Each fortnight this year, I’ve been writing a game design column at Rock Paper Shotgun called The Mechanic. It’s all about putting games up on blocks, and taking a wrench to hack out their best features to see how they work.

I’ve covered Doom and Brutal Doom, Duskers and Spelunky, Alien Isolation and Invisible Inc, Kentucky Route Zero and Super Time Force. And lots more besides.

They’re all based on interviews with their designers; what I really like to try to do is to find a feature of a game that players might not be aware of and yet is central to why it’s good. What I love is to be able to explain how much thought and creativity went into something players may never have considered.

I like to cover indie games and big AAA games - if it’s a great game that has a really interesting thing about it which its makers would love to talk about with me, I’m all over it. Maybe you have suggestions, or maybe you’ve made a game that I could cover? Let me know!

In short, I love writing The Mechanic (thanks for taking it on, Graham). Look out for it every other Friday at 9pm, UK time. Next one is July 29.