How do you use spreadsheets to manage your game's data and balance?

Spreadsheets represent a remarkably accessible tool for efficiently managing your game data. They offer a cost-effective solution with a low barrier to entry, especially when compared to the complexities of creating your own data management tools, especially for small to mid-sized game development projects. Everyone is familiar with spreadsheets, even individuals without extensive technical expertise can readily collaborate using them. Consider, for instance, how a translator can effortlessly work on translating game dialogue by simply translating each rows within the document, which then can be seamlessly integrated into the game.

Spread Sheets Help Game Designers maintain, manipulate and visualize game life cycle. As Game Designer is responsible for making games life more interactive and fun. The Key moments of game data like stats of player, health of player, enemies, User interface visualization, Mission Flow for story line. Being a Project Manager in Game Development I use Spread Sheets track Life Cycle of my Projects e.g. Timeline, Budget, Tasks completed, Projects methodology. I also use other tools like Trello, Slack to manage tasks on daily basis Like how much work has been completed, how much is pending, what Projects are on track, which ones are late and why then tackle those hurdles to keep projects on track.

I cannot think of a more vital tool for a Game Designer other than spreadsheets. They are very handy from the earliest stages of game production —prototyping game systems or setting the groundwork for development— all the way through to Live Ops —tinkering with your game economy or finding patterns in retrieved analytics. Sure, there are tons of specialized tools for everything from prediction models, project management, data analysis, and so on. But when time is of the essence, versatile and familiar spreadsheets can always fill in the gaps.

Most tech literate people have had some exposure to spreadsheets. So if you're working in a team where not everyone can program or use the game engine to make changes (e.g. balancing), creating a setup where such individuals can help develop the game using spreadsheets is a great idea.

We are more data-driven than ever before, needing to organize data in a tabular format and incorporate graphs to explain and justify our decision-making. As the saying goes, "A graph is worth a thousand words."

Create multiple spreadsheets, the key here is to keeping them clear but not exhaustive. It's essential to strike a balance between clarity and completeness. While you don't want to create overly exhaustive spreadsheets, you also don't want to omit critical data that is essential for the game's functionality and balance. For example, create different sheets for a. Character b. Level c. Dialogue d. Item e. Quest f. Localization / Translation g. and many more.. Don't forget to always have clear boundaries of every sheet to manage the spreadsheets consistency.

Right at the start of development, you might have several people still working out the structure of the spreadsheet, so there may be copies or duplicate tabs. Be sure to keep a "main" spreadsheet that all users agree is the source of truth, with any changes to main agreed beforehand so that everyone is on the same page.

To add to Ryan's point, we must ensure that only the right users have access to the spreadsheet and not allow co-authoring for everyone. Additionally, consistency is key. Having a master sheet that everyone uses as a point of reference will streamline everyone's processes.

Solid data architecture is key. Aim for consistency in hierarchies and naming conventions across code, databases, game documentation, and spreadsheets. This uniformity establishes a common language crucial for team success. Consider your team members when formatting spreadsheets. Prioritize readability and accessibility. Use clear titles and implement a color code for cells and sheets. Keep graphs and charts at the top, always well-tagged. Reserving the first sheet for a summary, like a KPI report or an overall progress chart, will surely be appreciated. Even if you're a solo developer, maintaining organized and legible spreadsheets is still important. Keep it neat, keep it efficient.

I agree, one of the most powerful tools Excel has to offer is its ability to convert unorganized data into a tabular format. Many times, I use the "Go To" feature (Ctrl+G) to highlight empty cells and convert them into continuous data. This is especially useful when some software downloads data in a non-tabular format, making it difficult to manipulate later on.

To add real world example, consider a scenario when you're developing an RPG game, and you need to manage the experience points (XP) required for character leveling. You want to create a structured spreadsheet to calculate and track XP requirements for each level, making it easy to balance and adjust the game's progression system. Create two columns of Level and XP Required. Insert the Level from 1 to your max level. On the first row of XP required, put your initial value of required XP. Then on second row you can put formula like (=B2 + (B2 * 0.2)) indicated level 2 XP is 20% more of level 1 XP. Then you can just fill down the rest by dragging down the formula. Need balancing? Just change the initial XP or the percentage. Easy!

Also subtotal, can add a new row and won't jeopardize the calculation, also with subtotal =subtotal(function,B3:F3) function coukd be to add, multiply, average(mean), stddev, or variance Average=1 Count=2 CountA=3 Max=4 Min=5 Product=6 Stdev=7 Stsevp=8 Sum=9 Var=10

It's also a good idea to convert formulas into plain language, so that everyone on the team understands what they are doing, and the variables and numbers being used. This is also useful when you come back to a formula later (perhaps many months later) and want to quickly get back up to speed.

Today, Open AI can integrate with Google Sheets, enabling us to use prompts instead of formulas. This transforms our everyday language into complex functions, potentially saving us a lot of time. However, I firmly believe that as designers and developers, it's crucial for us to understand and write our own formulas. How else can we discuss them with our team or improve our systems and processes —or even implement them— if we don't comprehend how they work? Always avoid creating a black box. Like everything in life, there's no way around reading the documentation.

Charts and graphs is must use when you want to analyze you game data. Consider a scenario when you want to analyze your Daily Active User (DAU) to find a trend and patterns to further develop / market your game. You can find the DAU raw data easily from platform you use, for example Google Play Console if you create Android mobile game. From this raw data, you can then create a charts and graphs to analyze your DAU. Based on your analysis, you can plan actions to improve player engagement. For example, if you notice a drop in DAU after a particular update, you can investigate the changes made and consider adjustments. Conversely, if you see spikes in DAU during certain events, you can plan more of these events to boost engagement.

Once the data is organized in a tabular format, the manipulation of the data begins. You can select important data to create a "story", which is essentially the best way to explain an idea and get everyone on board.

If the game analytics have been properly designed and implemented, you can compare the data they return against your User Journey. What pain point caused them to leave the game? What persuaded them to make their first purchase? The graphs will tell you the whole story. The challenge is to learn how to convert all your variables into quantitative data —for example, how do you measure the difficulty of a certain level. Once you have the numbers, the graphs and charts will show you the way.

As mentioned before, once all the information is arranged in a tabular format, you can pivot and summarize/aggregate the data into a concise and simplistic table that is easily "digestible" in for the end user.

Pivot tables offer an effective means to present data to stakeholders, tailored to their specific preferences. The marketing team's perception of player data and focus may significantly differ from that of the developers.

If you're using Google, you can use the Script Editor and Javascript to do all sorts of useful things with your spreadsheet, for example converting them into JSON files that can be used inside the game engine. You could also use Azure Devops pipelines to integrate new configuration changes directly into your game repo every time a change is made to the spreadsheet.

Having real-time data in our Unity3d project proved invaluable for updating offers and special sales in the in-game store, all without needing to submit a new build to the app store. The marketing team could simply update our Google Sheets file, without causing any disruption to our developers, who were very appreciative. This approach holds immense potential for online games, particularly for small studios.

We developed a tool to convert sheet to Unity Scriptale Object. Designer can import all the data from spreadsheets, then classes, types, enums are automatically generated so programmers can then use them in code.

Spreadsheets are great but cloud-based spreadsheets are even better! While maintaining its low barrier to entry, cloud-based spreadsheets provides much more further advantages. I am talking about tools like Google Spreadsheets, by working with it we can have feature like: a. Real-Time Collaboration (multiple people can working at the same time and minimize the conflict because the changes happened in real time) b. Cross-Platform Compatibility, you have a team member that Linux fan? Mac fan? it doesn't matter, we can worked by connected to the internet, simple. c. Automatic Backup and Version Control, they automatically back up your data, reducing the risk of data loss due to technical issues or accidental deletions.

Spreadsheets are also a versatile tool to integrate AI easily. For example localization and calibrations, and content generation are possible with AI integrated into sheets.