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Nandrew
09-08-2009, 11:40 PM
This is a thread of sobriety and introspection. If you could isolate the single greatest factor that hampers your game design, what would it be?

I think it's a useful and potentially constructive discussion to have. If we all just take a moment to sit down and think about our greatest weaknesses, it may provide an opportunity to improve ourselves for future projects. Document your weakness, and document how you resolve to remedy it -- or better yet, turn it into a strength.

Isolate your weak point and put it into writing, then you can more easily focus on cutting it out of your game development efforts. A noble pursuit, yeah? ;)

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Personally, I have a few things that I'd like to work on, but my number one hampering factor must be my inability to push my work to people. I usually focus on creating small games with complete systems, and do in fact have a few that could probably be advertised with a little more polish. But I kinda just leave them and go on to the next project.

I think the best way to approach this problem is to decide from the outset whether a game is a "proto" or a "final". A proto I can spend a few days on and abandon at will without any guilt: a final will be something that I resolve to complete and promote (usually a sophistication/elaboration of a previous proto). In instances like this, I'll grit my teeth and try to market it, ignoring the insecurities that I invariably have.

What's your game design comment?

dislekcia
10-08-2009, 02:32 AM
I like this thread, should provide a lot of learning ground for everyone :)

My biggest weakness is asking for money. I don't do it. I don't like it... I have no idea why, I think it's got to be some sort of odd independence thing, but I really feel bad asking for money.

This translates into people seeing my work as inferior or that I don't have a lot of confidence in what I do (which is something that I feel I should exude a little more as well, but that's another post entirely). This causes problems, especially when the only person determining how much I get paid is me. It always feels like when I do ask for money I end up asking too little, no matter what I try ;)

In some cases, this ends up with me basically "giving away" my skills for free. Aeq's input and strategy in meetings with clients has helped a lot in this regard - he's really good at saying "Ok, you've got our initial concepts and ideas on this, if you want to go further, this is our hourly rate." And at other times I simply see a game I want to help out on in some small way and an idea or something I've spotted can solve a problem for others. That second part seems to be a manifestation of me enjoying seeing things get better - I really don't care if I'm credited when a forum game uses an idea I came up with or if the guys at Luma integrate the racing camera tweaks or control scheme changes I'm ranting on about. What matters is the resulting game emerging as a better experience.

Obviously this is part of the "two hats" problem that Evil_Toaster and others raised recently: I do this for a living, but I don't do it because it pays the bills. That means that valuing what I do is really hard for me, because you might as well try to put a value on every second thought I have during a normal day. To get over it, I'm paying a lot of attention to QCF's business plan and what we as a company need. I'm also very concrete about when a project is for a client and when it's something I'm involved in on a personal level... That's sometimes a difficult distinction to make when working on something like SpaceHack - the game is MINE in a way few others are, but it's also for the company because we expect revenue.

I guess I'm still wrestling with this particular issue ;)

Fengol
10-08-2009, 11:14 AM
While I'm too embarrassed to talk about my weakness, have you thought about getting yourself a book or two on entrepreneurship? Your problem is not uncommon (I've been lucky to go to a few seminars on sole proprietorship) so maybe some reference material could be useful?

Gazza_N
10-08-2009, 11:21 AM
My biggest flaw? I'm overly critical of my games. I tend to focus on what DIDN'T work more than I focus on what DID, and this tends to make me give up on them. Not that I ignore mechanics that DO work, but I prefer to build a new game from scratch and try to "do it properly this time" than go back to an old, flawed game. This is evident when you look at my portfolio - rather than polishing up the old Overseer Assault, I tried to make a sequel. It didn't work either. If I'd've had my way, I would never have submitted anything to any comp I've entered. :P

I need to stop looking at my old, flawed games as an embarrassment and polish them the hell up. That's why I'm punting so hard for community input on GoWRPG - I know I can't trust my own biased judgement, so it's wiser to consult the players.

DukeOFprunes
10-08-2009, 11:27 AM
My weakness is a pair of very common ones: not finishing what I started and starting too many new projects.
I wouldn't fuss about these too much since my personal interest in making games is purely hobbyist and I have zero interest in selling anything.

DukeOFprunes
10-08-2009, 11:30 AM
My biggest weakness is asking for money.

Just remember what The Joker's daddy taught him:
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3188/2694728790_212ee17772.jpg
"If you're good at something, never do it for free."

Fruzz
10-08-2009, 12:27 PM
Heheh nice one Duke :)

I think my biggest weakness is being too precious with my ideas. Instead of knocking up something simple, getting some feedback and iterating on that I try to make something amazing from scratch. This obviously doesn't work and leads me to burn out on an idea before I get something fun up and running. Its something that I'm working on now though.

Tr00jg
11-08-2009, 08:19 PM
Adding content.

I like designing and creating the initial setup of the game, but I hate it when all I have to do is add levels. As was the case with Roach Toaster 2. I got so fed up when all that I had to do was add more and more levels (which is why it still isnt' done and been in hiatus for 2 years). Give me a story to flesh out or something. Don't get me wrong, I would love to design levels, but geez, its a bore when it doesn't really go anywhere. Give me the option to design something like Knytt's levels and I'm on it. :P

Nandrew
11-08-2009, 08:41 PM
Adding content.

I like designing and creating the initial setup of the game, but I hate it when all I have to do is add levels. As was the case with Roach Toaster 2. I got so fed up when all that I had to do was add more and more levels (which is why it still isnt' done and been in hiatus for 2 years). Give me a story to flesh out or something. Don't get me wrong, I would love to design levels, but geez, its a bore when it doesn't really go anywhere. Give me the option to design something like Knytt's levels and I'm on it. :P

Holy crap, too true. Content generation is a killer.

Nowadays, I try to motivate myself by genuinely putting thought into how I'd make each level or new facet stand out against the others. If I'm bored designing it, chances are my players will be bored playing it.

Still remains difficult, though.

cairnswm
11-08-2009, 09:22 PM
Finding time.

Own company, Full Time Contracting, Family, Adventure Racing.....

No time available. :(

dislekcia
12-08-2009, 05:10 AM
Adding content.

I like designing and creating the initial setup of the game, but I hate it when all I have to do is add levels. As was the case with Roach Toaster 2. I got so fed up when all that I had to do was add more and more levels (which is why it still isnt' done and been in hiatus for 2 years). Give me a story to flesh out or something. Don't get me wrong, I would love to design levels, but geez, its a bore when it doesn't really go anywhere. Give me the option to design something like Knytt's levels and I'm on it. :P


Holy crap, too true. Content generation is a killer.

Nowadays, I try to motivate myself by genuinely putting thought into how I'd make each level or new facet stand out against the others. If I'm bored designing it, chances are my players will be bored playing it.

Still remains difficult, though.

I find it really helps to have a set of concrete goals when doing something that could feel repetitive like designing levels. When I was working with Nandrew on some of the levels currently in Variance, I realised it was a lot easier to design puzzles or come up with a central event/player action to design around when I knew that we had particular elements we wanted to "teach" the player. I'm really proud of some of those tutorial style levels - and Nandrew and I literally made those happen during a random 4am wave of inspiration.

Once you've got a progression in mind and a set of goals for your design skills to flesh out, it becomes almost like putting detail in a story instead of an uphill battle to generate content.

And if that approach doesn't help, I seem to remember doing a big post a while back about procedurally generating ideas by simply mass-farming a poor generator and picking concepts that worked well. Of course, in SpaceHack's systems I totally cheat and don't have to make a lot of content, but I do have to know what I want to achieve with said content, otherwise the generators would throw out a lot of random useless crap.

Nandrew
12-08-2009, 12:41 PM
I find it really helps to have a set of concrete goals when doing something that could feel repetitive like designing levels. When I was working with Nandrew on some of the levels currently in Variance, I realised it was a lot easier to design puzzles or come up with a central event/player action to design around when I knew that we had particular elements we wanted to "teach" the player. I'm really proud of some of those tutorial style levels - and Nandrew and I literally made those happen during a random 4am wave of inspiration.

That was awesome, but I'm totally leaving the caffeine alone the next time I have to work with people. It made me cranky and concentration difficult. :<

Fengol
13-08-2009, 12:36 PM
Discipline to finish.

Once I've had an idea and prototyped the main interaction the game dies a pre-natal death cause I bored in programming "the basics" so I don't even complete level 1. This leaves me without a game to my name come competition close and therefore, no entry.

I need to create a list of completion tasks and set aside time each day or week and just sit and write this "boring" code.

dislekcia
13-08-2009, 01:43 PM
Discipline to finish.

Once I've had an idea and prototyped the main interaction the game dies a pre-natal death cause I bored in programming "the basics" so I don't even complete level 1. This leaves me without a game to my name come competition close and therefore, no entry.

I need to create a list of completion tasks and set aside time each day or week and just sit and write this "boring" code.

Design docs decompose wonderfully into to-do lists :)

BlackHawk
15-08-2009, 11:13 PM
Mine would be the same as cairnswm: Time. Every time I start on a project, it goes well for two weeks and then life interrupts (1 year and counting).
Another big problem is actual games: new and old. A new game comes out or I find an old game in a bargain bin somewhere and I just have to play it. So my projects rarely get a continuous stream of attention.

A habit I have to get into is writing design docs and creating to-do lists from them. Also the discipline to continuously chip away at something. But the biggest objective is still the one all good game developers preach: starting small. *sigh*