the rule that says that things get twice as good every year, processors get twice as fast,
et cetera, I don’t think that applies. I think game design is a pretty gradual, evolutionary
process, where we build on what’s gone on before, and make it a little bit better, a little
bit more interesting. Every so often a new genre comes along to open our eyes to some
new possibilities. I think that will continue, but it’s interesting to me that a three-year-
old computer is completely obsolete, but a three-year-old game can still be a lot of fun.
As long as you can get it to run ...
Right, as long as you have that three-year-old computer to run it on. There’s a different
pace, I think. Technology moves at one pace, a very quick pace, and game design evolu-
tion moves at a much slower pace.
Do you think that game design evolution has slowed since the early days of the
industry?
I don’t see a significant change. I think one phenomenon is that we only remember the
good games from the past. The past seems like it had all sorts of great games, and the
present seems like it has a few great games and a lot of crap. And I think there was a lot
of crap in those days too, it has just all faded away. I think there is a lot of great game
design work going on today. Before there was a lot more unexplored territory, and that
gave us the opportunity to be a little more innovative. But with online technology and
things like that, that opens up a lot of new areas for being innovative. So I don’t see a
substantial difference between the amount of good work being done today versus what
was going on years ago.
You have worked at both small development studios, Microprose in the early
days and Firaxis, as well as a big one, latter-day Microprose. Do you find that
one environment is better at fostering the creation of good games?
I’m personally much more comfortable in the small environment. That may be more of
a personal feeling than any kind of a rule about where good games happen. I think the
trend certainly has been to bigger groups, bigger teams, bigger bigger bigger. And that
may be just the way things are. If there’s anything that makes me feel a little bit old, it is
the fact that I’m not as comfortable in the big group environment as clearly some of the
other developers. I think some of the younger developers who grew up in that mode are
much more comfortable with the big projects. I was in Los Angles for the E3 show, and
the winner of the Hall of Fame award was Hironobu Sakaguchi who designedFinal Fan-
tasy, which is a massive, massive, massive game. It would totally frighten me to tackle
something that big. But there are designers who just thrive on that. I think it’s a per-
sonal preference for designers, and I think since I started in the time when there was no
such thing as a gigantic team that I am comfortable in that smaller mode, while other
designers prefer the larger projects. Primarily it’s a personal preference.
Chapter 2: Interview: Sid Meier 31