Recently I’ve started two game projects at home, none of which are in a good enough state to be published. One of them is TD1 which I’ve discussed here in the previous years, and I finally built a prototype, originally to have a concrete way to explore the issues in a specific defense-vs-attack gameplay. There were some interesting challenges. Then I’ve discussed that with some friends. Now that this is done, I have had little motivation to actually implement the discussed gameplay changes. Instead I have thoughts on other projects.

Then I see a lot of little short games on Itch.io that are “playable” -- small scopes and essentially “mostly” finished. But I honestly don’t feel like playing them much besides the initial intro. Each time I think I’m maybe jealous because these games are finished and mine aren’t… but is that really the case?

Well, let’s analyze this a bit more.

1- I’m jealous these games are “finished” and I don’t finish mine.

• Well, it turns out the first part is only the appearance of it. I fully understand some of the games I see in the various itch.io Jams are only finished “on the surface” -- good enough for a Jam deadline. Each time I try some, I feel like there’s a lack of depth.
• It’s not true that I don’t finish my games. My Labs has Nerdkill and Asqare which, also on the surface, can appear “finished” -- and in fact these 2 are actually finished from my point of view.

2- These games lack gameplay depth. Well, yeah. Totally. All of them.

• Nerdkill is a good example as I never intended for the “game” to have a scoring system because then it would become the game I don’t want it to be (gratification of violence). Not having a scoring system is a core part of this gameplay (“violence is pointless”).
• Asqare could do more, but really what for? It’s a me-too kind of gameplay and the more I add to it, the more it would be clear it’s not Bejeweled -- when I started, I was trying to not be that game, as part of the original implementation was to try different gameplays -- but the problem is that no matter what, it would be compared to that baseline.

3- I do have a number of totally unfinished games. Or maybe it’s better to see them as “not even really started”. They are not even on the Labs page or anywhere to be found.

• Cangrejo is one. It’s 200% me-too and not even clearly defined where it was going anyway. Jump! is another one such. They are essentially technological demos with a complete lack of interest in producing even a finished MVP. I only started them because I saw some other game and I thought “hey how would I implement this”. But once I found the core engine implementation, I didn't really care about all the work needed to make it a playable game.
• In a way TD1 falls into that category as well. I had a vague idea, but I see a huge gap between what the prototype is and where I’d want it to be, and it’s not clear to me the end result would be interesting. Thus, yeah, I have little motivation to put in the effort to bridge that gap, only to end up with something I don’t care for at the end.

In essence, that last part is key: I measure the cost of the project in terms of involvement versus result, and I don’t find it motivation compared to other stuff I may be doing. For example stuff like Conductor, RTAC, or even SDB have a high involvement cost, yet on the other hand I can see the tangible benefits to me of having them working -- the Randall Museum visitors may not see the software behind the train automation, yet I know what drives that automation and I’m proud of it.

The other aspect of these game projects is that I tend to focus on the wrong thing. I find it more interesting to focus on the engine and the framework than the gameplay or the rendering itself. I’m not really a game designer, and I’m definitely not a graphic artist. Eventually implementing the gameplay is the least interesting part of game development so far.