Lets get it started!

BallThrow in Shiva3D

So, this blog is supposed to be about game development so I guess I need to kick off the coverage of actual game development.  The screenshot above shows my game in the Shiva3D IDE.  Of course it is just a jumble of objects at the moment because I was prototyping some of the game play, but I have worked out some of the features that I want to incorporate.  I called the game BallThrow for now but that will change.

So how does one come up with an idea for a game?  Most likely if you are interested in making games you already have ideas and they can come from anywhere--other games you have played, a movie, talking with a friend, etc.  What I want to talk about is how to come up with the right idea.  By right I don't mean the one that will be hugely successful, although I'm sure we would all like to know that, I am talking about the right project for getting your feet wet and getting a finished project under your belt.  I have been reading and listening to a ton of interviews with successful indie game developers and they all say about the same thing--finish your projects!  For my first game I wanted to do something very simple so I would have a better chance getting the thing finished.  The original idea was simply to have several targets that you would have to get a ball through to score points.  You would get 10 balls on each level and in order to move to the next level you would have to get a ball through a certain target.  What I really like about starting with a very simple idea is that it gives you a little breathing room to add features as development progresses.  The game begins to have a life of its own.  BallThrow, for instance, has changed to become a game in which you have an infinite number of balls, but there is only one target and you move to the next level once the ball hits the target.  In order to get to the target you will need to position objects in the level so that the ball bounces off the objects and eventually reaches the goal.  The basic programming of the game will not change much, but as I thought more about what would be fun for me to play, the game naturally changed.  There were definitely moments in which I came up with ideas that would have made the game more difficult to make. I really liked some of the ideas and was set on implementing them, but the more I thought about it the more I realized that I would be making it that much more difficult to finish the project.


Keep it simple, keep it small.  Once you have a few successes, let your ambition run wild.  Make that epic MMORPG you have been dreaming about =)