Schell Games

[{"content":{"text":" Schell Games' commitment to education is something we live every day; in the products we create, the work environment in the office and the ways we share that knowledge with others. Each month, we'll be dissecting a different Lens from The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses by our CEO Jesse Schell and applying it to a noteworthy title. It's our hope that you use these as you develop your game or are looking to critically analyze what makes someone else's game successful. Pittsburgh (where Schell Games is located) loves celebrating weirdness, where everything from Andy Warhol and putting french fries on our sandwiches to a city-spanning pickle festival is the norm. So let's get weird with it and dive into the details of The Lens of The Weirdest Thing. Happy creating! "},"id":"b672735e-540e-4dde-b9d2-f61a277d4275","isHidden":false,"type":"textBlock"},{"content":{"location":"kirby","image":["file:\/\/g0i6iWjKZDjBZ0f3"],"src":"","alt":"The Lens of the Weirdest thing showing an angler fish holding a chess piece","caption":"","link":"","ratio":"","crop":"false"},"id":"71eec1d7-8f65-4542-9210-a6968cfca5a8","isHidden":false,"type":"imageBlock"},{"content":{"level":"h2","text":"The Lens of The Weirdest Thing","customid":""},"id":"279fe410-e550-4f12-a690-1c05d145c226","isHidden":false,"type":"headingBlock"},{"content":{"text":" How This Works: Use this Lens (full text below as well) and picture your game at the same time. See how you answer each question and how difficult it is to arrive at these conclusions. Repeat and refine until complete - how much different does your potential game look than when you started? Full Text: Having weird things in your story can help give meaning to unusual game mechanics, capture the interest of the player, and make your world seem special. Too much weirdness, though, will render your story puzzling and inaccessible. To make sure your story is the good kind of weird, ask yourself these questions: "},"id":"9b307f1f-f5b4-469c-8c52-0aa55592571f","isHidden":false,"type":"textBlock"},{"content":{"text":" What is the weirdest thing in my story? How can I make sure that the weirdest thing doesn't confuse or alienate the player? If there are multiple weird things, should I maybe get rid of, or coalesce, some of them? If there is nothing weird in my story, is the story still interesting? "},"id":"714409d1-7e94-4e55-94ba-9b7b89849660","isHidden":false,"type":"listBlock"},{"content":{"location":"web","url":"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=M38_aW8bo5A","video":[],"poster":[],"caption":"","autoplay":"false","muted":"true","loop":"false","controls":"true","preload":"auto"},"id":"a237d431-cb72-4792-a05f-de86cde9edf7","isHidden":false,"type":"videoBlock"},{"content":{"level":"h2","text":"Example - Promise Mascot Agency ","customid":""},"id":"99b646d6-8218-4cb2-a381-81fb85f84b1e","isHidden":false,"type":"headingBlock"},{"content":{"text":" What do you do when your entire game is the weirdest thing? That's the promise of Kaizen Game Works ' newest release, Promise Mascot Agency . Try explaining this game to someone and you'll soon run into the limitations of spoken language. Even the genre assigned to this game is weird: Open World Mascot Management Crime Drama and barely prepares you for the game itself. And yet...it works! You control a disgraced Yakuza looking to turn around a failing mascot agency into a cash cow, saving the town and learning more about yourself in the entire process. There's a built-in card battler, there's a claw game that's essential to making money, there's a weird cat covered in entirely too much yam (too many yams? idk). "},"id":"a092870c-3c32-41c5-8218-b148b0704d11","isHidden":false,"type":"textBlock"},{"content":{"location":"kirby","image":["file:\/\/JGEgL8wmRVASB9Ie"],"src":"","alt":"Screenshot of Promise Mascot Agency","caption":"Driving open-world city management crime drama mascot game, the best new genre","link":"","ratio":"","crop":"false"},"id":"2b322068-bf50-471f-b4a7-6e631c0634ec","isHidden":false,"type":"imageBlock"},{"content":{"text":" Despite all of the weirdness in play at Promise Mascot Agency, this game succeeds because of a key tenet of this month's Lens; never alienating or confusing the player. Anyone that has ever played an open world game will inherently know how to explore the map and all of the actual systems like the card battling are simple to understand and execute. That means that all of the extra weirdness has room to work and make this game truly memorable. Mascots get more and more bizarre (no spoilers on these; half of the fun is seeing which new weirdo you unlock next) and their jobs increase in difficulty from a humorous beer tap that doesn't work to cartons of radioactive waste and my personal favorite, the Stage of Death. It may have been tempting to cut some of the weirdness in this game, but the reason this title is being talked about (and is already top of my list of my GOTY 2025 list) is because it lets its uniqueness shine. In a world full of extraction shooters, Promise Mascot Agency is one of the wildest swings I have seen in gaming and stands out because of its adherence to The Lens of the Weirdest Thing. Author Note: If you haven't played their other title, Paradise Killer , it is also a must-grab. This was easily my top game of 2020. "},"id":"36a102d8-a537-4cfb-94af-4d961fb9be62","isHidden":false,"type":"textBlock"},{"content":{"location":"kirby","image":["file:\/\/WFz2lc8kMZ9ywWvo"],"src":"","alt":"Promise Mascot Agency","caption":"A mascot takes on its biggest challenge yet, resolved by a quick card battle.","link":"","ratio":"","crop":"false"},"id":"b3da600e-1be8-46de-8122-da245b1e7f5e","isHidden":false,"type":"imageBlock"},{"content":{"level":"h2","text":"The Art of Game Design","customid":""},"id":"0d883239-9628-4b2a-b02c-f851cbd51cb9","isHidden":false,"type":"headingBlock"},{"content":{"text":" This is just one quick example of all of the knowledge and expertise contained within The Art of Game Design . Learn more about the book, the 110+ Lenses that come with it and more about CEO Jesse Schell on The Art of Game Design website. 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The Lens of The Weirdest Thing

May 1, 2025 · insights

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