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Grytorm
2014-05-19, 10:28 PM
Don't you just hate that itch to make a new game. A masterpiece to show them all how it should have been done the first time. It comes and goes, some of the ideas are halfway good. But you know the system is probably to really finish by yourself. The project a major undertaking that is unlikely to ever really take off and become a star in the gaming world.

What have you thought of for a fantasy heartbreaker? Did you ever do it? Did you ever finish it? Do you still play it? I'm curious. What has been pondered.

My latest idea would be D20 based generic fantasy. Aiming for very D&D esque setting trappings. But the main ideas I had was that the system would have 15 classes, one for each combination of two attributes. Each class would have the core features but Archetypes would expand this greatly. Not just a short replacemen of class features but a 2 page spread replacing and changing a class deeply. Also feats and skills would be worth more. Skills probably advance special abilities as you level. You would only ge 5 feats in a career but each would be big and character defining. Scaling with levels, reaching new heights.
(Truthfully, I only really wanted to post the description. But the information would be nice.)

SixWingedAsura
2014-05-19, 10:50 PM
Two words: Joker Core.

Explanation: Do you dislike systems that rely on pure luck to do even the simplest of tasks? Tired of trying to perform a memorable or cool action only to have it fail because your dice have a love affair with nat 1s? Would you like more control over your destiny? Coming soon, Joker Core: A playing-card based system that's quick to pick up, quick to learn and keeps YOU in control of your character.

(Okay, I'm shilling, but yeah. I've been working on a system for well over half a year and I think I'm close to completion...)

NichG
2014-05-19, 11:20 PM
These days I tend to homebrew to the degree that its effectively making a system for each campaign. The timeline is generally something like 2-3 months system development followed by a 1.5 year campaign followed by the next round of system development (either something completely different, or an update of one of the previous campaign rule-sets).

As a result I've gone through about four editions of '7thscape' (combination of 7th Sea and Planescape originally, but it ended up getting revised for some other distinct fantasy worlds), did a ~100 page D&D supplement for Gilded Flasks, and am now running 'Memoir' which is a from-the-ground-up construction that is pretty much explicitly single-use since the major premise of the game is exploring a mechanically-integrated central mystery.

veti
2014-05-19, 11:49 PM
I spent the mid 80s doing that. All I can remember of it now is that it was a skill-based system using percentage dice, and without classes.

I ran it a few times, kept tweaking the rules... and eventually gave up when I discovered Rolemaster. I don't know if my system would ever have been any good - but RM/MERP was 'good enough' to distract me at the time.

Gavran
2014-05-20, 12:24 AM
I've never had the desire at all and I have a lot of sympathy for the people that do. :s

I mean, if you enjoy making it that's great but so many people think they've made the perfect system and that once they release it'll be wildly successful only to have it never even break from obscurity. Even if it's actually really good, the lack of marketing power alone...

It just makes me feel really bad for them. :c I'd hate to pour so much work and care into something only for it crash.

Ansem
2014-05-20, 12:34 AM
{{scrubbed}}

SixWingedAsura
2014-05-20, 12:51 AM
E{{scrubbed}}.

Whoah dude, chill. Some of us just make systems not for the fame, but just because we think we have an idea that will be fun. I doubt I'll make so much as a cent off of my system, I'm just doing it because I think it's fun. Calm yer tits.

erikun
2014-05-20, 06:39 AM
Yep, happens all the time. My first attempt was back in the 90s when I was just familiar with AD&D and Vampire: The Masquerade. It was a 2d6+stat system that was similar to AD&D and used Vampire's method of spending XP to increase stats, perhaps with some Tri-Stat influence. Generating a few characters showed that the whole thing was pretty broken overall.

My most recent idea was a D&D4e revision, where powers are based on power sources and combat role, not by class, meaning that any sort of defender could choose defender powers and any sort of arcane user could choose arcane powers. Oh, and tiers were simply new abilities/powers and optional, meaning players could play a 25th level campaign and still be relying on just "mundane" skills and powers. You a group could start the game at 1st level and be choosing superheroic abilities.

The biggest reason I don't pursue these ideas is an obvious lack of use. Even if I do make this awesome D&D4e revised system with a ton of original and balanced powers, who is going to play it? Even if I do create a "fixed" version of D&D3e that solves all the problems I find in the system, when am I going to spend my time using it? I've already moved onto other systems that do much the same thing better. I'd probably be better off simply spending time coming up with a few houserules or campaign material for Burning Wheel, or HeroQuest, or Fate instead.

Oh, I certainly have other ideas for systems. But the reasonable ones aren't along the lines on "Take D&D and modify it" anymore. (Which ironically means that they'd take more work to be practical.)

Ansem
2014-05-20, 08:22 AM
{{scrubbed}}

ghendrickson
2014-05-20, 08:38 AM
{{scrubbed}}

You really need to calm down

Airk
2014-05-20, 08:40 AM
{{scrubbed}}

Grinner
2014-05-20, 08:43 AM
{{scrubbed}}

ghendrickson
2014-05-20, 08:43 AM
Thank you Airk

Rhynn
2014-05-20, 08:57 AM
{{scrubbed}}.

It's okay, it gets better once you get out of high school. :smallbiggrin:

Mr. Mask
2014-05-20, 08:59 AM
I'll always be tinkering with one game system or another. Sometimes tabletop, sometimes video game. Have a number of design documents and notes for system,s but I'm working on two in particular (have an RPG ready for testing, but I haven't been able to get the testers).

One thing that really prompts me to think of tabletop systems, is when I see there's nothing else out there that fills the gap. Can you think of any fantasy table tennis/ping pong tabletop RPGs? You can't? That makes me feel like working out the mechanics for one (though admittedly, I'd be just as happy with a video game table tennis RPG).

Grinner
2014-05-20, 09:13 AM
One thing that really prompts me to think of tabletop systems, is when I see there's nothing else out there that fills the gap. Can you think of any fantasy table tennis/ping pong tabletop RPGs? You can't? That makes me feel like working out the mechanics for one

Here's (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balls_of_Fury) our source material.

Okay. Let's get to work. :smallamused:


(though admittedly, I'd be just as happy with a video game table tennis RPG).

That couldn't be too hard...I remember playing this ping pong-like flash game some time ago, which would be very simple to replicate. Implement that as a minigame attached to a walkabout with static NPCs, and you're done.

That, or ping pong-themed turn-based combat.

Airk
2014-05-20, 09:26 AM
Anyway, to wander back to the original question:

I made a game once. It was a percentile skill+stat amalgamation. I can't remember why, but it sounded like a good idea at the time, and I was annoyed with the games I was exposed to at the time. I was pretty pleased with some of it, and learned some important lessons, but at the end of several years and a couple of campaigns run in it, I realized that I didn't really have a reason to keep working on it, because it didn't really do anything all that magical.

These days, I find it more interesting to read what other people have done, because they're almost always several steps ahead of me in terms of thinking this stuff through.

Jay R
2014-05-20, 09:57 AM
I started a game design once. My approach was to start with a set of core principles and design around them. As I recall they were something like:


General principle 1. Weapons should act like real weapons, armor like real armor, and shields like real shields.
1a. Shields are not static. To block a blow with a shield requires a successful roll.
1b. Armor does not reduce the probability of being hit - it reduces the damage done.
1c. The difference in different weapons should have something to do with how they work. A mace isn't just a weapon that does less damage than a sword; it crushes but doesn't cut.
1d. Damage should affect what you can do, not just be a set of points. If your leg is hit by a sword, you can no longer run. If your hip is hit by a mace, you are completely disabled.
1e. Reach of the weapon affects more than the order of attack. If the spearman hits, the dagger fighter can't. If the dagger fighter gets past the spear range into dagger range, the spear can't attack (until the spearman successfully chokes up.)
1f. Actions in a fight are directly competitive. Any non-surprise attack is a opposed roll of one fighter's attacking skill and the other fighter's defending skill.
<This list went on for awhile.>

General principal 2. The rules should not be too complex.

Then I looked over my notes and gave up.

Rhynn
2014-05-20, 10:00 AM
General principal 2. The rules should not be too complex.

Then I looked over my notes and gave up.

:smallbiggrin:

I appreciate the joke, but there's actually several RPGs that meet both 1a. through 1f. and 2. ... Artesia: Adventures in the Known World, HârnMaster, The Riddle of Steel, RuneQuest...

Meanwhile, there's plenty of games that don't meet any of 1. but also fail 2.

Seerow
2014-05-20, 12:19 PM
I sympathize. I get the same thing, where I'll get the itch when I have no time to work on it, then when I do get the time, I work for a day or so, then the itch goes away until I have no time again. I've been working on my heartbreaker for a few years now, on and off again, and probably have a hundred pages or so worth of material thus far, but still nowhere near being done. Mechanically it's something like a hybrid of 3e/4e D&D, with a couple unique twists and a multiclassing system similar to older Final Fantasy titles or Bravely default (pick a main class, sub class, get support abilities to choose from based on those classes). The fluff/cosmology is heavily inspired by Stormlight Archives, with almost all magic originating from various spirits that individuals can create bonds with to gain power.

One day I will finish it. But at the rate I'm going, by the time I do I'll be an old man playing it with my grandchildren.

NichG
2014-05-20, 04:04 PM
With my group, there are just certain things I've noticed that on running for roughly the same players for years I can customize things to adapt to their tendencies. A lot of the stuff I end up making would really just not work well for other groups, so the entire purpose is in-house use.

For example, I've had players who really like to find powerful combos, mechanical interactions, etc - but they're already too familiar with base D&D for that to be as fun for them anymore. So running variants on D&D that intentionally disrupt the usual builds but make new things necessary helps keep that fresh. I found that out after running E6 and one of my players brought up that poring through the books trying to find a way to boost his CL high enough to make CL20 items in E6 was a cool research project and made him feel like he was actually playing a wizard for once because of the research -> power aspect of it. So after that I've tried to incorporate that sort of mechanical complexity into what I run and to change it up constantly with new subsystems, etc.

Mr. Mask
2014-05-20, 05:05 PM
Here's (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balls_of_Fury) our source material.

Okay. Let's get to work. :smallamused:

That couldn't be too hard...I remember playing this ping pong-like flash game some time ago, which would be very simple to replicate. Implement that as a minigame attached to a walkabout with static NPCs, and you're done.

That, or ping pong-themed turn-based combat. There's also this. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ping-Pong_Club)

I've always loved strategy and turn based games, at the same time as not particularly enjoying most of the ones out there. So turn based strategic ping pong would be my focus. to start with, I'd need a good mechanical base. Working out how difficulty of a shot is handled, and levels of success/failure, how your opponent predicts where the ball will go and how early. Once you get a good mechanical base, stuff like different techniques and other mechanics fall into place.

Dimers
2014-05-20, 05:42 PM
What have you thought of for a fantasy heartbreaker? Did you ever do it? Did you ever finish it? Do you still play it? I'm curious. What has been pondered.

I'd love to be able to run a few games in my own system, but that's at least another decade in the making -- probably more, based on progress so far. On the other hand, I'm enjoying the process ... fiddling with math, learning about what players and gamemasters really want to see in a game, writing evocatively. So I don't care too much if I ever finish.

I did a fantasy-heartbreaker AD&D ("Very Advanced D&D", I modestly named it) back when I was a teen. Worked fine for that period of life, playing with my puerile friends who enjoyed instigating trouble. Probably not so good for a general audience. :smalltongue:

lunar2
2014-05-21, 12:02 AM
i've had that itch off and on since i was 13, long before i ever actually played a game of D&D. when i was younger, my attempts always ran into an issue of being overly complex. as in take one stat, run it through a formula with a skill to get your actual modifier for your roll, then determine how much mana your going to spend, then roll to see if it succeeds, then roll for the effect, and plug that effect into another formula based on how much mana you spent and how well you could use that technique, then compare that to any modifiers your target may have. oh, and everything is completely skill based, and you level up skills by using them or studying them, and you level up stats by exercising.

now, i just tinker with modifying 3.5. a little here, a little there. post something as i get it, and hope somebody gives some feedback, and that that feedback would actually be useful, instead of complaining about how i'm doing it wrong (which is not to say critiques on balance or power level, but complaints based on ideological differences because my style isn't their style)

Ravens_cry
2014-05-21, 12:48 AM
I'm more a tweaker and a stealer. I am taking the wealth system from d20 modern and tweaking it a little for a Old Stone Age setting Pathfinder game. I think the idea fits a Stone Age gift economy a lot more than carting around any kind of coinage, whatever the material.

Judge_Worm
2014-05-21, 06:30 PM
I too know how it feels. I've even half started a dozen or so. My favorite was going to be a stripped down 3.5/PF clone. All races would be built off of a standard +6 to abilities (i.e. human +1,+1,+1,+1,+1,+1; dwarf +2,+2,0,0,+2,0). Classes would be balanced, and stuck in a category (martial, arcane, stealth/diplomacy, divine), monsters could be snatched from any source (no cr) the GM felt was a fair challenge. Alignment was class dependant (each category of class would have 5 classes, and you'd have to be within a single step). Never got much further than that though.

nedz
2014-05-21, 08:54 PM
In the early days this was practically a requirement if you actually wanted to run a game — the rules were somewhat incomplete. I did once start writing a system and even got to run a brief play test. It was a while ago and I'm not sure I'll ever pick it up again — though there were some novel ideas which I have considered porting to a d20 system.

veti
2014-05-21, 09:31 PM
I started a game design once. My approach was to start with a set of core principles and design around them. As I recall they were something like:

It looks like your notes could be summed up as: "The game must not be like D&D." Or to put it another way, you made a list of the features of D&D that you didn't like, so your system was almost entirely defined by what it shouldn't do.

As Rhynn points out, it's not as hard as your list makes it look. But by thinking entirely in negative terms, you pretty much made it look impossible.

My approach was to steal ideas I did like, from multiple different systems, and try to put them together into a coherent whole. I'm not sure now where I got the ideas of "opposed rolls", "percentage bonus" and "wound levels" from, but I'm damn' sure I didn't come up with anything so original by myself...

Cikomyr
2014-05-22, 05:20 PM
I know it's not the question, but I still want to pitch in with what I want to make.

I want to make a Fantasy strategy video game. Something that better reflect the abstract aspect of ruling the land; you shouldn't be able to see where your Heroes are. In fact, you shouldn't be able to control the "Adventurers" in your employ! For hell's sake, they are as likely to run around opening Demon Tombs as they are from stopping the bandits.

Mr. Mask
2014-05-22, 06:25 PM
My Life as a King might interest you.

StabbityRabbit
2014-05-22, 06:26 PM
I have been working off and on on a system meant to model what it's like to be half human. The actual mechanics of the so far game are roll xd6+number over number. The system is supposed to be similar to an extremely simplified and streamlined 4e with narrative mechanics added in, but I fully expect it to be a broken mess that never gets finished.

Knaight
2014-05-22, 07:20 PM
I've hacked Fudge pretty heavily, and practically made a system there. I also have an actual complete system (it's designed to be rules-mimimalist for people who don't want to deal with systems much, so that wasn't exactly hard to do), along with a lot of incomplete work - much of which is just enjoying tinkering with mechanics.

Thomar_of_Uointer
2014-05-24, 05:40 PM
I've found that playing tabletop RPGs regularly takes up enough of my energy and curbs my desires to homebrew.

mephnick
2014-05-25, 09:54 AM
I used to be really interested in Homebrew stuff. Now I'm not, especially with the lack of time that comes with adult responsibilities.

It comes down to the fact that Golarion or Forgotten Realms etc.. all do a good enough job that I don't really care any more. Every home-brew world I see ends up being the exact same thing with a few different gimmicks. The creators think they're amazing, but they are rarely very interesting to an unbiased observer. Oh your dwarves live in the forest instead of mountains? Great? Homebrew fixes to classes are pretty useful however.

Systems are the same thing. There's probably something out there already created that will suit your purpose with a few little changes.

Now I generally pick a system (like Pathfinder), take their setting (Golarion) and make my own adventure using all that great work that's already done.

I'd never want to discourage a creative soul from trying something new, that's how the hobby evolves, but those are just my observations.

veti
2014-05-26, 07:04 PM
I'd never want to discourage a creative soul from trying something new, that's how the hobby evolves, but those are just my observations.

And until you try, how do you know whether you're one of those Creative Souls or not?

I agree that for game systems, it's way easier to find one that is Good Enough and then make tweaks as required until it's "perfect". For you, anyway.

But settings is another matter. I've never been comfortable with using commercially published world settings, because all it takes is one book I haven't read (and worse, my players have...) to make my carefully crafted corner inconsistent with the canon. So when I do use a setting like that, I always say up-front that it includes numerous random changes from the published version, and whatever you think you know about that doesn't necessarily apply in my game. And for preference, I'll use my own world.

Which also has the advantage that you can reuse the same map (with only minor tweaks) for high or low fantasy, modern, or post-apocalyptic SF settings. And the players think it's kinda cool to find the gutted remains of the same city that was their base in another campaign a thousand years earlier...

Grinner
2014-05-26, 08:15 PM
I know it's not the question, but I still want to pitch in with what I want to make.

I want to make a Fantasy strategy video game. Something that better reflect the abstract aspect of ruling the land; you shouldn't be able to see where your Heroes are. In fact, you shouldn't be able to control the "Adventurers" in your employ! For hell's sake, they are as likely to run around opening Demon Tombs as they are from stopping the bandits.

It's called Majesty (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Majesty:_The_Fantasy_Kingdom_Sim). It was developed by one Cyberlore Studios and released in 2000, and it is everything you've just described.

Jay R
2014-05-26, 08:30 PM
It looks like your notes could be summed up as: "The game must not be like D&D." Or to put it another way, you made a list of the features of D&D that you didn't like, so your system was almost entirely defined by what it shouldn't do.

Not at all. My notes could be summed up as "The fighting system must simulate a fight." That certainly makes it unlike D&D, but that wasn't the goal - just a consequence of the fact that D&D (and most other game systems) is not a simulation of how a fight works. I made a list of how weapons actually work.

valadil
2014-05-26, 09:23 PM
I've had one that I've tinkered with on and off since 2009. I like the idea of replacing dice with a bidding mechanic. But realistically I doubt I'll ever publish it, even if I do finish, so it's hard to stay motivated.

NichG
2014-05-26, 10:06 PM
Oh your dwarves live in the forest instead of mountains? Great?


As far as making something that actually has greater appeal, I'd say the most important skill to learn is to be able to look at each thing you include/want to include/change/etc and understand the reason you made that choice. If you pick up that skill, then even if the first thing you make is sort of generic and doesn't do anything new, the thing you make after that will be better, and so on.

E.g. in the above example, if you made a game setting like that you should go back and ask 'Why did I have the dwarves live in the forest? What am I trying to achieve with that?' Eventually that sort of introspection leads to the development of design principles, and then broader ideas or purposes. Once you can start to say things like 'I put the dwarves in the forest because its necessary to mesh with X idea, or Y broad thing I'm trying to achieve' versus 'I put the dwarves in the forest just to make it different' then you can start to make things that feel more like a cohesive whole.

Some people can do that instinctually without having to mentally step through the reasoning behind each thing, but its hard to be objective about yourself as far as whether or not you actually possess that instinct at a high level - thats part of the reason why you often get a lot of 'look at my awesome homebrew!' that falls flat outside of the mind of the creator. But if you make the effort to understand the reason behind the things you make, then that can help fill the gap and refine whatever you do come up with to the point where its doing a particular thing well at the very least; even without being able to make good things effortlessly and instinctually, you can learn to make good things through a self-directed critical process.

Rosstin
2014-05-26, 10:26 PM
Become a Gamedev! XD

It's not easy, but you'll scratch that itch, ohoho yes you will.

Cherish, cultivate, and nurture that desire. The days I don't have that desire... are the worst days I have. I can't imagine living without it.

Mr. Mask
2014-05-26, 10:47 PM
I concur with that.

Or you could take up sleeping, instead. It's one or the other with game design, I swear.

NichG
2014-05-26, 11:55 PM
Become a Gamedev! XD

It's not easy, but you'll scratch that itch, ohoho yes you will.

Cherish, cultivate, and nurture that desire. The days I don't have that desire... are the worst days I have. I can't imagine living without it.

I think perhaps it'd be wise to first find a friend who is good at the business/marketting end though or you might find you're spending all your time learning how to market stuff on social media rather than actually doing development. Plus with that kind of thing, it really helps to have at least someone else who is stuck in the boat with you so you can bounce ideas off eachother.

veti
2014-05-27, 12:41 AM
I want to make a Fantasy strategy video game. Something that better reflect the abstract aspect of ruling the land; you shouldn't be able to see where your Heroes are. In fact, you shouldn't be able to control the "Adventurers" in your employ! For hell's sake, they are as likely to run around opening Demon Tombs as they are from stopping the bandits.

I'm reminded of Crisis in the Kremlin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crisis_in_the_Kremlin), where the premise is that you spend the whole of your time in one place (your office), make decisions, make speeches and announcements, and give instructions to other people based on what you're told (which may or may not be accurate).

Not much of a video game, but it was fun nonetheless. You'd see a very abstract map, with troublespots and threats marked on it, and a bunch of indicators reflecting what your advisors are telling you at any moment. Then pseudo-random events are thrown at you, and you have to decide how to react to them.

Rosstin
2014-05-27, 02:11 AM
I think perhaps it'd be wise to first find a friend who is good at the business/marketting end though or you might find you're spending all your time learning how to market stuff on social media rather than actually doing development. Plus with that kind of thing, it really helps to have at least someone else who is stuck in the boat with you so you can bounce ideas off eachother.

This is all true in my experience.

But you are extremely unlikely to find a business/marketing friend, unless by fortune you already have close friends with that skillset. Marketing is a lot more work than people think. I've never met someone who would market my material for me without payment. I've had to do all my own marketing for the last 5 years, and I schmooze a LOT. I don't know many indie devs that aren't startups that have a marketing person.

NichG
2014-05-27, 07:40 AM
This is all true in my experience.

But you are extremely unlikely to find a business/marketing friend, unless by fortune you already have close friends with that skillset. Marketing is a lot more work than people think. I've never met someone who would market my material for me without payment. I've had to do all my own marketing for the last 5 years, and I schmooze a LOT. I don't know many indie devs that aren't startups that have a marketing person.

Getting a bit off topic, but another general rule is probably that in the long run, paying people who have expertise in things in order to do a very good job is worth it compared to winging it. But thats probably more of a 2nd or 3rd game bit of advice - from the various post-mortems I've read, people's first games seem to usually make around $500 or less even if they paid several thousand on art/music/etc. So I guess the lesson is, get your first commercial game out as fast as you can to get over that hump, learn everything you can from the experience, then take a chance with paying people to make the second game as polished as you can.

In my case, I had the good luck to at least have a friend who knew how to write and submit press releases, which was basically responsible for something like 95% of what the game actually managed to make. In the end, even with that, the $500 estimate was spot on.

Rosstin
2014-05-27, 09:57 AM
Your first game is ALWAYS a disaster. I promise. Any gamedev who says their first game was great, is lying. Don't even THINK of selling your first game. The most ambitious thing I would do, is build it as a gift to someone.

I have a presentation I give about "Finishing Your First Game"
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1rFvsdJEc1vyUdrcVxUnO172-Qplw_UzfMoEdgayFFVI/edit#slide=id.g2567101a9_90

Basically, for your first game, focus on ONE thing. Finishing it. Everything about the game should make it "easy" to finish. Tiny tiny tiny scope. Something fun that you KNOW you can do. Something you can finish in a weekend. Something that you think you can finish in one day, in fact. Because even if you think you can finish it in one day, I promise that it will take Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday morning assuming you don't fall asleep on Sunday night. XD

Finishing a game is a skill, like any other skill, and you need to gain experience to be able to do it. Finishing even an implementation of pong is a difficult task, and many people get to their 4th or 5th project before learning to "finish".

A game isn't finished until you can email it to someone, and they can play it without you hovering over their shoulder.

I know that my experience is primarily oriented towards videogames, but modules and card+board games are the same way. In fact, I think they're much MORE difficult. It takes A LOT of work to make a standalone non-video game that people will actually pick up and play of their own volition.

Personally, if my goal was to make a module, I would pick my favorite fandom or gameworld and do an "adventure" for it using an existing system. That way, your audience is pre-existing and you have a chance of getting some feedback on it.

This sounds very cautionary, but I mean it to be encouraging. If you approach it right, your first game can be a wonderful experience. If you approach it wrong, you'll probably still have a great time.

NichG
2014-05-27, 10:42 AM
Also, 24hour/weekend game-dev contests and the like are good for getting a feel for what kind of scope is reasonable for a particular amount of development time. Its also worth being aware of the fact that content always takes much longer than game engine development. For something like a puzzle game, the ratio is probably about 2-to-1. For something like an RPG, the ratio is maybe something like 5-to-1 at the very least. If you're doing 3D, individually painted environments, etc then you'll probably double or triple that. Procedural generation doesn't actually save you all that much since it requires a lot more tweaking and you end up having to generate a lot of templates and different generators to keep it from getting repetitive.

Another big thing I found out was the right ratio of the development time ratio between stuff that the player will see within the first three minutes of play, and stuff that the player will only see hours in. That was a big mistake I made. If you have a ton of polished content hidden deep within the game, you might get a few hardcore fans of it but you'll get a lot more people who just never get hooked into the game. Those first three minutes really have to be super-polished and addictive - crystal clear to the player, good pacing, make it obvious how to continue, drop hints as to how the game will expand if the player keeps playing, etc.

Rosstin
2014-05-27, 10:45 AM
NichG, I agree with every single thing you said.

I'd love to see some of your work! What have you made?

Grod_The_Giant
2014-05-27, 10:53 AM
My first system-building desire (STaRS (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?281582-STaRS-the-Simple-TAbletop-Roleplaying-System-4-0)) was borne out of a random late-night inspiration. "What if your skill ranks encoded your chance of success, so the GM never had to have any numbers in front of him? I could use, like, a d6, so you'd easily have a 33%, 50%, or 66% success chance... hmm, and then I could..." (As it turned out, then I could be disturbed by a fire drill and lose my train of thought). But I slapped together a few rules and a character sheet and played it a bit with a friend. And, well, it worked, for the most part. The percentages were all wrong, and the skill system was goofy, and I'd forgotten a perception stat, but there was a core of fun to the idea. So I went back to the drawing board, fiddled with some things... posted it here, got some feedback, wrote a new draft... played some more, posted it here, got more feedback, wrote a new draft...

After something like six drafts, I've finally got the core rules where I want them to be. I've got enough kind words from friends and forumgoes that I kind of want to try and publish; I started working on a book version over winter break, and I'll go back to that now that I'm out of school. But that desire is fairly recent. For the most part, STaRS has been "well, that was pretty neat, but it'd work even better if I changed this bit..."

I've also done a lot of D&D homebrew and fixes, including system overhauls of of one level of complexity (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?258312-Gaols-and-Giants-Compilation-Thread) or another (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?329161-Giants-and-Graveyards-Grod-s-collected-3-5-revisions). Some of that was from I wasn't playing D&D, and missed it; others were the challenge of fixing something broken. I dunno.

That did lead into my fantasy heartbreaker (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?291015-quot-Tome-of-D-amp-D-quot-maneuvers-for-everything!). Or at least I guess it's a fantasy heartbreaker, although I have no significant desire to finish it. It was mostly brainstorming and design goals based on a "if you could rewrite the PHB, what would you change?" thread. I reached the point where one could probably start writing, if one wanted... And I think there are plenty of good ideas in there. I think it would work, and it would be fun... but, it'd be too big a project for one man, and I don't think it was really unique enough to be be worth pursuing.

NichG
2014-05-27, 11:32 AM
NichG, I agree with every single thing you said.

I'd love to see some of your work! What have you made?

About a year ago, I started a little studio called Urban Hermit Games in my spare time, trying to see if I could make game development work as an actual career thing. I made a few competition games for a small HTML5 competition called Fight Magic Run and did a Ludum Dare (the game was Rebound Recon (http://games.urbanhermitgames.com/ReboundRecon2/), a sort of motion-planning physics puzzle game for the '10 seconds' theme). 'Travelogue' was the full game, which I and a couple of friends made over the course of about three months. It got into Rock Paper Shotgun, but there were a couple mis-steps and I think the price point was poorly chosen. These days with even RPGMaker stuff making it through Greenlight I'm tempted to give it a go on Steam just to see if it sticks.

After that I started on a more arcadey thing called One With Everything (http://games.urbanhermitgames.com/one/) with a 3D artist I met at a game dev chat thing, but it kind of lost steam when we both realized we had no idea what we were actually trying to make in the end. The current posted version is about where development stopped, so there's some weird test stuff in it, but it should give you an idea. I've talked with him and if anyone were interested, we'd be fine with open-sourcing it or something at this point to see if anyone else could figure out a good ending for it.

Edit: I suppose to stay on topic, I should also link to tabletop system stuff. As I mentioned earlier, my current campaign is called 'Memoir' (http://games.urbanhermitgames.com/memoir.pdf) and is basically a game where the world itself has amnesia, and as individuals regain their memories they can choose how they remember in order to reshape history.

Unfortunately I've had to put professional game development on the backburner since about last December, though the upside is that it was because of involvement in a research project that's going to be my full-time job in a few months time for the next year or so.

I do have a few things bouncing around game-wise but with the other project its hard to get the momentum to finish them. For example, a catapult-building puzzle game with deformable beams and the like (really really raw development version here (http://games.urbanhermitgames.com/catapult/), if you're interested, but this is by no means even an alpha or a demo or anything that could be considered playable in any way, shape, or form). I should also say that the player's guide doesn't have any of the secret stuff, of which there's a ton - see the power chart (http://games.urbanhermitgames.com/memoir/powers/) for an example of what the players have uncovered so far.

Financially I need to figure out the right way to go with this stuff if I want to make a go of it full time, though I should have a good runway after the research project.

Thrawn4
2014-05-27, 12:16 PM
I've been trying to create my own system and setting for years. The first ideas were heavily inspired by "Seiken Denetsu 3" (propably spelled wrong) and entailed a lot of high fantasy and ways to power up your class based on the four elementals. So you had fire warriors, water warriors and so on. Obviously, it also had powerful ancient dragons and an evil god that threatened the world...
Nowadays, you wouldn't recognize it, as it is pretty much the opposite. Anyway, I have around 15 pages of keywords, which is enough to write at least 50 pages (probably 100), and I still can't persuade myself to write it down. I need something to motivate me, maybe someone eager to read the next chapter... Right now I am kind of motivated, but according my experience that means I will only write three pages and then take a break for one year.
So yeah...

lunar2
2014-05-27, 06:05 PM
then write the 3 pages. it may take a few decades, but you'll finish eventually.

Grod_The_Giant
2014-05-27, 10:37 PM
Right now I am kind of motivated, but according my experience that means I will only write three pages and then take a break for one year.
So yeah...
Try using National Novel Writing Month? Sign up for the site, go to events, soak up the energy, but write your system instead of a novel.

Rosstin
2014-05-28, 12:06 AM
Try using National Novel Writing Month? Sign up for the site, go to events, soak up the energy, but write your system instead of a novel.

I did that with Queen At Arms, it was awesome. I only got to 20,000 words but still.

Now Queen At Arms has like 100,000 words. I wish it had less. ヽ( ̄д ̄;)ノ