Read the document.
Here we go:

1) Document Length: a six page document is not a Design Document. It is called a high concept or treatment at best. If you are designing any game it should take about 20 pp. Any less and it is impossible to fully detail what the game should look like and play like.

2) Overview: Says nothing about the game. Says alot about HP (please see my post above about illegally using IP) but nothing about gameplay. As others have pointed out, this line "the player will also be able to use magic at any time, and as the game progresses, the
character will learn new spells." is saying nothing more than what happened in the book; it doesn't point towards any original or derivative gameplay.

Furthermore, here you repeat yourself "[...]character will learn new spells. During his time at Hogwarts, he can explore the whole castle, learn
new spells in fun mini-games and brew exciting potions." and once again state you will learn spells and brew potions.

The reader at this stage has the following question: what is a special about your game? From your description, it sounds exactly like the HP games that are already out there.


3) Characters: this is fine for a high concept, but not enough for a design document. In a GDD, you would go into more detail on each individual character. You say you can play HP... well so far I still don't know what the gameplay is!

4) Plot: please see my warning about IP. You CANNOT use the IP story nor modify it for your own projects, even if free or fan based.

5) Locations: This is actually done well. Sticking with only the first book gives you a realistic set of locations. However, you need to describe the locations better. Are you doing the whole castle, or just bits. ARe you doing all of hogsmeade or just the Boars inn...etc

6)Mini Quests: there is some problem with language. You refer to the below categories as mini quests but then talk about mini games. Never include something in a design document that isn't referenced somewhere else. AS others have point out, you've made a passing nod to a "lessons mini game" but have no solid description of what that is. It could be a multiple choice test, it could be a tetris game, it could be anything and a design document is supposed to be so it's not anything, it's something.

(EDIT: confusion. Your organization on this section is poor. I don't know if the mini quests are lessons and quidditch or what. After reading through a few times I get it, but trust me, people will not spend this time trying to decipher what you mean)


6.1?) Lessons: as others have said, you've made no mention of what this game will play like. You state how to make a potion (get recipie, gather ingredients, make potion) but that is not a game, that's a description from the book! I'm afraid all your lessons suffer this problem: they describe the actions as per the book but give no equivalent gameplay descritption. It's fine to know how they do it in the book but that has nothing to do with how you want to do it in the game.

6.2?) Quidditch: I'm assuming quidditch is the second mini game. Here again, you mention the game as per the book but no mention of how we will play it in your game.

7) Collectables: I don't know if this is a miniquest or not, but what do these collectables do in the game? For example, gather the pieces for the wizard chess game. Can you then play wizard chess? It's not mentioned anywhere so I don't know!


Conclusion:
This is not a design document. And I will leave you with the main reason why: after reading the entire things, I STILL don't know if this is a RPG, FPS, RTS, Action, Adventure, what! I have NO idea what type of game it is! I know I play HP, but that's about it. As well, there is not even a keyboard map. Something as simple as arrow keys to move, "i" for inventory, "r" to run, etc not only solidifies your gameplay but also gives insight into the type of game (a RPG will have a different keyset than a RTS and FPS, etc...).

Recommendation:
1) create a 5 minute walkthrough. Describe what the player would see and DO in teh first five minutes in the world. This is also a good oppurtunity to hash out a tutorial. The walkthrough will give everyone a better idea of what the game will play and look like.
2) Choose ONE location and ONE character and ONE spell and ONE lesson and ONE...etc... and develop that and that alone. Ignore the rest of the HP world (as a matter of fact, ignore HP all together) and focus only on ONE thing to fully detail what your game would be like in this limited instance. Once you've succesfully done that (success means that a person can read your description and know how the game will play)

As this forum is full of aspiring game designers, the issue is not "can I get away with it?" but rather "am I doing something illegal?".

You are right; most game companies don't know or turn a blind eye to IP infringement. But that doesn't change the fact that if you use copyrighted material, you are either: a) unoriginal enough to use your own material, b) cheap enough that you don't want to pay for your own matieral, or b) lazy enough that you don't want to take the time to make up your own material.

The ONLY reason to use IP material (like capcom or HP) is because you are "borrowing" the success these material had, the recognizability of their product, and using it for your own goals. In other words, since you can't come up with good material on your own (you in the general, not specific to any forum member), you use someone else so when they see the game, they don't focus on your bad game, but the good IP.



It's an even bigger drain on their good name if an inexperienced person makes a poor HP game, advertised it as a HP game, and then people and the news think that this is a licenced HP game. Ironically, you are correct that the better the game, the less the IP holder will complain. Free advertising right? But since "good" is in the eye of the beholder, the "little man" or the "big person" may take offense to your game and ask you to shut down at any time, even if they turned a blind eye to it for years.

Bottom line: You should not take silence to be persmission. If you don't have upfront permission to use someones IP, then it's illegal to do so.

HORRIBLE advice.

To rephrase your quote:...but starting with code will result in code-> design -> recode.

Example 1: you code a level. You realize late in the coding that you need a day/night system. Now I ask you, how hard will it be to recode the game to include a system that wasn't included in your original code?

Example 2: you design a level. You realize late in the design that your levels need a day/night system. Same question: how hard will it be to redesign your document to include an day/night system?

Now examine both example: Re-writing a design document is way easier than re-writing code. If you are going to make a game, get the game on paper as solidly as you can to make sure that the idea is viable, possible, manageable, etc and then base the code around that. If you start with code, then you are making stuff at random, hoping that your game will fit around it.

Note that this is true if you are working alone or in a team. Things always look great in our head; it's when it gets outside of our head that reality bitch slaps you. In this case, I'd rather be slapped with editing a word doc over reprogramming code.

Here's a little extra.

This is the TOC from my GDD.

Physics Adventure in Space-Time -- Massively Multiplayer Online Game Design Document

Please note that it's a MMOGDD and thus the 100 pp. is just the start. Once I "fill out" the data, it should get to 400-500pp. At that point, the GDD will be "almost" done.

Also note how I'm starting with a 3 pp. summary; then go into a little more detail about the game spending a page or two on the big areas of the game; then we go into deep detail about the specific game systems; and we end with a series of tables outlining every item, location, ability, etc that will go into the database.

Please use this TOC as an example of some of the things you might want to have on your own or how to organize your own.

It is not completed, as i have said before.

is saying nothing more than what happened in the book;
Could that be, do you think, because it is based from the book? Just a thought.
What would you want it to say, maybe something totally different from the book?
I believe what you might be saying, although badly wrote, is that i have not gone in to detail how the game will play out.

That just shows that you haven't played any of the other harry potter games. For one all the other harry potter games are based on the movies
not the books, and therefore they are normally quite short and in my opinion not as fun as one based on the books would be.


I will be going into details about some of the characters.


So what? As already said do you really think company's care, if so why haven't people who made versions of sonic or Pokemon been sued.
Because it's not for commercial use, and they will most likely only make a tiny bit of money.
Also in your previous post you mentioned Warner bro's, and not having permission. Yet Warner bro's don't own any rights at all over the books except exclusivity for films.



What i have wrote in the document in locations for the first book is what there is, when i said Hogwarts i mean the whole of the castle, etc.


there is some problem with language Maybe you should read what you just posted if you think there is a problem with my language?
So what if i called one bit a mini game and one a mini quest, the quests are indented in the menu to show what ones are mini-quests, and the quidditch is a mini-game.
About the lessons if you read below you can see that i mention a bit about how each lesson is going to be played out.

No one else has complained or had trouble, maybe it's just you?


Then you have misread this section because it is not a description of how it is done in the book, in fact it isn't done like that in the book.
It is a description of how each lesson will play out in general.


That is because it is a Work-In-Progress.


Collectibles are just things to collect when you want to, they are not compulsory but just something than can earn some extra stuff to do.
For example, gather the pieces for the wizard chess game.
Can you then play wizard chess?
Yes that is planned, and for some other stuff there will be content unlocked like the making off the game.


Things like controls will be mentioned later on but it is more important for the other information i have done to be completed first and the technical stuff after.
And the game type is going to be more or less a kind of RPG but with some FPS aspects hopefully.


Thanks, i will do that.

Ok, will try that.
Thanks for the crit's i believe i have managed to respond to your crits quite well.

@fastlane69

I guess it depends on the size of the project. If I was the head of EA Games for example I would expect that 99,9% of the fan projects never reach a playable stage and would just wait for one flashing out of the junk.
But then if it really got potential you can still make a deal and franchise their ideas.

For me it is just a hobby, write some code and make little games to play with my friends and stuff. Something that small will not bringt them up to the barracades, BUT I divide between those projects and my browsergame, which is 100% self made with the intention to earn money with in the future. If I used my other projects to gain players for the browsergame I'd be in trouble. So you (you in general) can judge for your self I think.



Your counter to my advice is quite good, maybe I was too short in my explanations.

Of course I started with some modelling and level design, but not for a game in the beginning. Then I wanted to maek a game with 2 friends of mine and we still had no clue about the code and created and created worlds, just to see we have no use for them in the end.
So, with the gained knowledge, we started making small codes and build some test maps only with what is necessary to test the coded features. this continued for quite a long time and I, again, realized this will never have a result.
Now I took both, level and scripting knowlegde and thought about a system combining both in a way that eleminates all heavy problems.
Some of them:
- Performance with huge maps
- Level border without having high mountains everywhere
- Too much code for character interaction (walk, swim, jump, climb etc.)
- Pathfinding
and so on.

Based on those "problems" I created a structure in my mind.
- Isometric view (high performance even with highly detailed maps and no need for level borders)
- Character movement only on ground and shallow water, no swimming, jumping or something else. (plain, invisible wmb supported, collision structures)
- "Open land" to cut pathfinding down to circle around trees or somthing like that.
(just a few examples and not too much into detail)

With those things in Mind, and planning is one of the most importand parts as it saves you a lot of time, I had a concept that gave me intense programming work for 6 months and I was able to create more than the whole 3 years before. After that, I started creating the first map and threw away the test map.

It took then part in a GS contest known as "Dragonrise" and was judged as "almost winner with high potential".


*phew*
I hope my intended way of showing how my start was got a bit more clear now? ^^

Oh btw. atm I'm working on the 3rd Dragonrise Demo. ^^

That pretty much sums up your document. What you have is a synopsis of the first HP book. It contains no unique or original information, nothing that you can say "I came up with that. That is my original idea."

In short, all your document is saying is: "I want to make a Harry Potter game."
That's it. Everything else is a summary.

And as for the HP IP, all I can say is tKarma's a bitch. If you don't respect other peoples IP, people will not respect your's. And if you make it that far, in time when you come up with something original you won't have a leg to stand on when others rip off your ideas for their purposes.

This shows the difference between an engineer and an artist. An engineer want to see how a system works... what are it's limits... how efficient you can make it run. For what purpose? Doesn't matter or that will be determined later.

An artist on the other hand doesn't care about the system, they have something in mind. The "vision" you hear about. They will then seek out anything possible to get that vision made, irregardless of tech.

Applied to this situation, if you are making a game, you have to be both artist and engineer, of that there is no doubt. However, if you are making a game, this intrinsicly means that you have to start with the Artist side, the vision, what it is you want to DO. Then you can engineer the system to make it work but if you don't have vision, you are not making a game, you are merely "making levels".

Please don't take this as meaning your approach is not good. It is. For engineering. But not for a Game Design Document and not to make a game, for that requires more than just that line of thinking.

Again this proves you have not read the first harry potter book.
There are my own ideas in there, maybe you should read the book and not just watch the film?

Again i should remind you that IT ISN'T FINISHED nor did i say it was.
And it really does say more than that.

Also i don't believe in karma and i truly doubt any one would call making a fan game "ripping off IP". If you really believe that then you also believe anyone making a fan site or any sort of fan game for anything are ripping off IP and cannot think of ideas, and even more think they will be ripped.

I really doubt it!

Blade...

In all honesty, you came here, and asked people to post their constructive criticism of your design doc.

Fastlane hes weighed in with the most complete crtique of your work, and while you did take some of it to heart, most his critique, as well as others, you seem to be taking way too personally.

My crit is pretty much in the same line as theirs: even unfinished, it is a whopping 7 pages long, but only really has three full pages of text describing what this game is supposed to be.

Lets go through it piece by piece, and please, I do understand that 'it isn't finished', so if/when you respond, refrain from going down that route:

Overall:


- Dot the "i"'s

The document as a whole could use a run through a spell/grammar check. This is your 'baby', treat it as something equally precious to you.

The purpose of a design doc is to get your idea across to the party across the table and draw them in, making them believe that your project is something worth investing in, be that in time, resources or money. Nothing will put someone off more than seeing what should be spit-shine polished in front of them, and it looks like you spent 5 minutes typing it up, errors and all.

Prime example: In the very first sentence of the document, you have 4 spelling errors. Harry Potter may be a fictional character, but his name is still a proper noun and should be capitalized, as should the name of the game, since it is a title.

- Details

This has been hit on before. If I were a publisher, investor, or freelance developer who was looking for something to do just for the hell of it, I would want to know that the project I am considering spending my time, money, resources or talent on is going to be directed by a person who has a crystal clear vision of what they want to accomplish.

You have to write this with a specific target audience in mind: the clueless. You have to assume that, no matter how popular the subject matter or concept is, the person who is holding your document has absolutely no clue what you are talking about. Get specific about everything, especially (and most importantly) the things that make your game or idea unique.

- Consistency

There are a couple of things that glare at me in this regard. The first, in your overview, you state that this project is going to encompass the ground covered in ALL the books, and later pull back that scope to one book at a time. Another one is Quidditch. You state, under lessons, that once the player completes the flying lesson, they will unlock the ability to play Quidditch as a mini-game, yet later, under collectables, you say that finding all the pieces to the Quidditch set will unlock it... which is it?

This goes hand in hand with details, as you have to ensure that while you delve into the details to a sufficient depth to make everything understandable and interesting, you don't get so caught up and confused by them that you forget to keep them straight in several different areas of the document.


I'll leave you with this, as this really needs a lot more meat on it's bones to be a design document... It really reads more like the writing on the back of a game box, that gets the player hooked into picking up the game and buying it, than it does as a vehicle to convey a dream or vision of grand scope.