Typing Games: how and why?

A beginner’s guide to designing typing games and exploring their niche market

A short article based on this genre study was published on gamedeveloper.com

If you already know some typing games, you probably have an opinion, good or bad. If you don’t know much about them, no worries, that’s what I expected. The genre is very niche, and for good reason: how odd to want to control a game with typing! It is indeed so odd that it brings unusual and pretty exciting design challenges. But the genre is so niche that there are few, if any, design resources available. That’s where I come in! I’ll try to give a good overview of typing games based on my personal experience as a game designer on Epistory and Nanotale, various typing games I’ve played, and interviews I’ve had with other typing game developers.

I plan to cover a bit of the history and background around popular typing games, then delve into the design considerations that typing poses and the solutions we can find. Finally we’ll look at where the genre is headed.

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