Arcade Game: Strictly speaking, a computer game that is found in an arcade envi-
ronment. It may also refer to home conversions of the same games. More broadly,
arcade game describes any game featuring the short and intense gameplay typical of
these games. See Chapter 4, which contains an analysis of the arcade gameCentipede
and an exploration of the nature of the arcade game as a genre.
Art: In the context of game development, this is most often used to describe the
graphical content of a game. It can also mean what all game developers engage in, the
creation of computer games themselves, which qualify as art. The author’s favorite def-
inition of art comes from Chapter 7 of Scott McCloud’s excellent bookUnderstanding
Comics: “Art, as I see it, is any human activity which doesn’t grow out of either of our
species’ two basic instincts: survival and reproduction.” Some game developers spend
endless time debating whether or not computer games qualify as art, but these argu-
ments are seldom productive or useful.
Art Bible: A document used in game development that includes concept sketches of
game art assets and possibly some descriptive text. The art bible is used by a game’s art
team as a reference tool in the development of the game’s graphical content, usually in
order to maintain consistency.
Artificial Intelligence: The artificial intelligence in a game controls all of the enti-
ties or agents in the game that have the ability to react to the player or otherwise
provide an unpredictable challenge for the player. Artificial intelligence in a single-
player game typically fulfills the role that human intelligence provides in a multi-player
game. Thoroughly defined in Chapter 9, “Artificial Intelligence.”
Artificial Life: A system for artificial intelligence that tries to imitate biological life
by assigning AI agents base behaviors and desires, which cause them to perform spe-
cific actions by their “nature.” This is the opposite of the type of AI typically used in
most games, though artificial life was famously used in the computer gameCreatures.
Assets: The content of a game; customarily used to refer to the art, sound effects,
music, and possibly the levels. Code itself is seldom referred to as an asset.
Avatar: The same as a game-world surrogate, the player’s avatar is whatever charac-
ter represents him in the game-world. It may also be an icon used in chat-room-like
situations. “The Avatar” is also the name of the character the player controls in the
Ultimaseries of games.
Beta: The state games reach after passing through Alpha, and the last step before a
game is published or otherwise released to the public. In Beta, changes made to a game
are supposed to be strictly limited to bug fixes. Some developers define Beta to be
when they first have what they consider to be a release candidate.See alsoAlphaand
Release Candidate.
Bible: Used in the gaming industry to refer to various reference materials used dur-
ing a game’s development.SeeArt BibleandStory Bible.
Blind-Play: In multi-player gaming, this refers to each player being able to make his
moves without the other players being able to see them; the other players are “blind”
to their actions. In non-computer games, this is typically accomplished via a physical
“screen” of some type that is placed between different players, or between a Game
Master and his players. In computer gaming, blind-play is most common in online
656 Glossary