Why don't we start with the question of how game design has come about in your life?

I’m a graduate in Polish studies and a teacher by education, but games have always been my hobby and passion. When I landed a job at a school, I started using gamification to teach Polish; for example, based on The Witcher, I discussed Romanticism with students, and based on Assassin's Creed II, Renaissance. Games were a world that students knew, so the threshold of entering as well as understanding a given issue through games was much easier for them. Searching for an answer to the question of how something was created or why I feel the way I do in a given game made me think about tying my career with games.

How did you start your adventure with the industry?

Maybe I'll start with the fact that for a long time the industry seemed technical to me and I thought that since I couldn't program, I had nothing to look for in it. Over time, however, on the wave of great successes of Polish games, many smaller studios were created, but also a lot of courses, and individual roles were more structured.

While working, I started my game design studies and as I got to know more about what a game designer position was all about, it became my dream. I got my first job in gamedev in the mobile game industry and I still value the experience I gained there. Mobile games fall into a specific category of games in which analytical thinking, paying attention to details and drawing conclusions count. All these skills are very important in the work of a game designer.

I would also like to add that I have not completely escaped being a teacher, because I am currently teaching Game Design Basics, Game Logic and Mechanics as well as Advanced Game Design at the DSW University of Lower Silesia. What's more, I’ve met students whom I used to teach Polish back in the day, which is very nice.

From teacher to game designer - was it a difficult switch?

Finding my first job was the hardest part, but I came at a good time when the industry was receptive, and it turned out that teaching experience could be very useful. One good example is writing documentation. When creating games, it must be written in a very coherent manner, so that developers, reading it, have no doubts about what a given functionality should look like and do not return to designers with questions, which would simply extend the production time. Polish philology studies have turned out to be very useful in this particular aspect of my work.

On the other hand, the work of a game designer consists of continuous analysis and breaking games down into their constituent parts, asking questions about how a given functionality works and how it affects the rest of the system. Such a point of view change from the player's perspective to the analytical perspective may in fact resemble the analysis that is carried out in literature, looking for the historical context in which a given text was created, for instance.

However, the most important thing for me in changing my profession was that when I got my first job as a game designer, I already knew that this was what I wanted to do.

You’ve talked a lot about analyzing, while it would seem that the work of a game designer should consist in "designing" :)

Let me return for a moment to my experience in the mobile game industry. As game designers, we must remember above all that we do not make games for ourselves, but for players. If we are working with an already existing game, which was the case with me when I started both in mobile games and at Techland, the main task of a game designer is to add a new experience to the already existing gameplay. And here analytical thinking is very important, because it helps to understand what players like and what they don't, what game functionalities are conducive to monetization, or what content works best. Thanks to the work with data that I did in the mobile game industry, I was able to afford a smooth transition to Techland, where I started as a game designer supporting GaaS.

Care to tell us more about this role?

My main task was to create new content and keep players engaged in Dying Light, which was a bit of a challenge, because the game had been on the market for some time and had a loyal following. My task was to build new experiences on the basis of existing gameplay so that players who knew and loved our game would still enjoy it. And in this case, it was very important not to spoil their experience.

Coming back to the analysis mentioned a number of times here - game designers tell different stories, e.g. by the numbers we call balance. This simplifies the amount of effort that must be put into an achievement, so that the player does not feel that a task is too easy or too difficult. The goal of balance is to give players satisfaction and the feeling that their efforts in the game have been properly rewarded. Due to wrong balance, such an experience of a well-deserved reward or progression can unfortunately also be spoiled. I can mention an example when, from the perspective of game designers, we thought that by giving players a new super weapon, we would increase their satisfaction with the game. Meanwhile, it turned out that being able to defend themselves easily, they did not feel the sense of survival that they had reached to our game for. So as you can see, you can overdo it.

Did you also work on Dying Light 2 Stay Human?

No, but I was working on one of the events that narratively connects both plots. It is worth noting that Dying Light was supported for an exceptionally long time for this type of production, as much as 7 years! It’s an important aspect to our players and it makes them feel that we care about them. We wanted the transition from Dying Light to Dying Light 2 Stay Human to be as enjoyable an experience as possible for them, and that's why we created an event with Spike. In this way, we wanted to embed Dying Light 2 Stay Human in the story we told in Dying Light, but also to build a bridge between the two games. It was one of my favorite events.

With the launch of Dying Light 2 Stay Human, support for Dying Light ended. What did it mean for you?

When we finished supporting Dying Light, there were two options - join the Dying Light 2 Stay Human team or join our new AAA project. I really liked the idea of a new open world fantasy game, but I wasn't sure if I would find a role in it. Then Mario Maltezos, Creative Director of the new project, told me an interesting thing, namely he pointed out that when I came to Techland I was working on a game set in a world with a specific story and rules and I had to keep the design within this specific world. Apparently I was good at it, because Mario encouraged me to try my hand at being an open world designer.

What is the difference between the work of a game designer and an open world designer?

A game designer thinks about specific mechanics and systems that the player encounters, e.g. about combat or the progression system. On the other hand, an open world designer is a person who connects certain dots and helps to maintain the coherence of a world, so that players who enter it can completely immerse themselves in it, while all activities have their justification there.

How does it work in practice?

Let's imagine we have a combat system designed in the game. My role is to figure out where the protagonist might encounter specific opponents so that the narrative and gameplay blend together. In other words, the game design side thinks about the mechanics, whereas the open world designer comes up with a physical emanation of this experience in the game.

In this job, you also need to understand how games are made. It's not like someone comes up with an idea and we all get down to making it happen. Each new idea must fit within the narrative framework, context, and scheme of the game. For example, we figure it would be nice to add a dog to the game. Everyone likes the idea, so the game design department creates the dog's logic and its balance. In the team of open world designers, we ask ourselves a series of questions, e.g. where should it appear, how does it affect society, does its presence positively or negatively affect any group, does its howling at night mean something, are children in a given world told to be afraid of dogs or not, etc. Each character, creature or place cannot be an empty shell, but must be embedded in the story of our game.

Aren't you already entering the narrative field here?

Narrative design is a separate department - its role is to create a framework for the world. In practice, it is primarily a scenario and the course of quests, i.e. everything that is supposed to happen to the player. An open world designer tries to turn the narrative vision of a game into a specific experience - for example, in activities or encounters of specific characters or opponents, but also places it all appropriately on the map. Let's imagine we have a story to tell about the oppression of one group over another, and my job is to place them on the map, so the player must have evidence of that oppression as they walk around the world. If the player encountered a big party, there would be a narrative clash between the story, which tells about the drama of oppression, and the view of happy people. This way, we try to avoid disturbing the immersion that we strive for in our work.

You mentioned a map; does the role of an open world designer also have a cartographic aspect?

The sense of exploration is likewise one of the elements we take care of. We don't create maps ourselves, but we work with other departments to create a world that encourages exploration. Our goal is for the desire to discover our world to come naturally, out of pure curiosity, and not out of necessity. For instance, the way the roads are run is not accidental. The storyline may lead along the main road, but from this path we can make a branch of a small path and add something interesting on the horizon to it. As a result, instead of following the main route, the player will want to deviate from it, if only to discover a new view. Interesting thinking in this regard was presented in Skyrim, where one of the paths was a river current.

In general, how the human mind perceives reality is very interesting - and this is an open world designer's strength when they are able to translate this knowledge into the language of a game. For instance, they know what the player's gaze will naturally follow, but also when the player will feel overwhelmed by the multitude of decisions regarding the "what should I do?" question or when you just need to let the player rest. Simply placing points on a map already tells a story, and an open world designer can control the player's curiosity along with emotions through the skillful placement of points on the map.

There seems to be a lot of room for creativity here. Where do you get inspiration from?

I use a lot of references. Not only games, but I also draw inspiration from literature, TV shows, generally all cultural texts in which communities are built. There are more unobvious references too - I once watched a presentation about how programmers created the character of Elizabeth from Bioshock. It turned out that when creating her character, they watched soccer matches and analyzed the players' positioning to get the winger effect in her character. I wasn't interested in that sport before, but it made me realize that inspiration is everywhere and now I join my husband when he watches soccer :)

In creating a convincing world in games, we also use references that are relatively universal and will seem familiar to players, if not from their own experience, then from culture. And so, to get an idea, if we want to show some elements of oppression, we can use propaganda themes, police patrols or introduce curfews to the game.

It is also important to be open - we tell a story for people, who are not one-dimensional, are brought up on different foundations, and everyone has their own worldview, while we have to reach them all with a finished game.

The best quest or game you've played is…?

I think I had the most fun playing Uncharted 4. The balance between the gameplay layer and free exploration was, in my opinion, very well designed. The game also builds tension perfectly, so whenever I felt I needed a break from the excess of emotions, the game provided moments of respite exactly then.

Do you have any occupational quirks?

My mind works like that of Sheldon from The Big Bang Theory and I like to strip things down to their essence. Say, when I watch The Walking Dead and one faction attacks another, questions arise in my mind as to why at this point, why didn't it happen sooner, where is the logic here? This makes watching anything with me a nightmare :)