Oh lord it is really hard! Get your minds out of the gutter slimes! It's really hard to write a freaking game. Even simulacrums that many accuse of it being "just copying". Well you shut the F*&^%K up and try to do it yourself. Oh I didn't think so Beeearch!
Many of us have "a take on what we would like to see" and THINK we can do it to but NOOOO! You won't and you can't. Either no free time or not the patience when there is free time. I envy those with that little extra spark that can get off their ass and write a game.
Hell trying to write up a decent module with production value is a task as well.
Lord knows I have built and burnt down my take on the OSR rules and such. Then loooooooose interest and then write a few lines. Should I truck on or gather a team? Should I just write a supplement of house rules? Damn a game is a huge undertaking!
SO my question to all writers and creators is : "How the hell do you do it?"
Too true. What most of us want is to "have written" rather than "to write."
ReplyDeleteIt burns our eyes, the picture does!
ReplyDelete- Ark
That damn picture! I keep looking at it and then wanting to look away.
ReplyDeleteI told my friend the other day playing old school is like putting together a kit car while driving it down the road. If I had any advice it would be to play as you design, it's too easy to get abstract and away from the way rules affect play.
And the picture, arrrrgh.
It's damn hard work and I will never do it again.
ReplyDeleteI looked, god knows I looked...but there just wasn't anything going to do what I needed without massive house ruling.
So I started sketching the notes and for a year and a half I have worked night and day and I am almost to the alpha phase and first playtest copy.
The player guide is the hardest. It's the back bone of the whole project.
I'm so looking forward to the creative part and being done with the mechanics and the math.
Hang tough, take breaks, don't burn out like I did recently. Just one foot in front of the other. I'm trying to remember it's the journey, not the destination. :)
It's the same rule for any writer - you have to sit down and work on it for at least an hour (or more) a day, come rain or shine.
ReplyDeleteDo a little each day. You don't have to write something but just look something up - an inspiring image, an interesting rune, draw a quick sketch of a room. Do at least one thing each day and stick with it. It doesn't always have to be something big and overwhelming, just something small. It will always be in the back of you mind, churning away, all the pieces that you've been looking at, noting, sketching, will start coming together and will be easier to put to paper.
ReplyDeleteThe designing seems to be fairly easy to me. But maybe that's a talent. I don't know.
ReplyDeleteThe playtesting is harder (as your rules have to be easy enough and your concept enticing enough to get other players to play).
Writing down is hardest, as it takes time - and you want your stuff to be read. Well, I do.
So, why do I do it? Seems 't just is something I have to do. Man does what he's gotta do...