Chris Crawford on Game Design, by Chis Crawford, Published June 2003, ISBN: 0131460994

The Book looks at Crawfords 25 years in the games industry, although the designs discussed are now old, the book brings fresh design insights and hard learned lessons about the games industy. Has chapters on what kind of education a game designer should get and what you should read! A very thought provoking book.

Andrew Rollings and Ernest Adams on Game Design, by Andrew Rollings and Ernest Adams, Published May 2003, ISBN: 1592730019

The book seeks to cover important but little discussed issues. The first half of the book is a detailed analysis of thekey game design elements: examining game concepts and worlds, storytelling, character and user interface design, core mechanics and balance. The second half discusses each of the major game genres(action, adventure, role-playing, strategy, puzzle, and so on) and identifies the design patterns and unique creative challenges that characterize them.

Game Design: Theory and Practice by Richard Rouse, Richard Rouse, Richard, III Rouse, Mark Louis Rybczyk, Publisher: Wordware Publishing 2001, ISBN: 1556227353

The book discusses in detail key game design topics including game balancing, storytelling, non-linearity, player motivations, input/output, artificial intelligence, level design, and playtesting. Learn the techniques of top game designers through in-depth interviews with: Chris Crawford, Balance of Power, Eastern Front (1941); Ed Logg, Asteroids, Centipede, Gauntlet; Jordan Mechner, Prince of Persia, Karateka, The Last Express; Sid Meier, Civilization, Pirates!, Railroad Tycoon, Gettysburg!; Steve Meretzky, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Planetfall; Will Wright, SimCity, The Sims.

Postmortems from Game Developer: Insights from the Developers of Unreal Tournament, Black and White, Age of Empires, and Other Top-Selling Games by Austin Grossman, Publisher: Publishers Group West, February 2003, ISBN: 1578202140

The Game Developer postmortems are written by game developers and producers and follow projects from start to finish with candid, thorough, and specific accounts of the good and bad decisions made along the way. You learn how each game was made, what kind of company and project team was involved, what tools were used, as well as major milestones. Gives an account of what contibuted to the projects sucess and the projects failures and missed opportunities.

Swords & Circuitry: A Designer's Guide to Computer Role-Playing Games, by Neal Hallford and Jana Hallford, Publisher: Muska & Lipman/Premier-Trade, 2001, ISBN: 0761532994

Despite the books language been aimed at a cool teenage audience this is a serious book on designing RPG games. Includes a history of the genre and interviews with designers. Lots of hard advice on the games industry as well, which should make it of interest to any would be designer.

Game Design: The Art and Business of Creating Games, by Bob Bates, Publisher: Premier Press, 2002, ISBN: 0761531653

About game development issues such as how to present your design to publishers.

Rules of Play : Game Design Fundamentals, by Katie Salen, Eric Zimmerman, Publisher: The MIT Press; (October 1, 2003), ISBN: 0262240459

This book is a theoritical discussion of what games are and the mechanics of play from board and electronic games. The authors believe there are 18 game design schemas that describe all the diffrent game forms. You get the idea and there may even be something in it or at least it may get you thinking!

Character Development and Storytelling for Games (Game Development Series), by Lee Sheldon, Publisher: Muska & Lipman/Premier-Trade; June 2004, ISBN: 1592003532

By an ex-TV script writter who is now a star of interative computer game script writing. The bumf says "This is a book of ideas and of choices. Knowing which choices to make is not teachable. It's part of that creative instinct we call talent whose secret voice guides us every time we sit down at the keyboard."

Creating Emotion in Games: The Craft and Art of Emotioneering, by David Freeman and Will Wright, Publisher: New Riders; September 2003, ISBN: 1592730078

How to bring emotion into a computer game. The Book has examples which demonstrate exactly how to apply the techniques. He also shows how some of these techniques were utilized in, and contributed greatly to the success of such games as "Grand Theft Auto: Vice City"; "Deus Ex"; and "Thief" I & II.

Mathematics for Game Developers (Game Development), by Christopher Termblay, Publisher: Muska & Lipman/Premier-Trade; (June 2004), ISBN: 159200038X

Book about how to apply mathametics of matrices and vectors to 3D game programming, some designers will need to know this as well.

Windows Game Programming for Dummies, Second Edition, by André LaMothe, Publisher: For Dummies; (September 2002), ISBN: 0764516787

Beginners game programming book concentating on Windows DirectX platform.

Ultimate Game Design: Building Game Worlds, by Tom Meigs, Published May 2003, ISBN: 0072228997

About programming the level design or world building - including modelling, texturing, and creating the lighting and how to create behaviour scripting which are the mechanics of building games regardless of the genre. Every technique in the book can be done using free tools, including Python and J2ME.

Focus On Mod Programming in Quake III Arena, by Shawn Holmes, Publisher: Muska & Lipman/Premier-Trade; September 2002, ISBN: 193184156X

The only book on moding.