Democratic Game Design

I've been experimenting with what I call "democratic game design", that is a game that is open to many people to all contribute. With democratic game design you can get many many different ideas, and get more eyes to correct typos, play test and make adjustments.

Tools

The internet itself is what makes this possible, and there are tools on the internet that makes having a democratic game design project much easier.

Wikis are basically websites where you can in one click edit the pages. Most everyone is probably familiar with Wikipedia, which is a very good example of a wiki. For personal wikis I like to use pbwiki for my projects.

The Creative Commons Licence is a licences that basically declares that other people may use and remix your materials. There are a few variations of the rules that you should check out and decide which works best for your project (for example, do you want others to be able to use these materials commercially?)

Is democratic game design right for me?

Most everything has a downside, and this is no exception. One disavantage is you obviously no longer own the project, but it belongs to everyone. This means that once you declare something open and you get contributers, then you cannot ever claim it solely as yours ever again. You're not going to make a profit of this, but that's exactly the opposite of the point of democratic game design anyway.

A second disadvantage is with differences of vision for the project. Not everyone's going to see the project exactly the same, so it's important to have an idea before hand of rules to resolve conflicts. You should state them clearly, posting a link at the top of the front page.

I like the rules used on Wikipedia where if something you wrote is changed, you're not allowed to change it back until you've discussed it in the comments area, and if necessary put it to a vote.

An example project

My democratic game design project The Paisho Wiki is based on the board game that's played in the animated television series "Avatar: The last Airbender". I've had quite a few people now contributing, and the start rules have popped up even on other wikis!

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Democratic game design is a neat way of getting a project off the ground, and it can be fun to see how many people get together to build something together. If you know of other neat game design projects like this, or have one of your own, comment here or shoot me an e-mail and I'll gladly link it!