Good at turning a phrase? Excellent – now turn seven of them, all equally-well written, that make sense in four different contexts, as said by three different characters. If nothing else, writing non-linear text game dialog and narrative is an exercise in constraints, creative reuse, and conviction.

Say you’ve got an outline for a text-based game. You know what the game’s about, who the main characters are, the major events of each chapter, what the player’s abilities are; all of the major pieces. Now it’s time to start writing – but you’re stumped. How can you write a story where anything can happen? How do you set up the player’s options? Where do you even start?

I recently released my first full-length text game for Choice of Games, titled The Last Monster Master (clocking in at 250,000(!) words), and through the process I came up with a basic framework to help write it chapter by chapter. I used the excellent (and free) Chat Mapper to write each non-linear chapter before bringing the final text into ChoiceScript, Choice of Games’ own writer-friendly scripting language.

I broke the process down by taking six passes through each chapter, which helped significantly in retaining focus. What’s more, Chat Mapper has a great feature that lets you change the color of each individual text node. To help track each text pass as I worked the chapters, I used this feature to change the color of each node to mark it as finished for that pass (as in the screenshots below).

Pass  1 – Stub Text (No Color)

The first pass is all about laying down the structure for how the chapter will play out. Instead of writing any actual dialog or descriptions, use stub dialog as placeholders to indicate who will say what and when they’ll say it, and what the player’s options will be.

If there are different branches depending on stat values or other conditions, indicate the stat in question and describe the options in plain English. Don’t worry about writing any game logic yet; that’ll come later.

Avoid excessive revisions (or any, if you can help it) in this pass – its main purpose is to get the high-level structure of the chapter down into a readable format. When you’re done here, you’ll have a first draft of a roadmap for everything that comes next.

In the below sequence from The Last Monster Master, one of the player’s monsters is stuck in a tree during an attack. The player must choose to use their Telepathy or Body Language detection skills to help the monster withstand the attack, or to run over and help directly.

Pass 2 – Stub Text Revision (Yellow)

In the next pass, focus only on revising the structure you just created. You’re looking only at the placement of things – don’t worry about misspellings or anything related to the text, since everything you’ve written will be replaced in revisions.

You’re primarily looking for choices or option branches that don’t make sense or are inconsistent with the story, edge cases that can lead to problems later, and dead ends that don’t link back to the main narrative flow.

Secondarily, you’re making sure that the structure so far makes use of all of the player stats or ability options you’ve planned to use in this chapter. If it turns out that you haven’t implemented as many as you would’ve liked, make a conscious decision to either amend your original plan, create new sequences or options that use these stats or make a note to utilize the forgotten stats in future chapters.

Pass 3 – First-Pass Text (Orange)

With the structure organized and refined, now it’s time to write the actual text the player will see. This is a fairly straightforward pass, but just as before, maintaining your focus is key.

Don’t worry about setting values for variables, structuring transitions, or anything else that isn’t pure writing. And just like most pure writing, this is both the most fun and the most time-intensive part.

Pass 4 – Text Revision (Purple)

Did you survive writing the actual chapter? Great! Things start to move significantly faster now. You’re about to enter editor mode.

Read through the first-pass text you just wrote with a merciless eye. Everything related to the text itself is fair game – spelling, grammar, incorrect references to characters or places, tighter word choices, etc. Again, keep your focus on the writing. Make the text sing.

Pass 5 – Variables (Blue)

The structure is nailed down and the text is looking tight. Now, go through the chapter again, looking for any instance where variables are invoked, specifically anywhere where player stats are modified or referenced in order to determine outcomes.  It’s likely you’ll also have a few special cases for unique player items, one-off encounters and the like.

You’ll refine the values used here in subsequent revisions, gameplay balancing and playtesting. For now, set a baseline for where you think values need to be.

Keeping an external reference document for how much of a given stat is required per chapter or before significant events can help with consistency. For example, if the player’s Strength stat must be at least 45 for them to kick a wooden door down in Chapter 4, it’s logical to require somewhere around 65 Strength to knock down a metal door in Chapter 6 (i.e., the requisite should go up).

Doing this in a dedicated pass helps enforce good internal consistency for stat checks, which will help with across-the-board adjustments to values later.

Pass 6 – Export and Logic (Green)

Finally, you need to bring your (almost) finished chapter into the development tool you’re using to make the game itself. Fortunately, Chat Mapper exports to XML, JSON, Excel, and Rich Text formats, giving you plenty of options to work with. For The Last Monster Master, however, I simply went through each text node and copied it into my ChoiceScript file, adjusting for formatting and segment transitions as needed.

If you’re also writing the actual logic that happened behind the scenes, you’ll need to start scripting this as you bring the text into the game. Fortunately, since you’ve already resolved the questions of what needs to happen when and where, each scripting task is handily divorced from the content for pure problem solving.

Other Methods

This isn’t the only way to go about writing non-linear text games, but it worked well for this project. Depending on your style of development and the tools you’re using, you could opt to export your stub text into the game early on so you can actually play through it as soon as possible. Plus, since Chat Mapper supports Lua for scripting, you could even set up all of the logic you’d need directly inside the program, as long as you don’t mind possibly scripting everything again in your actual development environment.

Whatever process you choose, stay focused on one task at a time, celebrate each milestone and take notes for things you could improve upon. Wrangling non-linear narrative is not a trivial task – so why not make a game out of it?

Elegy for a Dead World is about writing, remembering, loss and perspective. The premise is simple – you are the last person to witness the wreckage of long-forgotten worlds. Great calamities have taken place, and the only thing standing in the way of these worlds disappearing from the continuum of history is you.

If you buy into it as a player, the scope of the responsibility can be intimidating. If you’re timid about your creative writing capabilities, the core concept of having to write to literally save the world can be terrifying. For such a simple premise, the stakes seem inordinately high.

But it wasn’t always like this.

“I needed a break”

In development by members of the Indie Game Collective in Boston, Elegy was originally conceived by Dejobaan Games’ Ichiro Lambe as a break from intense development on other projects.

“I was at the point where I needed a break. You know crunch, right? You get burned out,” Lambe says. “So I said I need to take a break, and since I’ve been 10 years old, I’ve had this concept for a game where you walk to the right and that’s the whole game.” Popcannibal’s Ziba Scott and Luigi Guatieri joined to provide art, and after Scott suggested to theme the project in British Romantic poetry, a distinct atmosphere began to emerge.

“Creative people are curious, they are intrigued by what they might create, they are curious about the physical world around them, relationships, and the inner world of ideas and emotions.”
–From The Creative Personality, David Lyman’s essay of 34 characteristics that lead to greater creativity

As they were writing and sketching ideas, they invited fellow Collective member Eric Asmussen of 82apps to review the drawings so far and provide feedback. With no text in place to provide context, Asmussen’s interpretation of the events that had doomed the extinct civilization was completely different from what the team had originally conceived – yet his interpretation was still consistent with the sketches.

In this gulf between the team’s original authored intent and the player’s experience, Lambe saw an opportunity to engage players’ creativity in a subtle way.

“You know the way that people read the Bible, or they read any work of art and they interpret it, and they argue about its meaning?” says Lambe. “And some people will say one thing and it’s supported by one fact, and others say another thing and it’s supported by other facts. I would love for Elegy to make people realize there was specific meaning behind the worlds we created.”

With this new objective in mind, the team revisited the project’s basic method of interaction. Instead of just walking right, players would now add their own text in an attempt to paint their own picture of what had taken place. Players could choose from structured prompts for prose or verse, or opt for totally free writing.

Instead of just consuming the world, players would now co-create it alongside Lambe, Scott and Guatieri.

“Forget Myers-Briggs. A study out of BI Norwegian Business School has determined the signposts of a “creative” personality. Conducted by Professor Øyvind L. Martinsen, the study posed 200 questions to 481 people.

The subjects fell into three categories. One group of “baseline” subjects such as lecturers or managers, and two groups of people who are generally considered to be creative, such as students of advertising and performing artists. Martinsen says he found meaningful differences between the creative and noncreative groups.”
–How To Tell If You’re Creative (Hint: You Might Be a Bit of a Jerk), Fast Company

Elegy had transformed from a simple walking exploration game to a tool designed to tease creativity out of the player – something that Lambe strongly believes in.

“There’s creativity in everybody; there’s creative writing in everybody. You go to Reddit, to Imgur, to Facebook, and there’s a lot of creative output there. People write things that are very clever, very touching, very insightful. So I would like to push that forward, creative writing in games. And I would love to see people say, ‘Elegy is giving me just enough of a framework to get into my own creative writing.’”

The World Begins With You

At first, Elegy gives off an air of sad futility. As you tread through empty landscapes, the chaos has already been wrought, the world already ended – what good can you really do?

Yet in exploring the ruins, in trying to put to words an explanation or empathetic declaration or final remembrance, players who may be embarrassed by their writing ability transcend their fears in order to honor the dead. As they fall deeper in sync with the fate of this lost world, their own worries and insecurities fade away.

The true elegy that takes place does not honor the legions of deceased inhabitants of whatever made-up society your avatar wanders. The true elegy marks the death of the concept of yourself as a non-creative entity.

And from the ashes of imaginary planets, a new you rises – grounded, humbled, solemn, and joyful – all at the same time.

“Mommy, will you show me a bedtime story?”

“Yes, dear. Now get ready for bed.”

Charlie hops into bed, pulling the comforter tight over his little body. Wiggling his toes beneath the sheets in anticipation.

Mommy opens the closet door and takes the small black headset off of the top shelf, carefully fitting it over Charlie’s tiny head before kissing him gently on the forehead. She takes a step back, regarding her little man one last time before hitting the light switch. The soft throbbing glow from the headset fills the room as Charlie lays back in bed.

She closes the door, leaving him to it.

***

Charlie’s heading down into a cave.

There’s been an accident of some kind, with panic and frenzy all around him as people rush out of the cave’s mouth. Charlie isn’t scared – in this world, he’s six feet tall and brawny. It’s a familiar story.

He grabs a fleeing civilian, terrified for his life. “What happened here?”

“I don’t know! It was just a tour of the deep cavern – then there was an explosion! People talking about diamonds, jewels… I have to get out of here!”

The man races away into the safety of the woods as the recall videos start playing. In the top left of the VR screen, a brief scene shows Charlie’s avatar looking at a framed picture of someone as he looks worried. In the top right, his avatar eyes a photo of glittering jewels with a greedy gaze.

It’s the first choice of the game. Charlie considers his options carefully.

The role of practice as the key to improvement is a simple concept that most people intuitively understand. But it isn’t the whole story.

From 1983 to 1984, sociologist Daniel F. Chambliss set out to research the very nature of excellence in order to discover what really makes some people better than others. Because of their easily quantifiable results, he chose to study Olympic swimmers and their habits.

After attending numerous national and international-class swimming meets and spending years interviewing coaches, swimmers and officials, he concluded that the thing that separated the Olympic-caliber athletes from the rest of the swimmers wasn’t any one innate aspect of talent or drive, but a culmination of many little decisions taken along the way.

Little decisions, like consciously deciding to come to every practice on time, or committing to making small, continual adjustments to their swimming form, all enabled them to shave valuable seconds from their times during meets – seconds that added up to victories.

Chambliss went as far as to dismiss the very idea of talent, calling it “a useless concept.” Talent, he said, falsely mystifies the notion of excellence instead of grounding it in the numerous advantages inherent in the person’s habits, family, genetics, circumstances and atmosphere that all contribute to high performance.

Only by doing actions “ordinary in themselves” that add up over time to be qualitatively superior to others, Chambliss noted, do people ascend to the highest levels. Simply put, excellence is mundane.

Mundanity in Coding

There’s an old joke about programming. “If you have a problem, give it to an American Engineer. If you have a hard problem, give it to an Indian Engineer. If you have an impossible problem, give it to a Russian Engineer.”

Indeed, Russia has a strong reputation for producing top software engineers. But aside from the hard push from the government for math and science education during the Soviet era, there are other factors to consider.

When I asked a Russian programmer I worked with why this was, he told me that when he was in school, the computers used in Russian computer science courses were actually very outmoded. So much so that debugging took such an ungodly amount of time that it forced the students to develop an increased awareness of their code as they wrote it in order to reduce careless errors and minimize mistakes that would take hours to fix.

The unique challenges posed by their learning environment instilled in them such a rigorous attention to detail early on that it became a career-long habit, naturally making them superior programmers to those who didn’t face the same obstacle.

“But of course there is no secret; there is only the doing of all of those little things, each one done correctly, time and again, until excellence in every detail becomes a firmly ingrained habit, an ordinary part of one’s everyday life.”
– Daniel F. Chambliss, The Mundanity of Excellence

Mundanity in Performing

Singer/songwriter Andy Grammer isn’t quite a household name, but he’s getting there. He’s toured with Natasha Bedingfield and Colbie Caillat, filmed music videos with Rainn Wilson and recorded songs you’d recognize from the radio. He’s living every musician’s dream – but he didn’t start out that way.

When I was in college at SUNY Binghamton, Andy was a fellow undergrad student. I would watch him sing at the occasional open mic night and on-campus event. Whenever he sang, it was immediately obvious that his abilities dwarfed the other amateurs there – but in the few times I saw him, he never hung around after performances with the other singers and students.

“The most important thing I learned from my father about being a musician was the work ethic,” Grammer says. “He worked really hard, he traveled all across the country. I saw his respect for his audience, respect for himself. I saw him take days off where he wouldn’t talk to rest his voice. I saw the work it takes to cultivate an artist’s career.” –AndyGrammer.com

When he later moved to Santa Monica, he put in significant time busking on the pier and the promenade. Seeing that his songs alone weren’t drawing enough attention, he taught himself to beatbox, and continually reinvented his performance – until an agent caught his new act on the street and eventually signed him to a record deal.

For Andy, music was his life, and he was serious enough about it to constantly push himself forward.

Excellence Comes From Meaning

If Chambliss’s findings are to be believed, excellence in any field is a combination of persistence, motivation, and the ability and affordance to clearly establish a goal, stake out the path to it, then simply follow the path you’ve laid out for yourself.

Rather than despairing that you’ll never be as good as your heroes or being frustrated with your seemingly inadequate abilities, excellence lies in the stark decision to consciously use every decision point that comes your way as an opportunity to help you become what you want to be.

In this way, the secret to excellence lies in one simple decision you must consciously make: the decision to live for something.

Making games can be emotionally complicated. The joyous rush of creation, the ego-shattering freefall of disappointment when something doesn’t work out, the creeping sense of frustrated horror when searching for an elusive solution to some arcane design problem – game development has it all, and it’s easy to feel overwhelmed.

Fortunately, your emotions are hiding a secret from you: Like a cipher, hidden inside are instructions on what to do next.

Despite what you may believe, your emotions are not irrational or strange impulses to be squashed down. Emotions are felt for a reason – they’re the wishes of your physiological self trying to communicate with your sentient mind. Learn how to decode them, and you can harness their significant power to understand your process – and yourself – much better, improving the quality of your projects.

Here are a few ways that taking note of your emotions can result in better outcomes, seen through the lens of independent development:

Embarrassment

You’re setting out on your own project, and you have no shortage of ideas. But how do you properly set the scope so the game is something you’ll actually be able to finish? In general, the smaller and more manageable the scope is, the better. If you’re early on in making games, it’ll seem natural to shoot for an ambitious game – even if you think you’re scaling things down.

Instead, if you find that you still feel confident you can complete the game with the current scope, try reducing it even more. Do this until you feel embarrassed to set such a seemingly low target for yourself. Once you start to feel embarrassment, stop reducing – this is the scope you want.

Because game development always expands in complexity, starting with something that seems far too easy for you ensures that, when complications arise, they won’t reveal themselves to be so far beyond your abilities they stymie development entirely.

Exuberance

You’re deep in the design phase, and there seems to be no shortage of ideas for features. Stray thoughts turn into entire characters, levels, interactions and mechanics – an enormous amount of pure design fuel that you’ll most likely prototype and decide not to use, never get around to addressing, or pursue for a lengthy period of time before abandoning. Of course, some of these ideas will radically change your game for the better, but the odds of success for most of these ideas are low.

Instead of getting carried away with the vast array of potential directions you could take the project, becoming aware of this exuberance-driven design high helps guard against potential wasted time or feelings of having wasted energy thinking of so many ideas that don’t end up getting used.

“Emotions are data. They are just input from your biological system. You do not have to let them rule you. Observe them and then re-observe the situation before acting.” –Phoenix Perry

Hope

You’ve brought your game to a playable state, and it’s starting to actually feel like something. Now it’s time to put it in front of other people. As you work through your first batch of playtests, what do you feel? Excited? Nervous? Hopeful? If it’s the latter, then you may have things to work on that you’re already aware of. Feeling reliant on faith when going into a playtest could mean that you know, deep down, that the game isn’t straightforward enough to be accessible by external players yet.

Curiosity would be a better emotion to be feeling, since that would imply that you feel the game is solid enough to be interacted with in multiple, perhaps unintended ways.

Paying attention to when you feel hope can also be useful during development itself. If, when trying to explain a concept or idea to a team member who just doesn’t get it, the reliance on faith could indicate that you need to either simplify the message to communicate it better or reduce the mechanic, feature or whatever it is you’re trying to explain at the core.

Trust

The game is finally done, and you’ve been talking to a few potential business partners. Publishers, portals, co-developers… there are a few options you could pursue, but the right path isn’t clear. One proposed deal seems standard, another seems too good to be true, one seems unreasonably strict, but comes with the remote possibility of huge success. Who do you go with?

When picking a business partner, trust is paramount. When talking with your business contacts, what kind of impression do they give? Do they seem genuine? Are they overselling their capabilities? Do they drop out of contact for inexplicable lengths of time, only to return like nothing happened?

If you’re going to do business with an external party, it’s key that you trust them. Building trust and comfort is a primal way to make sure you don’t get eaten in the wild.

The Indie Fund specifically mentions the importance of trusting your partners:

“If you feel uneasy about sharing your ideas with a potential investor/colleague/acquaintance/whoever, that should serve as a warning to you. Stay away from people you mistrust. Millions of years of evolution have trained your brain to recognize what’s good and bad for your survival, so trust your instincts.”  –Indie Fund

Listen Close

These are just a few ways to tap into the power of your emotions. Once you realize that every emotion you feel has a reason for being there, as minor or irrational as they may seem, you unlock an incredibly powerful way to take control of your decisions in a completely new way.

For all the hand-wringing about the indie games bubble, concerns of an over-saturated marketplace, and fears that soon it will be impossible to make any kind of headway as an indie developer, the path forward has already been charted. It may have sneaked right by, under your nose. It will seem obvious, perhaps insultingly so.

The next phase of indie game development will be powered by collaboration.

All this means is that more developers, instead of toiling in seclusion, will join their efforts with others with similar goals in order to make, market, and sell games.

It’s already happening in development with compilations like SPORTSFRIENDS, combining four separate niche local multiplayer games together under one collective branding that’s easier to understand from a consumer point of view. On the studio level, it’s happening with experiments like Fixer Studios, a “collaborative cloud studio” that draws from a “constantly fluctuating workforce of veteran volunteers” who pool their time and resources to work on games as needed.

It’s already happening in marketing with the Indie MEGABOOTH, harnessing the shared power of dozens of indie game developers to compete with triple-A marketing budgets at convention floors at shows like PAX and GDC.

It’s already happening in sales with Humble Bundle and similar bundle sites, bringing indie games that may have gone unnoticed directly to attentive gamers eager for a deal on great games.

“The four of us made our games around the same time, and we’ve all influenced each other. By collaborating on one project, we hope to make something that transcends any of the individual games.” –SPORTSFRIENDS Kickstarter

But bringing a bunch of people together to accomplish a common goal – isn’t that the same thing as traditional triple-A development? Not exactly. The difference here is that independent collaboration of this type has grown out of needs that are no longer able to be met by the traditional worker/studio/publisher system. And for developers operating independently, there are ways to take advantage of the unique benefits being an indie offers.

Flexibility. As each remaining triple-A studio sheds workers or shutters completely, more and more of those jobless developers either leave the industry or go indie. As indies band together in temporary or permanent fashion to accomplish mutual goals, the lie that the triple-A industry sells to its workers over and over again – that their jobs are with the company, instead of on a given project – finally ends.

Relieved from the stresses of having to relocate across the country (or the globe) if they’re let go, and able to function with a higher level of autonomy that working independently enables, devs can join forces with other entities at will, per-project, with no party’s life being completely upended if the project doesn’t work out and their “stable job” in the industry ends up being precisely the opposite.

Network effect. As indies collaborate with others to undertake projects, it creates another tangible benefit: increased access to personal networks. This comes in handy for just about everything from sourcing leads on contract work to promoting titles and events.

For example, when my company Studio Mercato was presented with the opportunity to co-host a local multiplayer game-themed event featuring the arcade machine we built for our game Crystal Brawl, we were able to leverage not only each team member’s personal network to get the word out, but the development teams for the three other games presenting.

“Individually, we’re tiny. Together, we are mega. Sure, it may be tough for indies to get noticed, but we’ve pooled our resources to get a huge booth, front and center at the show, to showcase all our awesomely creative games. Our booth is now bigger than a big studio booth!” –Indie MEGABOOTH Facebook Page

Of course, there are parallels to triple-A development – groups of people working together toward a common goal – but there are key differences.

Triple-A development is often composed of interlocking pieces that must function together just so, like building a pyramid from a singular vision. Indie collaborations are looser entities that, while also needing to function together, are more open to interpretation and unconventional solutions in the spirit of empowered discovery – like conceiving and painting a mural as a group. The difference is autonomy and empowerment, not only in creative vision, but in life outside of the studio.

And it’s happening right now. As the remaining big studios continue to contract, spilling out more independent workers into the wild, the indie developers of tomorrow will take the time to learn how to operate on their own.

They will make mistakes, learn lessons, and come to grips with the realities of indie development. Eventually, they will find themselves.

Then, they will find each other.

Finishing things is hard. For all the brand new conveniences and leisure distractions available today, the harsh reality is that the world only values you for what you produce. This is largely true for game development – unless you’re backed by tycoon money or are able to live frugally for extreme periods of time, you need to produce if you’re going to get anywhere.

Shipping games is hard. Triple-A games routinely measure development cycles in years. Even among more nimble studios, indie stalwart Vlambeer is an aberration, having produced 18 games in just three years – and with a core team of two – no small thanks to the developer’s experience finishing projects in development spurts that last just a matter of hours.

For small teams and soloists, similar short term development-focused events like game jams, Ludum Dare, One Game a Month and others afford opportunities to buckle down and get something out the door. If shipping is a muscle, it stands to reason that it must be exercised.

Well, so what? None of this is new information. Even the muscle metaphor isn’t new, though it remains apt. So why write about a problematic dynamic that’s already understood?

Because even if you intellectually know how to do it, actually shipping something is really, really hard to do – with special regard to small projects with no bureaucracy to hide behind, or way to escape the inherent personalization that goes into projects released by small teams or individuals.

First, there are the self-imposed doubts, fears and worries that make the possible seem impossible, frightening, or even dangerous, a few being:

Fear of inadequacy. That creeping dread that tells you whatever you put out into the world will be terrible. It’s related to imposter syndrome, but in of itself is more of a defense mechanism to protect your ego from being damaged. It’s the fear of embarrassment, of being deemed unworthy, of being judged poorly by the outside world.

“A failure to me reflects directly on my self worth as a human being and a contributing member of society. For example, failing at something such as Game a Week causes me to think: ‘Wow, you can’t even accomplish one measly prototype in seven days? You are a terrible game developer and will never be successful at anything ever.'”
–Adriel Wallick

Anxiety of not knowing where to start. The sense of being utterly overwhelmed when faced with starting a new endeavor you don’t totally understand. Here, the gap between where you want to be – standing proud against a photogenic wind, with a finished whatever in your hand, gazing into the sunset with the satisfied glow of all the hard work lying safely in the past – and where you are, at square one, with no clue where to begin, let alone how to do the nuts and bolts of the thing.

Fear of choosing poorly. The queasy worry that the reason you’ve never done anything good in this field is because you’re simply not meant for it, that you never were and that all your time spent pursuing it has been in vain while your true calling as a rock salt salesperson waits for you to put the pieces together. The sense of second-guessing all your efforts, even as you struggle with the fears and anxieties mentioned above.

The best advice for handling these kinds of traps is simple in theory, but not in practice: There is no advice. You simply have to do it yourself.

The truth is, you can read all the blog posts on the internet about how to learn to ship projects, but if that’s the kind of content and help you’re seeking out, odds are it’s an indication that you’re still not ready to jump in and start completing projects.

And there’s nothing wrong with that. But there comes a point when you know, deep down, that you have all the pieces necessary to get on your way.

Read enough material to know what Unity/GameMaker/Construct 2/UDK are? Download them and mess around. Don’t wait, don’t read another article, just do it. Totally baffled yet? Good – start looking for help, one step at a time. This is how The Stanley Parable was born.

Struggling with a half-finished concept that never seems to get any traction? Take a hard look at the core focus of your game, refine it, and start cutting everything else until the raw kernel of that game is evident and workable – and then release it and move on.

Jam It Out

Here’s an example. I had long heard about game jams and how fun they were, and was curious to try going to one, but I was held back by fear. Up to that point, I had only worked in teams on bigger projects and was scared that I wouldn’t be able to contribute in a small team on a 48-hour dev cycle.

In November of 2012 I went to one anyway, still afraid that I would be totally useless… and lo and behold, we ended up making a decent enough jam game. Ever since, I’ve grown more and more comfortable going to jams, even when the project doesn’t exactly pan out, because I realized that the fears that gave me pause were bogeymen I had made up.

Shipping is a muscle. It can be learned through practice, but nobody can flex it for you. When faced with the uneasiness that comes with taking on a new project or finally finishing an old one, the key is to do it now. You are never quite ready to start – but you are always ready to begin.

If you’re a game developer, it’s likely part of you is terrified right about now. All the rules of the games business seem to be in constant flux, an incredible amount of studios have closed or shrunk to shadows of their former selves, and the phrase “job security” seems to be an oxymoron.

There’s a good reason for it, though: The gaming singularity is near.

A bit of explanation first. The popular concept of the technological singularity, commonly referred to as the singularity, refers to a hypothetical period in time when the rapid speed of technological advances will outpace our ability to predict what will come next.

Some predict that we’ll end up augmenting our bodies with technology to essentially become cyborgs. Others say we’ll transfer our consciousness into machine containers. Others still figure the lines between human and machine will be blurred in ways we can’t quite understand yet.

In any scenario, the idea of the singularity refers to a time when the possibilities made real by technology will be unpredictable, both in their effects on humanity and what forms they’ll take.

And, in its own small way, this is the path the game industry appears to be heading in.

Unpredictable Present, Unknown Future

In recent years, the landscape of the game industry has turned violently tumultuous. The occasional round of layoffs has risen to a torrent of downsizing as a veritable changing of the guard took place, washing away most of the mid-tier developers.

Social and mobile game companies rose from obscurity, buoyed by Apple and Facebook’s world-changing platforms to become behemoths in their own regard. Leveraging new methods of distribution, indies rode their quirky niche status into prominence, competing alongside huge games backed by million-dollar budgets.

Combine all of these developments with the new viral channels of the past decade, an increased access to amateur-friendly game development tools, and even more indie-friendly distribution methods, and what do you get? None other than the harbinger of the gaming singularity, the one and only Flappy Bird.

Think back to 15 years ago. Microsoft’s first Xbox had yet to be released. The PS2 reigned supreme. The Dreamcast was still kicking. Would you have ever dreamed then that a game made by a solo developer in Vietnam over 72 hours could go on to not only command the game industry’s attention, but make $50,000 a day in advertising alone?

The mystifying success of that game should be enough to tell you that 1. Nobody has any clue what the rules are in today’s game market, and 2. It’s only going to get weirder from here.

With the industry already in a state of torrid flux, the pace of change keeps roaring by. New consoles (and new console distribution pipelines for indies), Valve’s play for the living room, the Oculus, more distribution methods like Humble Bundle and itch.io, the insanely insane rise of live game streaming, plus an arguably saturated indie bubble means nobody has any kind of clue what the next big hit game, genre, platform or trend will be.

In one light, it’s terrifying. Strategies that used to work so well may fail for unclear reasons. The gaming empires of today may fall by the wayside if they fail to catch on in time.

On the other hand, it’s exhilarating. No known shortcuts to prosperity means the time to experiment is now. Who knows, maybe people really want to play games where you walk around and look at stuff or, I don’t know, read. Why not see if it works?

The gaming singularity is near – if it’s not here already. No matter your station or vested interest, as gamers, you have to admit that it’s an incredible time to be playing.