Kinds of Games Every Aspiring Designer Should Study

For aspiring designers, video games are an underrated source of learning. Great games solve difficult design problems, clarity, guidance, feedback, aesthetics, in elegant, interactive ways, making them rich textbooks for anyone studying design. Knowing which kinds of games to study, and what each teaches, can sharpen a designer's eye as effectively as any traditional design reference.

Games demand solutions to design challenges under real-time pressure and the need to engage players, which produces insights worth studying. Rather than specific titles, looking at the kinds of games worth examining, and the design lessons each offers, gives aspiring designers a practical guide to learning from the medium that pushes design hardest.

Games with elegant, minimal interfaces

Games celebrated for clean, elegant interfaces are worth studying for how they convey information with minimal clutter. They demonstrate restraint, clarity, and the art of showing just enough. Examining how these games achieve so much with so little teaches aspiring designers the discipline of minimalism and the power of showing only what matters.

Interfaces that are praised for their elegance reward close study, revealing how careful design communicates clearly without overwhelming. The restraint they show, resisting clutter, prioritizing clarity, is exactly the discipline designers must learn. Studying games with minimal, elegant interfaces is a direct lesson in doing more with less, a principle at the heart of sophisticated design.

Games that teach players without words

Games that guide players to understand mechanics without explicit tutorials, through design alone, are masterclasses in intuitive design. They show how good design can teach and direct behavior invisibly. Studying how these games lead players to figure things out naturally teaches designers how to make experiences self-explanatory through design rather than instruction.

The art of teaching players through the design of the experience itself, rather than text, is one of game design's finest achievements. Games that do this show how layout, cues, and structure can guide understanding. For designers, studying how a game teaches without words reveals how thoughtful design can make anything intuitive, a hugely valuable skill across all design.

Games with a strong, coherent aesthetic

Games with a distinctive, coherent visual style are worth studying for how they maintain a unified aesthetic across everything. They demonstrate how a consistent design language creates identity and atmosphere. Examining these games teaches designers how coherence of style and mood ties an experience together and gives it a memorable character.

A game with a strong, consistent aesthetic shows how every element can serve a unified vision, creating identity and feeling. This coherence is something designers strive for in any project. Studying how such games maintain their distinctive look and mood throughout teaches the value of a consistent design language and how it shapes the entire character of a work.

Games with satisfying feedback

Games known for satisfying, responsive feedback, where every action feels good and clear, teach the importance of responsiveness in design. They show how immediate, pleasing feedback makes an experience feel alive. Studying how these games reward and acknowledge player actions teaches designers how feedback shapes how an interaction feels.

The satisfying feel of a game with great feedback, where actions produce immediate, pleasing response, is a lesson in responsive design. This quality, often called game feel, makes interaction delightful. For designers, studying how games deliver such satisfying feedback reveals how responsiveness and acknowledgment of user actions make any interactive experience feel good and engaging.

Games that make complexity understandable

Games that present complex systems in understandable ways are invaluable studies in managing complexity through design. They show how careful structure and presentation can make the intricate feel approachable. Examining how these games tame complexity teaches designers how to organize and present complicated information so it feels clear rather than overwhelming.

Making something complex feel understandable is one of design's hardest challenges, and games that do it well are worth studying closely. Through structure, progressive disclosure, and clear presentation, they render complicated systems approachable. For designers facing complexity in their own work, studying how games make the intricate accessible offers practical, transferable lessons in clarity and organization.

Games as a design education

By studying games with elegant interfaces, intuitive teaching, strong aesthetics, satisfying feedback, and well-managed complexity, aspiring designers learn the principles that underlie all good design, demonstrated under the demanding conditions of real-time, engaging play. Games are a rich, interactive design education.

So aspiring designers should look to games as serious objects of study, not just entertainment. The design problems games solve, and the elegance with which the best solve them, offer lessons as valuable as any design reference. Studying the right kinds of games, with a designer's eye, sharpens one's understanding of clarity, guidance, aesthetics, and feel across all design.

For aspiring designers, great video games are rich, interactive textbooks. Study games with elegant minimal interfaces for restraint and clarity, games that teach players without words for intuitive design, games with a strong coherent aesthetic for unified style, games with satisfying feedback for responsiveness, and games that make complexity understandable for managing intricacy. Each demonstrates core design principles under the demanding conditions of real-time, engaging play, offering lessons as valuable as any traditional design reference for sharpening a designer's eye.