Monthly Group Post
Hey gang, here’s the group update/feedback post for December.
So, it looks like the posting requirement backfired on us. 🙂 I think instead of “posts per week,” the idea should be re-focused to the Ping — how long you go dormant before we ping you about it.
I’d also like to change one of the notions of this group. Rather than a vibe of “this group is for people who want to get a game done and published,” I think “this group is for people who want to get a game as done as they like” fits better. Not every game needs to be published in order for us to be happy with it and take away lessons from designing it.
With that in mind, I’m going to get autocratic for a moment and say that jumping from one game to another is cool. I got a bit of flak for it when I started designing a new game after GenCon, and that is actually why I don’t post much anymore. I have a new game I’ve been working on for the last week or so now, as a way to work on something that is the exact opposite of Know Thyself, in order to get some perspective. So, expect to see some posts about Mythender soon, because I want to crank on that for at least a couple months. Its causing me to make notes about Know Thyself on occasion, because my brain doesn’t feel stalled out on the project when moving forward on another.
Last bit of news from me: we’ve got another member.
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Master Mines 
Is the change of focus to the ping an official change?
I can deal with the change of vibe to game development, but I presonally prefer the idea of carrying it through to a fully realized game for publishing. The thought of helping someone work through a game so they can play it with their buddies is less interesting to me than being a part fo a book that sees print or is released for publication, even if it is out there free of charge. how about this? The goal is to finish the game and if you don’t want to publish, then you can “publish” it to the group so they can share and enjoy?
I agree that designing more than one game should be okay, but should you change the layout of the About piece, or do you now get two entries, Mr. Macklin? 🙂
Lastly, I want to know more about Mythender based on the brief bit you shared with me this week. So, please share!
First, yes, the change of focus to ping will be an official change, if folks like that idea. I want to inquire before doing so, though, since the last time throwing up a change was tried it didn’t work out so well.
I don’t think I want to draw extra attention to myself by posting up two games on the About box. Honestly, I think that needs redesigning, as it was more useful when we had fewer people, but it’s just pushing the important stuff — recent posts and comments — down farther on the page.
As far as the goal, I’m going to let people decide their own goals. After all, you can believe the entire time that you aren’t going to publish, but at the very end you’ve become interested in that process. Or vice versa. Since this group is about open design, I don’t think anyone here is thinking “Oh, I’m just going to play this with my buddies and never release it, even for free.” That, and there is a benefit of communicating with other designers and learning from what they have to say, regardless of their goals.
I’m happy with the ping change; I’m agnostic on the multiple projects thing.
However, I think people explicitly setting their own goals is key. We need to have a place where everyone says, “Here’s what I’m trying to do, and here’s how you can help me get there.” (This needs to be kept current.)
I dig Paul’s comment about explicitly stating the goal of each project. That is a good idea.
It feels weird to say this as a newbie, but what the hell: I’m a little uncomfortable with the rescinding of the pledge to attempt to publish. Not only because I don’t want my “effort” to be “wasted” but because the social pressure of expectation is helpful to me to push me to get the project done. Part of why I want to be in a design group is so that I’ll feel that pressure.
Robert, we’re still a design group, and if you state your goal is to publish, be sure that we’ll call you on it — that is, unless you publicly declare that you’ve changed your goal, which adds its own pressure to it.
But, you can’t publish before you design (at least, you really shouldn’t), and that is ideally the same point we’re all at.
One of the thoughts I have here is that there’s nothing to keep someone from dropping out (as we’ve already had) or to change projects and just stop posting (as we’ve already had). I want to fix the problems that cause those issues (at least, where I can) while still keeping the essence of what you’re talking about in a design group.
Fair enough, consider me having asked to be harassed.