Tell us your name / nickname and how old you are.
My name is Dario. I am 28 years old.
What is your profession?
Game Designer.
How long have you been working for Travian?
Four and a half years.
What’s your job at Travian? (Or what have they told you?)
My day-to-day work involves brainstorming ideas, writing concepts, developing mechanics and attending to balancing matters. However, that’s just routine work. In my opinion, the really important task is something else.
I always try to get as much feedback and creative input from our great team and players as possible. In my opinion, the most important task as a Game Designer is to listen carefully.
If you do that, you’ll get a good idea of the direction your game should evolve towards. Now for a Game Designer, it’s important to creatively moderate the team through the process of making the game.
It takes teamwork to make a game. This means: You create an environment where the whole team shares the vision of the game and are motivated to give their creative input. As Game Designer, you must be able to absorb this input and, most importantly, decide what fits well and what does not fit so well into the game. What’s more, of course, you must be able to explain why a really good idea generally might degrade the game.
What’s your favorite genre and game?
My all-time favorite game is “Alpha Centauri”. At the moment I really like Crusader Kings II with a Game of Thrones mod. My favorite genre is strategy.
What was your first impression of online games?
I started playing Starcraft and Diablo 2 with a crappy 56 k modem on Battle.net. In 2002 when browser games had reached Germany, I started to play “Inselkampf” and many other browser games followed. Playing online is really cool. You are able to play with other people any time and not only during network or board game sessions.
What is the biggest challenge in Travian for you?
I have a one year old son. So at the moment, the biggest challenge in Travian for me is managing time.
What would you do once you achieved world domination?
I would advise experts to find solutions for some basic problems facing humanity:
• Poverty and hunger
• Compound interest
• Ecological destruction
• Reasons for war (such as religious or territorial motivations)
• Lack of a real transparent and fair democratic system
Then I’d hope the power wouldn’t corrupt me and I’d have the courage to hand it over to whoever is most able to solve the problems (most likely the people elected within a real transparent and fair democratic system). 😉
What should be the next invention?
A holodeck would be nice.
Quick questions:
Tee or coffee? Coffee
Dogs or cats? Cats
Pop or folk music? I like the Beatles as well as Bob Dylan. So I prefer the best of both.
Mobile or board games? Best of both. 😉
Consoles or browsers? Browsers alone.
Shout-out:
Travian 5 is going to be cool!
