What is a game designer?

People almost always confuse game designers with game developers; they would point out a developer and say: yeah I know this guy, he works in game design; The process of explaining what is a game designer exactly has been a pain for such a long time; I'm pretty sure almost 70% of the people I know have no idea what I do and what I found shocking is that I had to explain the concept in interviews when I applied to local game development houses. 

The state of game development in the middle east and in Jordan especially is a subject of a different post beyond the scope of this one. 

To many of us, we love this man like a father; I had the honour of meeting him back in 2007; didn't wash my hands for weeks

For now, let us start with the definition of a game designer. 

Definition 

A game designer is a person who designs games. The term normally refers to a person who designs video or computer games, but it can also refer to one who designs traditional games, such as board games. 

Game design is the creation of the rules and content of a game. It does not involve programming, art or animation, or marketing, or any of the other myriad tasks required to make a game. All of these tasks collectively can be called “game development” and game design is one part of development.

A video or computer game designer develops the layout, concept and gameplay: the game design of a video or computer game. They work for a video game publisher or developer. This person usually has a lot of writing experience and may even have a degree in writing or a related field (such as English). This person's primary job function is writing, so the more experience they have with the activity, the better. Some art and programming skills are also helpful for this job, but are not strictly necessary.

History

Early in the history of video games, game designers were often the lead programmer or the only programmer for a game. This is the case of such noted designers as Sid Meier and Will Wright. This person also sometimes comprised the entire art team! As games became more complex and computers and consoles became more powerful (allowing more features), the job of game designer became a separate job function, with the lead programmer splitting his time between the two functions, moving from one role to the other.

 Sid now strictly designs; his focus shows in creating complex titles such as civilizations series 

Later, game complexity escalated to the point where it required someone who concentrated solely on game design. Many early veterans chose the game design path eschewing programming and relegating those tasks to others.

Today, it is rare to find a video or computer game where the principal programmer is also the principal designer, except in the case of relatively simple games, such as Tetris or Bejewelled. With very complex games, such as MMORPGs, designers may number in the dozens! In these cases, there are generally one or two principle designers and many junior designers who specify subsets or subsystems of the game.

What is a Game Designer?

As you may have noticed, game design is an incredibly broad field. Those of us who are professional designers sometimes have trouble explaining what we do to our families and friends. Part of the reason for this is that we do so many things. Here are some analogies I’ve seen when trying to explain what it is like to be a game designer:

• Game designers are artists. The term “art” is just as difficult to define as the word “game”… but if games can be a form of art then designers would be artists.
• Game designers are architects. Architects do not build physical structures; they create blueprints. Video game designers also create “blueprints” which are referred to as “design docs.” Board game designers create “blueprints” as well — in the form of prototypes — which are then mass-produced by publishers.
• Game designers are party hosts. As designers, we invite players into our space and try our best to show them a good time.
• Game designers are gods. We create worlds, and we create the physical rules that govern those worlds.
• Game designers are lawyers. We create a set of rules that others must follow.
• Game designers are educators. As I have discussed earlier, entertainment and education are strongly linked, and games are (at least sometimes) fun because they involve learning new skills.

Hanarubo Sakaguchi created worlds in the Final Fantasy series players still enjoy to this day 

Game design in the real world

In the video game industry, the job of game designer is one of the hardest to obtain. It is not easy, though many people think they "have what it takes" to perform this job. It is the biggest problem that faces designers is that people always have opinions about everything, and while it's part of the designers job to collect those pieces of information and take what suits the project the most; the constant nagging could get tiresome. 

Because everyone think that there's nothing to being a game designer and they can be it, it could lead to lots of clashes with the management; Game designers are creative people and hostile disrespectful environment in which the boss dictates what 'he' thinks best all though it's out the scope of his expertise could get the designer very very frustrated.  

Almost everyone in the game industry has what they believe is the ultimate game concept and is waiting for the opportunity to develop the game. As a game designer, they may get the opportunity to develop that game concept, so competition is usually very high.

Since a video game publisher may invest millions of dollars towards a game's development, it is easy to understand why they choose game designers carefully—one or two poor game concepts could end up costing them millions of dollars of revenue and could even risk bankrupting the company. For this reason, game publishers usually choose game designers who have a proven track record with several hit games under their belts. Less seasoned designers may be assigned to low profile games that have budgets in the low thousands.

Hideo Kojima works with huge teams to create cinematic gameplay experiences; I attended a lecture of his in TGS 2006 in which he described in full detail the creation of MGS4; he inspired me to become a better designer 

Being a successful game designer implies handling all these pressures and coming up with a title that will entertain the masses and bring back the company the most revenue possible.