Info

Welcome! On this site you will find publicly available game design documents and other related content.

Note that we don’t own the rights to any of documents posted on this website. All copyrights belong to their respective owners.

Documents

Design Documents

• ZACH-LIKE (a book of behind-the-scenes design documents from Zachtronics.)
• Remember Me (GBA RPG) Demo Documents and Assets
• Remember Me Soundtrack
• Wasteland 2 Vision Document from inXile Entertainment (published by Deep Silver) on Kickstarter
• David Candland's Destiny and Halo UX/UI designs
• The Chronicles of Spellborn artbook
• Dirty Bomb (from Splash Damage) game design doc, art book and soundtrack
• Azrael’s Tear game design documents from Matthew Stibbe
• Early concept docs for What Remains of Edith Finch Blogpost (Greenlight pitch trailer, a game design document and a moodboard.)
• Deus Ex Design document and Thief 4 Submission Document
• Sam & Max: Hit the Road design document (scroll a bit downwards). Also note this is a lovely webiste to learn more about Sam and Max!
• Captain Claw Game Design Document, Monolith Productions (scroll to the bottom of the link)
• Apocalypse Now game design document
• Starfox 2 Manual
• Starfox 2 Design Document
• Starfox 2 Arwing Design Document
• Narbacular Drop (Portal predecessor) documents
• Design document for the original GTA (Race’n’Chase) shared by Mike Dailly
• Canceled Monster Knight from Insomniac. and The design bible can be found on the second page.
• Sample of development journals Prince of Persia, Karateka, and more info GDD's. Written by Jordan Mechner
• The Doom Bible written by Tom Hall in 1992
• WipEout Game Design Document (Facebook), shared by Nick Burcombe, who worked at Psygnosis
• Saints Row Undercover GDD and walkthrough
• Monaco Game Design Document
• Pid game design document from Might and Delight
• Ninja Theory Razer Document
• Ninja Theory Kung Fu Story Document

Pitches

• Mythos Pitch (Flagship Studios)
• Azrael’s Tear game design documents (Matthew Stibbe)
• The Flame in the Flood pitch (The Molasses Flood).
• Metal Gear Solid 2 Grand Game Plan
• Guacamelee! design pitch
• Pitch for a SpongeBob card game by TiNYTOUCHTALES
• Chris Sawyer’s Transport Tycoon Pitch and snippets of source code
• Planescape Torment Vision Statement
• The Monster Island Pitch from Irrational Games
• Shred Nebula Pitch and Gameplay Documents
• Grim Fandango Puzzle Document
• Bioshock Pitch document by Irrational Games
• Diablo 1 pitch
• Rogue Legacy Design Notes

Templates

• Game design template from Chris Taylor

Uncategorized

• It’s Behind You: The making of R-Type for the ZX Spectrum (Bob Pape)
• Valve Employee Handbook
• Valve publications

Collections

• Collection of Game Design Documents (Fallout, Tron, Silent Hill and more)
• Double Fine Productions Documents (HeadLander, Stacking, Brutal Legend) from Lee Petty
• Game design documents and pitches from designer Thomas Grové (Street Fighter IV: Flashback and more)
• Classic LucasArts Game Design Documents, once shared by Aric Wilmunder. Can still be found on archive.org
• Classic LucasArts Game Design Documents - Aric Wilmunder
• Game design documents from designer Richard Hill-Whittall

Broken

• BROKEN! GDD Template from Nikkona, switched to paid

Vocabulary

During game development many different types of documents are used. Some are more common than others. This section will give a brief overview of the most used documents.