Will Wright: Game design a lot like dealing drugs

GDC 2010: Sim City, The Sims, and Spore creator offers thoughts on the rise of social media in games, the allure of Advance Wars, and how games fit into the overall entertainment picture.

Who was there: On the final day of the 2010 Game Developer Conference, GameSpot got wind that legendary game designer Will Wright would be delivering an impromptu lecture. The man behind Sim City, The Sims, and Spore left EA last year to set up Stupid Fun Club, working on three "play industry" projects.

Stupid Fun Club's Will Wright.

Stupid Fun Club's Will Wright.

What he talked about: Wright's 70-minute session touched on a range of topics, from past successes to the crossover of the games and movie industries and social gaming platforms. The one thing he wouldn't be drawn on, however, was his current work at Stupid Fun Club. He addressed this matter early on in his presentation, saying, "I can't talk about anything yet…but soon."

Talking about his inspirations, Wright specifically referenced Nintendo's Advance Wars on the DS as the game that he's played "probably more than any other." Every morning, he sits down with Advance Wars and a cup of coffee and spends 15 minutes spinning up his brain.

The relationship between players and game makers was perhaps the largest theme in Wright's session, and he fed back some of the findings from his previous games. "Players are inherently narcissistic--we'd see that players would spend hours creating themselves in The Sims," he said. He joked numerous times that he was essentially a drug dealer, as the end result of his work was to a stimulate player's "hormones, endorphins, and neurotransmitters."

Wright also gave his views on changing trends in gaming. Games such as Sim City were about creating a world for the player to invest in, but games have now evolved to improving the player, such as Wii Fit, or about the player, on networks such as Facebook. He also touched on the evolving nature of AI within games, with an emphasis on meta models as seen in Spore. These effectively involve communities, with players that have "a voracious appetite" but thankfully harness the power of collective effort.

He also touched upon the crossover between games and other media, such as movies. He pointed to the main science disciplines--geology, physics, biology, and chemistry and said, "the interesting stuff is in the intersections." Wright claims that a similar crossover is already happening in entertainment, pointing to augmented reality and its introduction into televised NFL football and the recent Winter Olympics.

Wright ended his presentation by touching on social games, looking at the rise of Facebook in particular over the past couple of years. Rather than displaying an exponential growth curve, though, Wright believes social games will display an S-curve over time. Investment is high at the current point of the curve, but Wright claims that growth will eventually even out. "I can see [social games] becoming a quarter of the market," he said.

Quote: "I think the highlight of my professional career was when Jack Thompson called me a child pornographer."--Will Wright on the nude patches for The Sims 2.

Takeaway: Facebook is going to be a prominent gaming platform, according to Wright, although he expects growth to slow in the long run. Wright also expects various entertainment platforms to merge, pointing at augmented reality as an example of how virtual worlds have mixed with real ones on TV. Wright also clearly plays a lot of Advance Wars.

57 Comments

  • enragedcritic

    Posted Dec 10, 2010 9:08 pm GMT

    Will Wright is awesome!! One of the best videogame creators ever!

  • Dualmask

    Posted Mar 18, 2010 7:23 am GMT

    Advance Wars FTW.

  • DiscGuru101

    Posted Mar 17, 2010 10:37 am GMT

    He played the Jack Thompson card... Addressing gamers, that is like walking into fat camp with cheese.

  • NeonNinja

    Posted Mar 16, 2010 11:49 pm GMT

    Yeah, because Will Wright is TOTALLY in the know for dealing drugs.

  • etai79

    Posted Mar 16, 2010 7:59 pm GMT

    Except Will Wright has never made a game, he's only designed simulations. Games /= Simulations.

  • sandgroper

    Posted Mar 16, 2010 10:18 am GMT

    let's follow this further - drugs and games AT THE SAME TIME!

  • Itachi1800

    Posted Mar 16, 2010 12:52 am GMT

    Child pornographer lol

  • teclu-cezar

    Posted Mar 15, 2010 11:26 pm GMT

    I knew there was something between spore and simcity..I just didn t know it was this smart guy hehe

  • RunningRiot1134

    Posted Mar 15, 2010 3:27 pm GMT

    MAKE A NEW SIM CITY PLEASE!!!!

  • maverick_76

    Posted Mar 15, 2010 10:37 am GMT

    Man I cannot wait to see what Wright will develop next!

  • Trogeton

    Posted Mar 15, 2010 9:31 am GMT

    SIMS

  • TheDogout

    Posted Mar 15, 2010 8:18 am GMT

    *Likes will wright and doesn't afraid of noobs"

  • zool152004

    Posted Mar 15, 2010 7:37 am GMT

    @gruug
    I can see where you are coming from, when you look at how large games are becoming in scope and complexity it's hard to imagine such simple games taking a large share of market space. The fact is though, my dad has played more Solataire on his PC than i have played any other game, some people just want a quick, accessible game that doesn't always require total commitment and is rewarding in very small doses and that's what most Facebook games are about. Us core gamers (if you wanna use that term) don't understand it but those people just aren't interested in big epics like God of War or Mass Effect, they'll just look to another medium like movies or books.

  • SocialAnXieTy

    Posted Mar 14, 2010 9:22 pm GMT

    "I think the highlight of my professional career was when Jack Thompson called me a child pornographer." Hahaha. I almost forgot about dear ol' Jack.

    And yeah, this guy has definitely done LSD.

  • blakeney

    Posted Mar 14, 2010 2:51 pm GMT

    @ TehReaper

    you cant? alot of weed dealers are old hippys, WW has clearly expreimented in his past, just look at his games! or the fact he uses words like neurotransmitters! he has LSD written allover him lol!

  • MacenKrace

    Posted Mar 14, 2010 2:30 pm GMT

    Play Kotor and then review your opinion. If a story is that good that it keep you going, is then that book also compared to drugs?

  • SDBusDriver1979

    Posted Mar 14, 2010 2:08 pm GMT

    I wonder if Wright puts accused of being a child pornographer on his resume?

  • Bleed4TheWorld

    Posted Mar 14, 2010 1:44 pm GMT

    I've only played a couple of Sims games and the majority of that includes Sims 2. It was great and definitely addicting (not to mention a huge time killer haha). I would absolutely LOVE a true Sims for consoles without negating so many features.

  • CronoDAS

    Posted Mar 14, 2010 1:28 pm GMT

    But does he play "Advance Wars: Dual Strike" or "Advance Wars: Days of Ruin"?

  • Gruug

    Posted Mar 14, 2010 11:49 am GMT

    "Facebook is going to be a prominant gaming platform", maybe for entry level gaming and for those that want to play something for "free". Games offered by places like Facebook are really not very good games. After a few hours of game time (much less actually) they all become pretty mundane. I am sure that game designers like the "idea" of such a new platform but it really is not the best platform.