

Subtractive Design - Harkins
http://www.sirlin.net/articles/subtractive-design.html

======
subtra
Subtractive design is an expected-but-unintentional occurrence if the project
is running over scope. And the stuff that is subtracted is dependent on the
size and status of the project. Big budget games will typically cut large
swathes of content and some of the less-critical features. Small budget games
may end up gutting the entire concept in favor of whatever gets some gameplay
with the available assets and tech.

It is a meme, almost a cliche, for designers to battle programmers over the
quantity of features in the game, because more features (usually) allow more
gameplay. There's a lot of inertia to avoid cuts if possible; a cut is viewed
as "wasted effort," and each one potentially violates the interests of
stakeholders.

On the other hand, if you view games as being like other art forms, it's not
uncommon for other mediums to overproduce and then cut to reach the final
product: Pop songs are cut to about 3 minutes, and movies get cut to about 90
minutes. Big budget games have been steered towards shorter length recently,
but this is done mostly because it costs too much to produce 40+ hour games at
the current quality bar, not because of a move towards "cut to perfection"
methodology.

~~~
pmichaud
It's more than that. A designer's fundamental job is to distill the essence of
a presentation to it's more powerful form. That means not only taking a clunky
version and paring it down; it means reimagining what the piece fundamentally
is or does, and presenting it in a way that conveys the actual meaning--not
just what you thought the meaning was.

With games, it means figuring what makes it fundamentally engaging, then
presenting that in a way that capitalizes on those aspects that improve it
while cutting those that add nothing.

------
satyajit
Designers/film-makers use it a lot to draw attention to particular subject,
such as the all B&W except the girl in red coat depicted in Schindler's list
was perfect example.

------
jrp
This is a great article. I haven't had a chance to play some of these yet, and
now I'd like to. =)

