I don't know of a single game that isn't a conglomerate of the entire teams vision. Yes someone has to make sure it all matches but everyone contributes to the vision.

A bit confused by the purpose or goal of the thread...

Of all the designers I've worked with, or have talked about with others who have worked directly with them, I can't think of ANY who didn't generally get a group discussion going to look at things from different angles and get a back and forth. Designs are hard, and feedback helps refine ideas or inspire new ones.

I can't even think of a Solo developer who really does everything totally on their own for a proper released game. Friends or family or even community typically gets involved in the discussion and refinement process. 

2 hours ago, Kavik Kang said:

Doom was pretty much Romero as far as I know

Nope. Romero was a level designer.. the game designer was Tom Hall, and the game would be nothing without John Carmack's engine, Kevin Clouds art style and Robert Prince's music (even if he did "borrow heavily" from metal bands of the day).

2 hours ago, Kavik Kang said:

walking around hallways and shooting at things is a pretty straight forward thing to begin with

Jesus, you call yourself a game designer? You clearly haven't a clue what you're talking about. 

Doom is not just "walking around hallways and shooting at things".

2 hours ago, Kavik Kang said:

The first FPS computer game was actually Magic Maze

I think you mean Maze War, but so what?

No-one cares about Maze War, because it just wasn't that good. A game can still be a classic even if it's not a new genre. Should we have just stopped at Maze War?

A game (especially a video) isn't just a set of rules and mechanics. Those things are important, but they're not the only aspect.

Take Dark Souls. Miyazaki is rightly credited with driving the direction of that game, but it's not just because of the game mechanics. If you want to be reductive (and clearly you do) Dark Souls is just another hack'n'slash adventure. But the reason it's a classic is because of the amazing level design, the fantastic boss fights and how the mechanics integrate with the idea of the game. 

"Game design is a benevolent dictatorship ruled by an iron fist."  This is a mantra of the military/hobbyist game industry.  I was a member of the SFB Staff, we invented the process by which you make games today.  We are your founding fathers.  Nobody would be entrusting a million dollar effort too me alone.  They would be making the entirely sensible decision of choosing someone who has forgotten more about simulation design than anyone in your industry is ever going to live long enough to know.  Assuming it is one of the types of games that I specialize in (strategy war games, space ships, or team sports) that would be like hunting rabbits with a 120mm cannon.  There is no competition out there, we are in a different league.  We are decades ahead of you in the core functionality of what we do.  It is insane to be entrusting those millions of dollars to people with almost no knowledge or experience, not the other way around.  The whole "entrust you with millions of dollars" line that is so often repeated makes no sense at all.  Nobody is going to entrust me with that, but they have no problem entrusting someone with less than half of my knowledge and experience with it?  That makes no sense at all.

Rube is literally three full generations ahead of what you do.  Only half of my games use Rube, the others are only two generations ahead of you.  You began reinventing the wheel just 35 years ago, we are centuries ahead of you with this stuff.  Your arrogance prevents you from learning anything beyond "family game" level game design.  Games that fundamentally function like Candyland or Risk.  Our "treadmill of time" is quite a bit more sophisticated than that, and Rube is the next step beyond that.

No, I didn't mean Maze War, I meant Magic Maze.  You've probably never heard of it.  It was never published as a commercial game, it was only played at board game conventions.

So where is a shipped title that is 'centuries' ahead of anything we are apparently doing that I can check out? I deal with QA and UX, and am always happy to check out new content doing things I may not have seen before.

I for one am amused that "We" are the arrogant ones, and yet you somehow have not only learned centuries worth of knowledge, but have even managed to learn and then forget more beyond that, and there is no way any of us could possibly catch up? - Would YOU want to hire someone acting as arrogant as that to work with?

Also do you have any more information on Magic Maze? 

Advanced Squad Leader and Star Fleet Battles are the ultimate evolution of military war game simulation games.  These are the current end of the line of evolution of the military simulations played by real world militatry men for centuries.  SFB is the more advanced "ultimate evolution" between the two.  If you study SFB intently, and play it every weekend, in 3 or 4 years you may begin to understand it well enough to begin seeing certain things within it.  Rube is the next generation beyond SFB, but no Rube games exist yet for you to look at.  

Magic Maze was an FPS game setup LAN at board game conventions in the mid-late 1980's before online games were a thing.  It was immensely popular because it had never been experienced before.  You had to wait in line for an hour or so just to get 15 minutes playing it.  The players were "Have a nice day" smiley faces that shot spit balls at each other.  There were some options that could be set like the hated "bouncing bullets" that took all the skill out of it because you would just bounce the shots down hallways and around corners.

And, arrogance is not the centuries old game industry telling the new guys that we know more than them.  Arrogance is the new guys absolutely insisting that an 20-something graduate of the Devry School of Game design is a qualified professional and we are not.

1 hour ago, Kavik Kang said:

The whole "entrust you with millions of dollars" line that is so often repeated makes no sense at all.  Nobody is going to entrust me with that, but they have no problem entrusting someone with less than half of my knowledge and experience with it?  That makes no sense at all.

You don't get it, do you? Experience is meaningless without results.

In fact, the more "knowledge and experience" you have, without something to show for it, the more likely your knowledge and experience is of no economic value.

4 hours ago, Kavik Kang said:

The first FPS computer game was actually Magic Maze.

1 hour ago, Kavik Kang said:

Magic Maze was an FPS game setup LAN at board game conventions in the mid-late 1980's before online games were a thing.

Then it wasn't the first FPS, because Maze War was released in the 70s . 

It's incredibly hard to take you seriously when you constantly make claims that are objectively and (trivially) verifiably wrong.

1 hour ago, Kavik Kang said:

There is no competition out there, we are in a different league.  We are decades ahead of you in the core functionality of what we do. 

And yet you're still here whinging on these forums instead of actually producing anything.