So I've been thinking about the value of ideas in today's culture, and I'm wondering what you guys think.

This concept has been rolling around in my head for a week or so, and I think I've finally got it to the point where I can verbalise it fairly concisely.

In the past, it seems like if you got a great idea for a game, then you could sell it and make millions. Tetris is the classic example -- the world had never seen a game quite like Tetris and as soon as it came out, *boom*, the market loved it and clamored over it.

But is that really how things work normally? I mean, I hear wonderfully different ideas all of the time -- many even sound feasible, but none/few of them ever go anywhere.

So what what makes a "great idea for a game"?

I'm not sure that there is such a thing. There are good ideas for games, sure -- but what is it that turns a good idea into a great game?

I think it's implementation. How well does one execute the idea? How much polish, how well organized, how user-friendly, how does the challenge scale? I argue that that's where the real heart of good game development is. It's not like all a game needs is a great story to be a good game -- there are plenty of games with horrible stories that made great games -- just look at Super Mario Brothers. "We're sorry, but our princess is in another castle!" Big surprise plot-twist there. But SMB had polish, it had finesse -- it was well balanced. That game was just... fun. And it didn't have anything to do with the core platform (Nintendo, good for the time, but had plenty of poor games made for the system as well), the core genre (platformer, of which there were dozens for the NES, plenty of them not-fun), the graphics (other NES games had much better graphics at the time but many weren't nearly as fun), the sound, or the story (as we've already shown). But I would say that it was a combination of all of the above factors that can be simply summed up by saying that what separates a *good* game from a *great* game is by how well the various pieces are put together.

Let me show you a few more modern examples. Was Myspace the first place where people could go to create their own websites and develop communities with other people for free? Certainly not! Geocities did that way back in the mid/late 90's, so did plenty of other spots. But Geocities got "acquired" by Yahoo! and is still festering in some corner of the 'net, usually plagued by heaps of 404's. So what did MySpace do that Geocities didn't do? I don't think there's any one particular thing that a person can point to to say "that's why MySpace succeeded where Geocities failed", but rather, it was a combination of many many things.

There aren't any new ideas. People just rehash old ideas and implement them slightly differently. People talk about the "classic" movies like Wizard of Oz and Ben Hur, but you know what? They were both remakes, and so were most other classics I know of.

But while we shouldn't necessarily copycat old works, I get a general feeling from people that they're often hesitant to share their game ideas because they're afraid someone's going to "steal their idea" and beat them to market. Yes, this can happen in some cases, but I would say that by and large, if someone else can so easily make your game better than you can, then you didn't stand a chance in the market anyways. It's not your idea that counts, it's how well you put it together.

So in thinking about things like the next community project, or about projects that I work on elsewhere, it makes me think that I don't need to worry about having an idea that's different from other people's -- I just need to implement that idea better.

Just some rambling thoughts. I know that I sometimes get frustrated with other people posting their misc. blog-type thoughts on the boards here, but I thought that this one was relevant enough to game development that it was appropriate to post here for discussion.

Cheers!

--clint

Do you think you might post this up as an article? Then it would be there for the ages :P

again, well done awesome work...

------------------
"But it is God who judges: He brings one down, he exalts another." - Psalm 75:7

quote:

---

Originally posted by JeTSpice:
I agree. Great insite and what a helpful idea -- it can be applied to just about any entertainment-type endeavor. There's also something to be said for timing. And something to be said for marketing, advertising, publishing. Any ideas?

---

Totally! You're exactly right, Jeff. I think you're extending this idea very well -- as a programmer, I tend to focus on the programming-related kinds of implementation, but you're exactly right. So you're saying things like price point, distribution, packaging, documentation, support, fan-community, etc.

I picture games that are well put together like what we're talking about as being closer to art. People often ask, "are games art?" Sometimes games are art, and sometimes they're just drivel. I think that what we're talking about here is one of the largest dividing lines between art and drivel.

Thanks for the discussion! This is very helpful for me to talk all this stuff out with y'all.

In Christ,
clint

Tetris, to me, is always such a great example. No fluff or eye candy, just purely interesting gameplay. Along those same lines, some of my favorites are Clickomania and Fashion Cents. Simple, yet quite addicting gameplay.

Why do people want to play the old ROMs...with squares flying around? Why are Gameboy/DS so popular? Clearly, there is something special and unique regarding the games.

> I think it's implementation. How well does one execute the idea?

True. This is why you can have a zillion games in a single genre, but only a select few really make it. On the other hand, marketing plays a big role too. It's hard to find those great gems if marketing is weak. Thankfully, I found some of those gems such as 'Neverhood' and 'Total Annihilation'. Both of these were unique in their genre, were extremely fun, and went beyond what you expect for the genre. You probably have your own little gems of your own.

> There aren't any new ideas.

Interesting comment. I disagree, but I think I know what you mean. I actually did not know that about Wizard of Oz and Ben Hur. This subject alone can probably be its own long thread. I think it boils down to what we each consider to be a unique idea. We are certainly influenced by things in our past and will take those good parts and reuse them, but we continue to refine and bring in better ideas/thoughts into the mix.

The whole Geocities thing is a very interesting point. It would be fun to research into it some more and find out why it didn't work. I completely agree. I tried it one day and was completely turned off and find way too many missing links. On the other hand, Yahoo itself is one of those unique gems. In a day when hot, cool websites are in, Yahoo is still relatively the same, simple text-based site it has been from the beginning. But it works! It's easy. You see what you want. You can find what you want.

I agree, this can make a good article, but may need some more thought and time to really provide a good impact. I hope this doesn't offend. It's a great beginning, but I think more discussion can really bring out some interesting ideas and thoughts.

Aaaaahhhh....this is long enough for now. I have a Stargate SG-1 DVD I need to get through tonight before it gets too late.

To be a better designer you have to know what is logical and use the metaphors in other aspects.

A game like GTA3 sucks as a game but just because it was a pointless scavenger hunt game it had many of the things other games had and more. sure it didn't have great graphics like high end games at the time but it was average and it made it self better by compensating the average art with variety, The music was not original but familiar, the game was not for hard core gamers but for everyone, it was not a game that was in one room but explored everywhere like a kid in a candy store, and had other addicting things for people to keep wanting to play it which I said some examples in the post about addicting games.

If anyone here made Christian game that was like GTA to have the same art, and scavenger hunting abilities and to be able to do whatever then it would do well but I don't think anyone has millions to back it up. A Christian game would do well if it played almost exactly like GTA but change it that you get in trouble when doing bad and get things to progress for doing good. Christians and non Christians would play it and what road they decide determines the ending they get. In GTA you didn't get an option like that and encourages bad. Just a thought.

------------------
"The conversion of a savage to Christianity is the conversion of Christianity to savagery." George Bernard Shaw (Hence christian sects)"Hell is paved with good intentions, not with bad ones"
"Matthew 7 21. Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven;... depart from me, ye that work iniquity."
Orthodoxy=best kept secret in the US. 2nd largest Christian communion in the world

I think all great action games have great control schemes and have natural responsive controls and a good balance of ease of play and challenging aspects. Bad action games have awkward interface and unbalanced difficulty (too hard or too easy). Great RPG's have a decently interesting plot, simple and straight forward combat/skill systems with a wide variety of character specialization and an open environment to roam in. Lame RPG's have linear plots, overly complex combat/skill systems and restrictive, linear environments. That actually covers most games. There are also strategy and simulation games. Other than that, there are all the so-called casual games. It's not a terrible mystery what makes games from each genre great, it's just that it's not easy to do. It's nearly impossible for a single person to do. I think we need to band together to make fun games, and just be willing to do what it takes to make our alright games awesome. Then once we have a few gems we can worry about money and polish. Most legendary game studios started small with small or nonexistent budgets and produced enough gems to attract the money it takes to make the blockbuster games they are famous for.

Most of the people here, including myself, do not have years and years of game industry experience. If we came into millions of dollars of funding, I think we'd end up with polished river rocks. But if we start small and focus on making games that are primarily fun, we could grow up to be a huge influence on the game industry. I'd say that we are in seed form now, but if we are patient, we can grow to a large tree.

------------------
+---------+
|steveth45|
+---------+

Take worms for example. Andy Davidson had an idea, he made up a "cheezy" game in Amiga BlitzBasic, people from Team17 saw it, liked the idea, and signed him up. you can read more about the history of worms at http://www.planetgamecube.com/newsArt.cfm?artid=6874

A good example of how with very little, he was able to make a huge franchise/chain which is internationally known.

Quote from the article on worms history...

"Worms succeeded because it plays so well."
"Infinitely re-playable, it relies upon darker human emotions such as jealousy, anger, rage and sarcasm to stir the feelings of your opponents."

The second quote should be taken to heart by all developers... The person playing the game has emotions. You need to, especially in christian game development, touch the players heart. Bring the player into the game, and then keep him there

I strongly believe that looking at previous games and their success can help you figure out how they sort of "did it". It's like if your to start a business, say a food chain, you'd look at the market at the moment, and then at previous food chains to see just how they "did it". It doesn't mean however to mimic them, that will most likely just lead to disaster...

------------------
"But it is God who judges: He brings one down, he exalts another." - Psalm 75:7

At the moment I'm trying a few things, this is perhaps more in regards to RPGs. I am:
-giving the game as much of a cinematic feel as possible, wanting the game to immerse the player and draw them in immediately (easier said than done), done with good animations, black bars and some voice acting .
-creating an immersive and interactive environment, making the world feel full, making things move, and allowing the player to interact with as many things as possible
-creating smooth and immersive gameplay, wanting it to draw the player in but also offer action and fun.

I agree, to do that it takes organizing, and the big problem is being organized. For example if a game company used 10 people to make a good high budget game full time then it might be done if 50 people work on the same game part time as a hobby, but the problem is organization since many small to big game don’t get completed since the organization was not good. So people can compensate millions of Dollars and full time workers that don’t care for the project with more people that do it part time with better organization, right????

An ant colony can move like clock work but a small group of people seem to not have better organization than ants, and seems like the animals are outsmarting people. :| Maybe we need to take an ant queen and let it rule over all humans. lol

------------------
"The conversion of a savage to Christianity is the conversion of Christianity to savagery." George Bernard Shaw (Hence christian sects)"Hell is paved with good intentions, not with bad ones"
"Matthew 7 21. Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven;... depart from me, ye that work iniquity."
Orthodoxy=best kept secret in the US. 2nd largest Christian communion in the world

quote:

---

Originally posted by ssquared:
> There aren't any new ideas.

Interesting comment. I disagree, but I think I know what you mean. I actually did not know that about Wizard of Oz and Ben Hur. This subject alone can probably be its own long thread. I think it boils down to what we each consider to be a unique idea. We are certainly influenced by things in our past and will take those good parts and reuse them, but we continue to refine and bring in better ideas/thoughts into the mix.

---

That's a fair statement on your part, and I can't directly disagree with what you're saying. Obviously, there *are* some new ideas out there. The Wiimote is a very current example of something that's fairly "new".

But is it? I mean, people have been playing those little hand-held fishing games for years. And anybody besides me remember the Power Glove? Granted, there *are* some new things about the Wiimote. I guess I'm just addressing a feeling that ebbs and flows within game development communities that in order to succeed, one needs an original idea. I think that in general, that's not as true as many people would think it is. We can take a fairly standard "good idea" for a game (a rough gem as Steveth put it), and with a fair bit of polishing compound, elbow grease and the Lord's guidance, turn it into an absolutely fabulous game.

I don't mean any of this to say that we don't need originality in how we put things together -- little novelties like that are what become our signatures and is how we define our brand/style of creativity. What I'm addressing here is core ideas or base storylines or a certain twist in fundamental game mechanics -- of course we need to be original in our character names or our art style or a host of other little things, but I'm saying we don't need to worry about getting as different of ideas as possible as much as we should focus on working with what we have in a quality fashion.

So look at Dance Praise -- voted at this year's CGDC to be the top Christian game of the past year. Why did it get first place? It's not *that* original! They're not even the second ones out on the market -- there are at least half a dozen other rhythm games that have been published that Dance Praise seems to be an almost direct copycat from.

So why is Dance Praise selling? I'm suggesting that Dance Praise is a successful game because they took an old idea, added improvements/cool twists where they saw that they were able, and took it to market. Dance Praise did not try to be a "copy" of DDR -- they took what they liked from DDR, but they did their best to learn from the faults of DDR (too hard, sketchy lyrics that aren't family-friendly, not enough cooperative play), improved on those, and they've opened up entirely new markets for themselves by doing just a few small changes (adding Shadow Dance, Christian music, marketing to churches and homeschool groups).

I think that Digital Praise did a great thing with Dance Praise, and so that's what I'm talking about here when I say there aren't really any new ideas. Sure -- every once in a while people get ideas for things that are fairly original (some guy wants to make a tennis ball fly around on an oscilloscope), but you can still succeed just by making your product *better* (I.E., how Pong built on Tennis for Two).

quote:

---

Originally posted by ssquared:
I agree, this can make a good article, but may need some more thought and time to really provide a good impact. I hope this doesn't offend. It's a great beginning, but I think more discussion can really bring out some interesting ideas and thoughts.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by JeTSpice:
Perhaps "There aren't any new ideas" can be phrased as "There's nothing new under the sun." Meaning, that what is important is not the new idea or the spin or variation of an old idea--we shouldn't go running off thinking we're going to be famous millionaires over an idea, or entertain some covetous or haughty attitude about it

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by steveth45:
Well, the millions of dollars gets you polish in video games. If you polish a gem, it becomes incredibly valuable. If you polish a common stone, it's just a shiny rock. I'd rather have an unpolished gem, than a polished common stone, any day.

---

quote:

---

I think all great action games have great control schemes and have natural responsive controls and a good balance of ease of play and challenging aspects. Bad action games have awkward interface and unbalanced difficulty (too hard or too easy). Great RPG's have a decently interesting plot, simple and straight forward combat/skill systems with a wide variety of character specialization and an open environment to roam in. *snip lots of other good examples*

---

quote:

---

I think we need to band together to make fun games, and just be willing to do what it takes to make our alright games awesome. Then once we have a few gems we can worry about money and polish. Most legendary game studios started small with small or nonexistent budgets and produced enough gems to attract the money it takes to make the blockbuster games they are famous for.

---

Dartsman: *Great* example about Worms. I think that's a great example for us to look to -- thanks for that! I didn't know that about Worms.

David Lancaster: One of the things I really like about Axys Adventures is all of the little minigames. Good minigames are one indication of polish to me, and while there are a few unpolished areas in Axys, I was very impressed with the amount of polish that I did find in that game. Keep up the great work! I'm really looking forward to your next one.

quote:

---

Originally posted by warsong:
"I think we need to band together to make fun games, and just be willing to do what it takes to make our alright games awesome." As Steve said
I agree, to do that it takes organizing, and the big problem is being organized. For example if a game company used 10 people to make a good high budget game full time then it might be done if 50 people work on the same game part time as a hobby, but the problem is organization since many small to big game don’t get completed since the organization was not good.

---

I dunno'. I agree that a large chunk of the problem is found in organization, but I don't necessarily think organization between people as much as organization in our own lives. I'm amazed at the different games that people have created *by themselves* if they work hard (Doukutsu by Pixel and Exegesis by JeTSpice are the two big ones that come to mind for me). I don't know about you, but I tend to spend at least a couple hours a day checking e-mail way-more-than-I-need-to or checking these forums every-few-minutes just because I want to *talk* about Christian game development so much. One thing I'm trying to remind myself to do is to *talk* less, and *act* more. If I worked on Christian games more than I talked about them, I think I could have a handfull of small, polished gems to show off to people which could open doors for future endeavors for me. I know my efforts with Mite and Bible Dave have already opened up opportunities for me in some ways, and I'm looking forward to getting some more (and better-polished) little gems into my collection.

So I don't think we need to worry about organizing large groups of people as much as we need to worry about working dilligently and faithfully in our own lives.

Well that looks like I made it to the bottom of the thread. I want you all to know that I don't consider myself an expert on Christian games, but rather someone who is always trying to learn about them. Please correct me where you've seen me go wrong, please argue with me if I haven't convinced you (I'm available to be convinced to other viewpoints), and please encourage me where you see me weak. I'm not the final authority on Christian games, though I hope to continue studying the genre and to share with you all what I've learned.

Thanks for the discussion! I'm very blessed by it, and hope you all are as well.

In Christ,
clint

[This message has been edited by HanClinto (edited July 16, 2006).]

I don't know if you'd get this but (it is ment to be a compliment)...

"Your words are like roadkill in tasmania (australia)... it is always there, and people stop to watch/listen/learn, if not swerve to be apart of it."

ie. People want to hear from you, and you are always there to help. When people are around you, they just want to be apart of the "clinto-clan"... hehe :P Like in that CGDC06 picture, your sitting there and you've got all those guys listening to you :P

Oh and have a great holiday

------------------
"But it is God who judges: He brings one down, he exalts another." - Psalm 75:7

quote:

---

Originally posted by dartsman:
ie. People want to hear from you, and you are always there to help. When people are around you, they just want to be apart of the "clinto-clan"... hehe :P Like in that CGDC06 picture, your sitting there and you've got all those guys listening to you :P

---

I just had to post it, can't resist the urge to post....arrhrggggg:

------------------
"But it is God who judges: He brings one down, he exalts another." - Psalm 75:7

Back on track...

About organizations. I agree with Warsong. And I'd like to add just a little bit more insight to it.

The Bible says "He who is faithful with little will be made ruler over much." This can apply to being responsible with people.

Being responsible with little means with whatever God has given us to start with. The Word says that if you have the gift to teach, teach, if you have the gift of prayer, pray, an so on. And also in the Christian gaming world, gifts have been given to us by God. If a person has the ability to code, then code, if create art, then do that. This is how we can be responsible with little. God may have given someone the ability to encourage gamemakers, to come up with cool ideas, with stories, to beta-test and be a stickler for quality, with the ability to make music or organize people. There's tons of gifts. But if we are responsible with our gifts and don't love others (through faithful action--how we treat them) I'd say God won't make us ruler over much. We won't get opportunity to work with more people, if we can't work with one. This has been my walk.

Paraphrasing Warsong, many part-time volunteers, well organized, can compete with a few full-time employees. A design doc is a valuable tool, and necessary to organize a group of people, but it is only as good as the person spearheading the game. What is unsaid is that the skill to organize comes the same way wealth does: little by little, being faithul as an individual first--if coding, coding, if art, art--and then receiving the blessing (and responsibility) of having people come along side a project, and so on. A good example of this is Clint, in his proceedings with people on the boards, in his love for Christian gaming, he has been faithful with little in the past. Now he is a well-respected member of the gaming community. People listen to him, take his advice, trust him, and listen to what he says. Carried on into the future, we can all see that this will lead to bigger and bigger things.

[This message has been edited by JeTSpice (edited July 17, 2006).]

Exactly. Is an MP3 player a new idea or is it a twist on a Walkman? Or is a Walkman just a twist on the transistor radio? Or is the radio a twist on morse code? My answer is YES that each one is a new idea. Others may think all or some are just a rehash of something old. Personally, I don't think one answer or the other answer is necessarily the right one. It is simply different perspectives.

[An Aside] My tendency on the internet (and marriage too) is to have people define what they mean so EVERYONE can be on the same page or understand where each other is coming from. I've seen too many arguments on the internet happen simply due to a different interpretation. Once people understood where everyone was coming from, the argument ended. So you may see me take this approach a bit.[/end]

Keep in mind, I do completely agree with you. I like what Steveth45 said about the polished gem. It's sort of what I was trying to say in regards to Neverhood, but he really made it come alive. I have never been one for the latest/greatest. I keep my computers for 4-5 years, so you get used to buying bargain bin games and finding those gems which never really made it.

> Even if you do have a good idea but you fail to implement it well,
> someone else will recognize it for the good idea that it is and do it
> better than you can.

Yep. Implementation is the key. So true. I was thinking about the old rogue/hack ASCII character D&D type game. It was a huge success. I even found a version for the Palm and played it for awhile. You certainly can't say much for the graphics, but what is it which drew people to play? What about the text-adventure games? There's still a community today.

Steveth45 wrote:
> I think we need to band together to make fun games,

Exactly. It just needs to be fun. No whiz-bang next big thing. Just a good ol' plain fun game that is well executed.

This has been a good discussion.

'Clinto-Clan'!! ROFL... count me in =D

i definitely think you should post it as an article.

------------------
WARNING:

RADIOACTIVE IE AHEAD!
--------------------
#include <spazz.h>

int name()
{
char name['B','u','d','d','B','o''y']

Most of the programming for Super Mario Brothers went into making the controls just right. Mario was a smooth moving, jumping, freewheeling rectangle before they even added the graphics. Graphics change, and can be updated, but game play is more precious than gold. So many games focus on the technology, usually the graphics, primarily and the fun factor second.

To add on to what I said earlier, lets come up with great ideas, find the best ones and start working on them. Don't worry about that which we lack (artists, etc). Don't worry about killing bad ideas. Be open and honest with critique. Listen to critique. It's these things that forge great games.

------------------
+---------+
|steveth45|
+---------+

I think enemy territory: RTCW was another one, but I don't know the history for sure so I could be wrong.

[This message has been edited by NetCog (edited July 18, 2006).]