Both of our games 'Rhythm Doctor' and 'A Dance of Fire and Ice' are single-button rhythm games, and one of them is also playable without sight. Many reviews of our games mention the games as 'surprising' because they never expected such constraints can lead to exciting games. Rhythm Doctor is the current highest rated rhythm game on Steam, and in the Top 40 games overall on Steam by user rating.

In this session I will talk about how deciding to stick to certain constraints was able to help us find unexplored territories in game design that would surprise people. I'll speak about specific examples of our mechanics, and also talk about the parts of pop music and music theory that I used to figure out the base mechanics of the game.

A general audience is assumed with no prerequisites. If you are familiar with music theory, you might find some parts more interesting. I hope to share the design process of our games in detail, and teach some different ways we can get inspiration for our game designs.