What I Heard by Listening to the Ramblings of Games: a Manifesto

Your first game is undoable.

Seriously don’t make that game that you became a game designer for. That is something that you only do right before you die as the light from your incoming death answers all your questions and in a flash of inspiration you say to yourself “I know what I must do” and you finally make the game. Anything short of doing that will leave you disappointed because you will have never come close to the things you have imagined for the game.  

Your game is bad.

You will never make a game that is perfect or even anywhere near it. People will hate it. You might hate it for what it has done to you or what it is. You are going to post it somewhere and no one will look at it. Guess what? NONE OF THAT MATTERS! Make it anyway! Who cares what they think? Why does it matter that it didn’t end up like you wanted so you hate it? The answers are: “not you”, and “because it doesn’t”. You will have made something that is a part of you and that is what matters. 

Everyone needs to see your game.

Get hyped about your game. This is a big thing! You are making (have made) something and it’s so goddamn cool that anyone would be foolish to not at least try it out. You spent this time making this thing, putting yourself into it, making it enjoyable. This game is the child that you pieced together bit by bit from your imagination so that it may be interacted with. This child’s first image of the world as it awakes with a “hello, world”  should be that of some other person interacting with it. Let that child be molded by those people under your careful protection.

Games you make will be a piece of you.

You have no choice in the matter. You can either strive to enforce this and purposefully make the game that resonates with you, or not. Even if you don’t, the game you make should and will have some part of you with it. Whether that is your aesthetic, or that it tells a bit about your story; people will be able to understand you better by interacting with your game.

Do not spend more than an hour thinking about what to do next with the game.

Follow your gut. You know what games are like. You know what you like. You know what people like (you are a people). Start making it. The act of you making it, will let your gut speak to you and you will make something better. Your gut will tell you when what you are making does not feel right. Your gut will also tell you when you actually need to spend time thinking about what you are making, but make sure that you can keep it in check. First ideas are worth trying. 

Never allocate time to do anything involving your game at all. 

There’s something to be said about some law or something about some Hofstadter guy or gal. No idea. Anyways, everything takes time to do and you will never have time to make the game. So don’t plan anything at all! If you never plan for there to be time to do it, then the time never existed and you won’t lose time or worry about a deadline, or miss said deadline. Your game will be finished when it is finished. Time has no power over your game.