This week, Aaron chats with Benjamin Lindsay, game designer with experience mostly in multiplayer action live service. Benjamin worked for Riot Games on League of Legends and in one of their illustrious R&D studios, then for a startup called Sprocket Games. In this episode, we talk about some of the most topical issues that have ever come up on this podcast, including Silksong's difficulty, what makes 'good' game design, how to design and balance for live service games, and what it's like working on a Riot R&D project!

00:00 Introduction

02:03 "Resource Management Under Pressure"

03:23 Playing Games In Time to Catch the Discourse

04:14 The Silksong Discourse ("Good" vs "Bad" Difficulty, Audience Expectations, etc.)

16:33 Systems Design For Live Service Games ("Give Everybody a Cookie")

25:23 What Even Is "Good Game Design"?

28:36 The Riot R&D Process - Pros and Cons

32:08 Wrapping Up

Links:

Benjamin's person site: 

https://www.lowbo.io/

You can find the podcast at:

http://www.makegamesdrinkcoffee.com 

Questions? Comments?

[email protected]