David Sirlin is an American
game designer and
fighting game player.
He featured in and narrated much of ''Bang the Machine'', a 2002 documentary by Tamara Katepoo about a
Street Fighter
, commonly abbreviated as ''SF'' or スト (''Suto''), is a Japanese media franchise centered on a series of fighting
Combat ( French for ''fight'') is a purposeful violent conflict meant to physically harm or kill the opposition. Combat may ...
"exhibition tournament in Japan showing the difference between American and Japanese gaming cultures" that starred other notable competitive fighting game players who were part of "Team USA."
He balanced the
video games ''
Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix'' and ''
Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix
''Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix'' is a two dimensional fighting game released using the PlayStation Store and Xbox Live Arcade download services. A physical copy of the game was later released as part of '' Capcom Digital Collection''. It ...
''. He designed the physical and online card games ''
Yomi
is the Japanese word for the land of the dead (World of Darkness). According to Shinto mythology as related in '' Kojiki'', this is where the dead go in the afterlife. Once one has eaten at the hearth of Yomi it is (mostly) impossible to retur ...
'', ''
Flash Duel'', ''
Codex
The codex (plural codices ) was the historical ancestor of the modern book. Instead of being composed of sheets of paper, it used sheets of vellum, papyrus, or other materials. The term ''codex'' is often used for ancient manuscript books, with ...
'' and ''
Puzzle Strike''.
Early in his career, Sirlin was an assistant game designer at 3DO, but now works primarily for his own company, Sirlin Games. Sirlin has been described as a "renowned game theory author" by ''
Forbes'' magazine, and as an "arcade guru" and "internet-renowned ''Street Fighter'' tournament player" by ''
Ars Technica''.
Writing
Sirlin maintains a
blog where he writes primarily on the subject of game design. A frequent contributor to
Gamasutra, he is relatively infamous for his sometimes unpopular opinions towards the way companies choose to enforce rules in their games, as well as for his articles on Playing to Win. Sirlin's website, Sirlin.net, was profiled in
Katie Salen
Katie Salen Tekinbas is an American game designer, animator, and educator. She is a professor at the University of California, Irvine. Previously, she taught at DePaul University College of Computing and Digital Media, Parsons The New School for ...
's ''
Rules of Play'' (2004), which commended the site for its "surprising amount of thoughtful commentary and analysis".
In addition to this, he has published a book called ''Playing to Win: Becoming The Champion'', a book that explores the concept of
competitive gaming
Esports, short for electronic sports, is a form of competition using video games. Esports often takes the form of organized, multiplayer video game competitions, particularly between professional players, individually or as teams. Although orga ...
and the mindset of actively playing to win, also drawing examples of the different kinds of gamers that exist by selectively choosing and analyzing both
chess and ''
Street Fighter
, commonly abbreviated as ''SF'' or スト (''Suto''), is a Japanese media franchise centered on a series of fighting
Combat ( French for ''fight'') is a purposeful violent conflict meant to physically harm or kill the opposition. Combat may ...
'' players.
[ Physical copies of this book were initially available from ]Lulu.com
Lulu Press, Inc., doing business under trade name Lulu, is an online print-on-demand, self-publishing, and distribution platform. By 2014, it had issued approximately two million titles.
The company's founder is Red Hat co-founder Bob Young. Lu ...
before the book was released for free to the general public on his website. The book was cited by scholar David Myers in his paper "Self and selfishness in online social play".
Sirlin has become critical of many mainstream competitive games for what he perceives to be manipulative business practices and other 'anti-competitive' elements. He has particularly condemned collectible card games
A collectible card game (CCG), also called a trading card game (TCG) among other names, is a type of card game that mixes strategic deck building elements with features of trading cards, introduced with '' Magic: The Gathering'' in 1993.
Genera ...
such as '' Magic: The Gathering'' for hiding strategically critical components behind the random distribution
In probability theory and statistics, a probability distribution is the mathematical function that gives the probabilities of occurrence of different possible outcomes for an experiment. It is a mathematical description of a random phenomenon ...
of booster packs
In collectible card games, digital collectible card games and collectible miniature wargames, a booster pack is a sealed package of cards or figurines, designed to add to a player's collection. A box of multiple booster packs is referred to as a b ...
and popular multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game League of Legends for its "forced grinding," calling it "fraudulent" and disrespectful to players.
Career
Backbone
While employed at Backbone Entertainment
Backbone Entertainment was an American video game developer based in Emeryville, California. The company was formed in 2003 as the result of a merger between developers Digital Eclipse and ImaginEngine. In 2005, Backbone merged with The Collec ...
, Sirlin was lead designer behind ''Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix
''Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix'' is a two dimensional fighting game released using the PlayStation Store and Xbox Live Arcade download services. A physical copy of the game was later released as part of '' Capcom Digital Collection''. It ...
'', a remake of ''Super Street Fighter II Turbo
''Super Street Fighter II Turbo'' is a fighting game released for the arcades by Capcom in Japan on February 23, 1994, in North America on February 23 and March 26, 1994 (beta) and in Europe in March 1994 (beta). It is the fifth installment in ...
''. He was also in deliberation with Capcom
is a Japanese video game developer and publisher. It has created a number of multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil'', ''Monster Hunter'', ''Street Fighter'', ''Mega Man'', ''Devil ...
in an attempt to acquire permission to use the ''Street Fighter
, commonly abbreviated as ''SF'' or スト (''Suto''), is a Japanese media franchise centered on a series of fighting
Combat ( French for ''fight'') is a purposeful violent conflict meant to physically harm or kill the opposition. Combat may ...
'' characters in addition to original characters from his Fantasy Strike universe for his current project, ''Yomi'', but was not granted it.
During development of ''Super Street Fighter II HD Remix'', many interviews as well as a number of blog posts on Capcom Unity chronicle Sirlin's involvement in both the game's development as well the major design choices and changes made to the game itself.
Kongregate
Sirlin designed the online card game '' Kongai'' for the gaming website, Kongregate.
Sirlin Games
More recently Sirlin has been involved in the design and production of his own games—particularly, a range of tabletop games, most taking place in and featuring characters from the ''Fantasy Strike'' fictional universe he created. Two of these games (Yomi
is the Japanese word for the land of the dead (World of Darkness). According to Shinto mythology as related in '' Kojiki'', this is where the dead go in the afterlife. Once one has eaten at the hearth of Yomi it is (mostly) impossible to retur ...
and Flash Duel) attempt to recreate some of the game concepts found in the fighting games he is familiar with. The third game, Puzzle Strike, attempts to recreate the Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo
''Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo'', released in Japan as , is a tile-matching puzzle video game released in 1996 for the CP System II (CPS2) arcade board, by Capcom and its Capcom Coin-Op division. The game's title is a play on '' Super Street F ...
experience. Another game, Pandante, is similar to Texas holdem poker, and Chess 2 is a redesigned, asymmetric version of Chess.
His most recently published game is Codex, a turn based game with elements from Magic: The Gathering and themes from RTS (real time strategy) games such as '' StarCraft''.
The ''Magic: The Gathering'' card "Master of Predicaments" contains the flavor text "''Designed by David Sirlin''".
In January 2015 Sirlin created a podcast on his Patreon page discussing the possibility of creating a simple, accessible fighting game, and in June 2015, Sirlin announced that he would begin creating a fighting game set in and featuring characters from his ''Fantasy Strike'' universe. The resulting Fantasy Strike was released in Early Access
Early access, also known as alpha access, alpha founding, paid alpha, or game preview, is a funding model in the video game industry by which consumers can purchase and play a game in the various pre-release development cycles, such as pre-alph ...
on Steam in September 2017.
In December 2022, Sirlin Games LLC issued a DMCA take-down to two games, Yomi Hustle and Yomi Domini into changing their names, enforcing his trademark of the Japanese word "Yomi". While Yomi Hustle would comply and reach an agreement due to the similarities between the two games, no reason has been given for Yomi Domini's removal.
Speaking engagements
Game Developers Conference (2009,2017)
In 2009, Sirlin was one of the speakers at the Game Developers Conference
The Game Developers Conference (GDC) is an annual conference for video game developers. The event includes an expo, networking events, and awards shows like the Game Developers Choice Awards and Independent Games Festival, and a variety of tutori ...
, the largest annual gathering of professional video game developers. His one-hour lecture was about balancing multiplayer competitive games. In 2017, Sirlin gave a design talk discussing Puzzle Strike specifically.
Montreal International Game Summit
In 2009, Sirlin spoke at the Montreal International Game Summit about the subject of omitting unnecessary clicks from games. The talk was entitled ''Every Click Counts''.
Personal life
Sirlin grew up in Sacramento
)
, image_map = Sacramento County California Incorporated and Unincorporated areas Sacramento Highlighted.svg
, mapsize = 250x200px
, map_caption = Location within Sacramento ...
, California and graduated from Rio Americano High School
Rio Americano High School, colloquially known as Rio, is a public high school in Arden-Arcade, California, just outside Sacramento, serving students in grades 9 through 12 as part of the San Juan Unified School District. Rio Americano students co ...
. He is the son of Ted (1923-2009) and Thela Sirlin. His father was a photographer and owner of Sirlin Photography Studios for over 40 years. David Sirlin currently lives in Emeryville, California. He has obtained degrees in mathematics and business
Business is the practice of making one's living or making money by producing or buying and selling products (such as goods and services). It is also "any activity or enterprise entered into for profit."
Having a business name does not separa ...
from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and MIT Sloan School of Management.
David Sirlin is in a relationship with his long-time girlfriend Lina Jemili.
See also
*''Capcom Classics Collection
is a compilation of arcade games released by Capcom for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox on September 27, 2005 in North America and in 2006 in Japan. It was developed by Digital Eclipse Software (then Backbone Entertainment), Sensory Sweep, and its ...
''
*'' Kongai''
*'' Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix''
*''Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix
''Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix'' is a two dimensional fighting game released using the PlayStation Store and Xbox Live Arcade download services. A physical copy of the game was later released as part of '' Capcom Digital Collection''. It ...
''
*'' Yomi (card game)''
*'' Fantasy Strike''
References
External links
Sirlin.net
SirlinGames.com
Fantasy Strike.com
David Sirlin's Patreon: Thinky Games and Podcasts
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sirlin, David
Year of birth missing (living people)
Living people
American esports players
Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni
MIT Sloan School of Management alumni
Writers from Sacramento, California
People from Emeryville, California
Artists from Sacramento, California
American game designers
Board game designers
Video game designers
Fighting game players