Over at PopCultureShock, there's an excellent new column on the realities of game development, part of a continuing series by High Voltage Software lead designer David A. Rodriguez.

Rodriguez discusses how he talks about his 'dream' game designer job with friends, noting: "The problem is that they eventually make their way to telling me all about the awesome game they would make if “they” were the ones making the games. This is usually how it goes for most of my conversations with game fans and even interviews with new designers."

He explains, cannily: "I’m not an artist... Someone comes to my company with a contract. They give us money to make something. I make it. They take it and sell it. I don’t work in art. I work…in customer service. And fortunately or unfortunately, the customer is always right. That means that no matter how bad I think an idea is. That means no matter how unreasonable the request or how STUPID the last thing they said was, in the end they write the check, so they get to decide. I can voice my opinion. I can tell them what I think because that’s what they are paying me for, but ultimately, if they decide that something must be in the game…then you can bet your sweet ass it’s gonna be in the game."

Interestingly enough, Rodriguez is currently working on 50 Cent: Bulletproof - G-Unit Edition, a PSP game which is different to the underwhelming PS2/Xbox title released last year, and one can only imagine how whimsical shot-up rappers can be about gameplay - not that he's referring to that particular title in this case. But yep, it's all about customers, and it's a very fair point to make. [Via DubiousQuality.]