Top all-time · #753
David Sirlin
Personal blog · sirlin.netgamesdesign
David Sirlin writes Sirlin.Net — Game Design, a personal blog at sirlin.net about games and design. Since 2007, 87 different Hacker News readers have linked it 124 times, most often “Playing To Win”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2025-01-14, and you can follow it by feed.
Sometimes recommended · 13 of 40 sampled comments recommend it?
Why HN links it
HN readers link David Sirlin's Playing to Win and his articles on competitive game design and balance, often to apply its 'scrub' ideas to life and business.
- Recommended for · 13 comments
- Calls Playing to Win a 'masterpiece', 'intelligently written and insightful'; his articles and podcast 'great'.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 40 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Game design for tabletop and video games from the designer of Yomi and Street Fighter HD Remix
Most-linked posts?
- Playing To Win10 people · 15 mentions · first linked 2008-12-11
- Playing to Win9 people · 9 mentions · first linked 2018-10-13
- Playing to Win (2000)8 people · 11 mentions · first linked 2022-01-13
- /ptw-book/introducingthe-scrub7 people · 7 mentions · first linked 2016-10-20
- /ptw/5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2009-04-02
- Introducing... The Scrub3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2022-11-17
- Making Games Faster3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2009-11-07
- External Rewards and Jesse Schell's Amazing Lecture3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2010-02-24
- Playing To Win3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2009-06-14
- /ptw-book/what-should-be-banned.html2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2011-02-16
What Hacker News says?
https://www.sirlin.net/ptw-book/introducingthe-scrub
Comment linking /ptw-book/introducingthe-scrub
on “Panic at the Job Market”Submitted Announcing Chess 2 as a story · 46 points
HN discussionIf you've never read it before, I highly recommend reading David Sirlin's Playing to Win. http://www.sirlin.net/ptw/ Specifically the chapter "Introducing... the Scrub" discusses exactly this sentiment. http://www.sirlin.net/ptw-book/introducingthe-scrub > In Street Fighter, the scrub labels a wide variety of tactics and situations “cheap.” This “cheapness” is truly the mantra of the scrub. Performing a throw on som…
Comment linking /ptw-book/introducingthe-scrub
on “Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews”Submitted Subtractive Design as a story · 18 points
HN discussionThis essay reminds me very much of the "Playing to Win" series by David Sirlin: http://www.sirlin.net/ptw/ It's also worth noting that AlphaGo optimizes its perceived chance of winning the game, rather than its score. It "gets complacent" and mostly plays very conservatively the moment it's ahead on points, because it doesn't care about margins, only about win/loss.
Comment linking /ptw/
on “DeepMind and Blizzard to release StarCraft II as an AI research environment”Submitted Games don't (all) have to be fun as a story · 6 points
HN discussion>With such a cheat, roaches punch way above their weight, completely breaking the rock-paper-scissors balance of the game. Against marines, sure. But against siege tanks/disruptors? Sirlin's spiel about there being more counters than people think ( http://www.sirlin.net/ptw-book/introducingthe-scrub ) seems applicable here.
Comment linking /ptw-book/introducingthe-scrub
on “Riot Games Approach to Anti-Cheat”Submitted The theory and practice of happiness as a story · 4 points
HN discussionYou have hit on a way of thinking that, for me, was inspired by reading David Sirlin's masterpiece 'Playing to Win'. The book is available on amazon or for free on his website http://www.sirlin.net/ptw Although the book focuses on competitive video games it quickly establishes an important point that can be applied to nearly every situation in life: There are two types of people in a situation, "scrubs" who make up…
Comment linking /ptw
on “Bribing maitre d' to skip the line”Submitted Playing to Win (2000) as a story · 3 points
HN discussionNot sure if it's been linked in this thread yet (although I did see it on another post yesterday) but iirc this is one of the core messages of Playing To Win by David Sirlin ( https://www.sirlin.net/ptw ). To win, all you have to do is not lose.
Comment linking /ptw
on “Avoid blundering: 80% of a winning strategy”Submitted External Rewards and Jesse Schell's Amazing Lecture as a story · 3 points
HN discussionThanks for the link. Although there were some points in the article where i was not sure he was being serious or sarcastic. Just began reading the actual book Playing to Win (Its available free for online reading: http://www.sirlin.net/ptw ). It has already struck me as very intelligently written and insightful when you view its lessons as applying to life (at least the competitive aspects of it) rather some video g…
Comment linking /ptw
on “Fun with your friend's Facebook and Tinder sessions”Submitted Playing to Win as a story · 2 points
HN discussionThe Overwatch example reminds me of Playing to Win ( http://www.sirlin.net/ptw ), and in particular, "the scrub" section ( http://www.sirlin.net/ptw-book/introducingthe-scrub ). "A scrub is a player who is handicapped by self-imposed rules that the game knows nothing about. A scrub does not play to win."
Comment linking /ptw-book/introducingthe-scrub
on “95th percentile isn't that hard to reach”Submitted Introducing... The Scrub as a story · 2 points
HN discussionYeah, Sirlin covers that really well in his Layers of Yomi on Playing to Win: http://www.sirlin.net/ptw-book/7-spies-of-the-mind
Comment linking /ptw-book/7-spies-of-the-mind
on “Street Fighter II's AI Engine”Submitted Playing to Win as a story · 2 points
HN discussion>Chess is as balanced as it gets. It's "balanced" in some respects but both sides use the same features and most games end in a draw, and high level play is less and less interesting. And for that matter it's not even balanced really -- tournaments have players play both white and black because they are so inequal. This is like balancing starcraft by having everyone play mirror matchups or swap races. >So Anand enco…
Comment linking /blog/2013/5/30/announcing-chess-2.html
on “Magnus Carlsen is World Chess Champion”Submitted Playing to Win as a story · 2 points
HN discussion>Chess 2 ( http://ludemegames.com/chess2/ ). I'm not joking. USGamer has a good write-up on it: http://www.usgamer.net/articles/chess-2-the-sequel >I agree there's a certain amount of hubris behind the endeavor. But I'm interested in the design of balanced games, and the ways in which some old games are not balanced or rigid. The creator's blog post is quite entertaining, thought it was a joke but the game is quite…
Comment linking /blog/2013/11/11/high-level-chess.html
on “Magnus Carlsen is World Chess Champion”Submitted What Makes the Best Player? as a story · 2 points
HN discussion> Digital game design lends itself to working "UI down" instead of "data model up" because most of the feel of the game derives from the interface. You're talking about a later stage of the ideation process than I am, I think. You seem to be talking about building a game in an established genre, where you know what kind of medium you'll use, and even what game engine you probably need, and so you can sit down and st…
Comment linking /articles/designing-puzzle-strike
on “Making small games, which is fun in itself”Submitted Playing to Win – David Sirlin as a story · 2 points
HN discussionAlso related: Sirlin's article on Donkey Kong Country 2's level design. http://www.sirlin.net/articles/the-secrets-of-donkey-kong-co...
Comment linking /articles/the-secrets-of-donkey-kong-country-2
on “Level Design Patterns in 2D Games”Submitted GDC 2012, Day 2 as a story · 2 points
HN discussion> "good to avoid people that have a tendency to game things" Sorry, but most employers essentially "game things": they extract as much value as they can out of you in return for the smallest amount of compensation they can get away with giving you. Yet I don't see you being critical of managers and CEOs, just other engineers. Managers love it when engineers getting into pissing matches about "passion", hackathons, w…
Comment linking /articles/playing-to-win
on “Ask HN: 40+ Career Advice?”Submitted The Anti-Zynga as a story · 2 points
HN discussionI think it's worth adding: Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix is a rebalancing of Super Turbo done by David Sirlin and officially supported by Capcom. David's design notes and commentary are really interesting. https://www.sirlin.net/sf-hdr/street-fighter-hd-remix-design... I'd love to see someone do the same for Capcom vs SNK 2, but a guy can dream, right? :)
Comment linking /sf-hdr/street-fighter-hd-remix-design-overview
on “Mortal Kombat+”Submitted Two Amazing Hours (Increasing Efficiency) as a story · 2 points
HN discussion
