Game Industry Interview with Eric T. Elder

Eric Elder. Have you heard of him? You haven’t? Well, let me school ya! Actually, that’s how I met Eric, who is now the Creative Director for Diamond Games. I had just started at the Art Institute of California–Hollywood and was the first Game Art & Design student accepted in the new program. Eric was my first mentor in the game industry and have really grown to not only respect him but really like him as a fellow human being.  Now it is my pleasure to introduce you to one of my favorite people in the industry:

1. Tell me a little bit about your background and how you got into the game industry?

ERIC:  I started out in animation but have always had a passion for games.  While working at the Art Institute in Santa Monica I was the Asst. Dept. Chair for Animation and a newly formed Games program.   I soon after had the choice of becoming Director for either and I chose Games.  It was new and I knew I could mold it from scratch plus at that time around 2003 the games industry was really exploding.

2. What kind of a gamer are you?

I love all kinds of games but my favorites are Euro style resource management, strategy and family board games.

3.  What excites you about games?

ERIC:  I love game mechanics and looking at games from a design point of view.  I am also really excited at the unlimited potential of games as experience.  Alternate Reality Games are very interesting I think.

4.  Now that you are in gaming, have you found that the “OMG, I’m making games!!” factor has waned or is the excitement still there?

Sometimes I’m present to it and sometimes not.  I just got into the casino side of the business which a lot of it is new to me.  I get most excited when I think about the games I could be making 3-5 years from now.  Also I have not yet made a fully immersive virtual world game, I think that could be a “OMG” moment for me.

5.  When we first met, you were my first mentor in the industry and I learned so much from you. How did you get into education and what is the best piece of advice that you could share with any aspiring designers out there?

ERIC:  Thank you.  I got into education by necessity it was the last thing I wanted to do but turned out to be tremendously rewarding and really has given me my career.  In Philadelphia where I’m from when I graduated there were very few if any animation opportunities there.  Teaching animation was the closest thing.  I had some experience as an assistant teacher at my alma mater to stay close to the expensive equipment and hear about job opportunities at studios.  I was then offered an opportunity to teach my own courses at the Ai in Philadelphia.

My best advice is that if you want to be a designer or anything else for that matter do it right away and do it as much as possible.  You cannot beat experience and that is why my training methods have always been simply experiential and I think have been so successful.  If you want to be a game designer start designing games today, right now.  Get some cardboard, dice and pieces from other games and make a game and have people play it.  People get caught up and think they need the experience, or programmers or artists and they don’t.  Nothing is stopping you from being a game designer right now accept excuses!

6.  Tell me about what kind of games Diamond Games are making and how you contribute.

ERIC:  At Diamond Game we make Class II slot machines and Class II is more for the Indian Gaming market and are underneath bingo machines but look just like the Class III game you see in Vegas and Atlantic City.

I’m Creative Director so I manage and build the Creative Team, pitch new titles and themes and steer the creative vision for each title.

7.  What is your favorite game and why?

ERIC:  That’s a tough one!!  I would have to say poker because it is the most accessible.  I can play online for free (Zynga Poker) I can go to the casino and play at various cash levels as well as tournaments.  I love tournament gameplay.

My favorite German board game at the moment is called Ora & Labora by one of the hottest designers in the field at the time Uwe Rosenberg.  The theme is that you are building up a monastery with various buildings and getting and collecting resources to convert into points.  I love that there are many choices and paths to victory and that all the choices are good ones.

8.  What is the worst game and why?

ERIC:  I try to avoid bad games and put them out of my mind if I ever do encounter one.

9.  If you could be any game character, who would you be and why?

I guess “The King of All Cosmos” his title says it all.

It’s pretty obvious that Eric knows his stuff and I hope to continue learning from him now as his peer.

Continue to Game On, Eric—Andrea