Ask Rami: Prototyping Pros

"Programmer here - I have read your posts on prototyping and I agree but I have a question. I want to do more design work, but I always get lost in tweaking values. How can you avoid that?"

Hey there slow prototyper,

I started as a programmer too, and learned to become a game designer later on in life. This is very much a common programmers' dilemma, and one I talk about with programmers in my consultancy practice - or with team leads that are struggling to get an engineer to prototype effectively. You see, as an engineer, you learn quickly that understanding the whole helps tremendously - you start by figuring out the structure and fundaments of your production.

And, frankly, that's probably the worst impulse you could have when it comes to being an effective prototyper. So - this requires a shift of mindset, or -if you're not the person affected- a good conversation with whoever could benefit from this shift in perspective. It's usually not a difficult thing to fix, but it does require intent and clarity.