons stick, and the emphasis on the audience as collaborator is refreshing. Platz treats the history of gaming with reverence, mentioning deep cuts such as MadMaze alongside indie darlings like Unpacking; this makes the guide feel truly all-encompassing—as expansive as an open-world RPG—in a way that will resonate with industry insiders, newbie developers, and curious players alike.
A wide-ranging introduction to how games are made, balancing insider rigor with accessibility.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781959029717
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Rosenfeld Media
Review Posted Online: Aug. 21, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our...
A psychologist and Nobel Prize winner summarizes and synthesizes the recent decades of research on intuition and systematic thinking.
The author of several scholarly texts, Kahneman (Emeritus Psychology and Public Affairs/Princeton Univ.) now offers general readers not just the findings of psychological research but also a better understanding of how research questions arise and how scholars systematically frame and answer them. He begins with the distinction between System 1 and System 2 mental operations, the former referring to quick, automatic thought, the latter to more effortful, overt thinking. We rely heavily, writes, on System 1, resorting to the higher-energy System 2 only when we need or want to. Kahneman continually refers to System 2 as “lazy”: We don’t want to think rigorously about something. The author then explores the nuances of our two-system minds, showing how they perform in various situations. Psychological experiments have repeatedly revealed that our intuitions are generally wrong, that our assessments are based on biases and that our System 1 hates doubt and despises ambiguity. Kahneman largely avoids jargon; when he does use some (“heuristics,” for example), he argues that such terms really ought to join our everyday vocabulary. He reviews many fundamental concepts in psychology and statistics (regression to the mean, the narrative fallacy, the optimistic bias), showing how they relate to his overall concerns about how we think and why we make the decisions that we do. Some of the later chapters (dealing with risk-taking and statistics and probabilities) are denser than others (some readers may resent such demands on System 2!), but the passages that deal with the economic and political implications of the research are gripping.
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our minds.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-374-27563-1
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
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These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.
A helpful guide to working effectively with people from other cultures.
“The sad truth is that the vast majority of managers who conduct business internationally have little understanding about how culture is impacting their work,” writes Meyer, a professor at INSEAD, an international business school. Yet they face a wider array of work styles than ever before in dealing with clients, suppliers and colleagues from around the world. When is it best to speak or stay quiet? What is the role of the leader in the room? When working with foreign business people, failing to take cultural differences into account can lead to frustration, misunderstanding or worse. Based on research and her experiences teaching cross-cultural behaviors to executive students, the author examines a handful of key areas. Among others, they include communicating (Anglo-Saxons are explicit; Asians communicate implicitly, requiring listeners to read between the lines), developing a sense of trust (Brazilians do it over long lunches), and decision-making (Germans rely on consensus, Americans on one decider). In each area, the author provides a “culture map scale” that positions behaviors in more than 20 countries along a continuum, allowing readers to anticipate the preferences of individuals from a particular country: Do they like direct or indirect negative feedback? Are they rigid or flexible regarding deadlines? Do they favor verbal or written commitments? And so on. Meyer discusses managers who have faced perplexing situations, such as knowledgeable team members who fail to speak up in meetings or Indians who offer a puzzling half-shake, half-nod of the head. Cultural differences—not personality quirks—are the motivating factors behind many behavioral styles. Depending on our cultures, we understand the world in a particular way, find certain arguments persuasive or lacking merit, and consider some ways of making decisions or measuring time natural and others quite strange.
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.Pub Date: May 27, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-61039-250-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: April 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2014
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