Game Treatment
CSSE 290 – Computer Game Design
Winter 2010–2011

What is a Game Treatment?

Ernest W. Adams (author of your textbook, Fundamentals of Game Design) writes the following.

So you've shown your high-concept document to a number of producers or potential investors, and now one of them wants a meeting to hear more about it. (It can take quite a while before you find a producer who's interested enough to give you the time. Be persistent!) For that meeting, you'll normally bring along the key members of your development team and do a PowerPoint presentation showing the main features and concept art for the game. It would also be good to have some prototype code running that you can show; producers want proof that you can deliver.

But after the meeting is over, people's memory of what you said will start to fade and get mixed up with impressions of other developers' pitches for their products. To keep your game fresh in the producer's mind, you need to give them something to remind them of it. This is where the game treatment comes in.

Like the high concept document, it's a selling tool whose function is to show off your idea in the best possible light. It's longer, though, typically 10 to 30 pages. The text and images should echo the content of the PowerPoint presentation.

Don’t try to cover all aspects of the game in rigorous detail; it's not the game's design script. The treatment should fill in a few of the gaps and answer some of the questions left by the high-concept document. This is the place for:

  • concept art,
  • mocked-up screen shots,
  • a little bit about the key characters,
  • a brief description of the overall story arc, and
  • anything else that's crucial to understanding what the game will look and feel like to play.
You should also include an analysis of the competition and indicate the ways in which your game will be different—and better.

--- The above is part of Adam's template for a Game Treatment licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License. You may redistribute and modify it freely, including for commercial use, so long as you provide attribution to Ernest W. Adams as the author of the original template. David Mutchler has made additions to it, including notes. (Be sure the Reviewing option is turned on.)

Another author, Luke Ahearn, says it a little differently:

“I didn’t have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.”

— Mark Twain (1835-1910)

This quote sums up a very important aspect of the game treatment: it is often easier to write a 10-page document describing your game than to write one page that says everything concisely and effectively.

The game treatment is your primary selling tool which quickly orients the publisher to your game (genre, platform, story and other elements should be mentioned). The treatment is your opportunity to convince the publisher that your idea is as complete and crystal clear as you believe it to be. If you can't briefly explain your game idea, then the following might be true of your game:

  • It is too big and complex. Your game idea may be too ambitious.
  • The game is not as good as you think.
  • You need help crystallizing the core aspects of the game. If you think this is the case, get help from an objective source who knows something about games.

One approach to writing the game treatment is to cite your game's “unique selling points” (USPs). USPs are the aspects that differentiate your game from the competition, offer gameplay value, and ultimately make consumers want to buy the product. You should be able to determine the USPs of your game after writing the “competitive analysis” section of your proposal. If yours is truly a good idea, the publisher may even read your design document all the way through.

The game treatment should also grab the publisher's attention by focusing on the bottom line. You can do this by citing sales projections based on solid market and sales information relevant to your game.

When you have distilled your game into a single game treatment page, have others proofread it for you to see if they understand what you are trying to say and find the game idea compelling. Have it edited and reviewed by as many qualified people as possible.

Note: Many people erroneously believe the treatment is the first thing written, since it is usually the first thing read. But this document should be written last, right before you approach the publisher. The reason for this is that at this point you know as much as possible about your game. The treatment is a distillation of all the work that you have done designing, researching, and otherwise developing the game on paper. Proposals and forms are often used by publishers and agents to weed out developers and game ideas. Not just bad developers and game ideas are weeded out however; publishers are just as likely to weed out inappropriate or unwanted ideas and developers.

— Luke Ahearn from http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20060717/ahearn_03.shtml#, July 17, 2006. (This link no longer points to that article.)

In our Computer Game Design class, we will write the Game Treatment to meet two goals:

  1. It is a sales document—an expanded version of the the High Concept document.

  2. It helps your team clarify your thoughts about the basics of your game.

What steps will you follow to write your Game Treatment?

Here are the steps you will follow.

  1. With your help, I will appoint a member of your team to be Lead Designer. Her special role is to be “keeper of the vision.”

  2. With your team, in parallel with writing this document, write your documents that give details of your:

  3. Individually, read the Game Treatment template, paying special attention to the comments that I put into that document using Microsoft Word's reviewing capabilities.

  4. With your team, divide up the sections of the Game Treatment template, with everyone contributing their fair share, in whichever sections they feel most comfortable with.

  5. Individually, write your assigned sections.

  6. As a team, combine your sections and discuss them as needed.

  7. When you have a draft that is mostly complete, every member of the team should proofread the entire document (making corrections as needed). After it is a polished document, submit it to your Subversion repository in a file called GameTreatmentDraft, with the appropriate extension (Microsoft Word or PDF), in the appropriate folder.

  8. After you get feedback on your draft from me, every member of the team should participate in making additions/corrections as appropriate. Then every member of the team should proofread the entire document (making corrections as needed). After it is a polished document, submit the final version in a file called GameTreatment, with the appropriate extension (Microsoft Word or PDF), in the appropriate folder.