Oscar Clark – författare

The games industry is serious business and the role of a games designer has dramatically changed over just the last few years. Developers now have to rethink everything they know about the creative, technical and business challenges to adapt to the transition to games as a service. Games as a Service: How Free to Play Design Can Make Better Games has been written to help designers overcome many of the fears and misconceptions surrounding freemium and social games. It provides a framework to deliver better games rather than the ‘evil’ or ‘manipulative’ experiences some designers fear with the move away from wasteful Products to sustainable, trustworthy Services.Oscar Clark is a consultant and Evangelist for Everyplay from Applifier. He has been a pioneer in online, mobile and console social games services since 1998 including Wireplay (British Telecom), Hutchison Whampoa (3UK) and PlayStation®Home. He is a regular columnist on PocketGamer.Biz and is an outspoken speaker and moderator at countless games conferences on Games Design, Discovery, and Monetisation. He is also a notorious hat wearer.

Playing with Balance: Game Economy Design is your guide to understanding why games are unlike any other medium: they are built on verbs, not nouns. Players don’t just watch or read – they do. Every choice, action, and interaction forms part of a living system designed to engage, challenge, and reward.Great game economies are about far more than numbers or virtual currencies. They are intricately designed systems that blend anticipation, frustration, fear of missing out, and the relief of success. Through systems thinking, we can create experiences that keep players coming back – not through manipulation, but by balancing curiosity, challenge, frustration, and satisfaction across days, weeks, and months of play.Oscar introduces the three loops of engagement – Core, Context, and Culture – showing how they build authentically on intrinsic player motivations to create value loops that feel desirable, meaningful, and fair. These foundations provide a framework for designing progression, difficulty, and rewards that truly resonate with different kinds of players. You’ll discover why ethical design isn’t just the right thing to do, but a commercial necessity – and why short‑term exploitative tactics inevitably undermine long‑term loyalty and success.Drawing on deep industry experience and insights from leading designers, this book combines diverse perspectives with practical tools to help you calculate value, balance economies, and adapt from launch through LiveOps.Whether you’re building a small indie project or running a massive live game, Playing with Balance: Game Economy Design gives you the tools to craft mechanics that feel alive.

Playing with Balance: Game Economy Design is your guide to understanding why games are unlike any other medium: they are built on verbs, not nouns. Players don’t just watch or read – they do. Every choice, action, and interaction forms part of a living system designed to engage, challenge, and reward.Great game economies are about far more than numbers or virtual currencies. They are intricately designed systems that blend anticipation, frustration, fear of missing out, and the relief of success. Through systems thinking, we can create experiences that keep players coming back – not through manipulation, but by balancing curiosity, challenge, frustration, and satisfaction across days, weeks, and months of play.Oscar introduces the three loops of engagement – Core, Context, and Culture – showing how they build authentically on intrinsic player motivations to create value loops that feel desirable, meaningful, and fair. These foundations provide a framework for designing progression, difficulty, and rewards that truly resonate with different kinds of players. You’ll discover why ethical design isn’t just the right thing to do, but a commercial necessity – and why short‑term exploitative tactics inevitably undermine long‑term loyalty and success.Drawing on deep industry experience and insights from leading designers, this book combines diverse perspectives with practical tools to help you calculate value, balance economies, and adapt from launch through LiveOps.Whether you’re building a small indie project or running a massive live game, Playing with Balance: Game Economy Design gives you the tools to craft mechanics that feel alive.

The games industry is serious business and the role of a games designer has dramatically changed over just the last few years. Developers now have to rethink everything they know about the creative, technical and business challenges to adapt to the transition to games as a service. Games as a Service: How Free to Play Design Can Make Better Games has been written to help designers overcome many of the fears and misconceptions surrounding freemium and social games. It provides a framework to deliver better games rather than theevil ormanipulative experiences some designers fear with the move away from wasteful Products to sustainable, trustworthy Services. Oscar Clark is a consultant and Evangelist for Everyplay from Applifier. He has been a pioneer in online, mobile and console social games services since 1998 including Wireplay (British Telecom), Hutchison Whampoa (3UK) and PlayStationHome. He is a regular columnist on PocketGamer.Biz and is an outspoken speaker and moderator at countless games conferences on Games Design, Discovery, and Monetisation. He is also a notorious hat wearer.