I'm Game

I was talking to a friend of mine tonight. Nothing specific – movies, books, tv…the stuff of life, and somehow we got to talking about creating a video game together, with me writing it and him programming it.

We both like puzzle-based games like the Myst series, and we like the visuals in the steampunk genre. We also both like absurdist humor, so there is a lot of potential in our collaborating. (We’re also both currently unemployed, so we have the time.)

It’ll be interesting to see if this actually turns into something, or if it’s just one of those “You know what we should do?” conversations. Even if we never get a game out of it, I can always recycle those elements into a story. I’ve been wanting to put together a steampunk thing for a while, but haven’t had a story arc to tie in all of the diverse scenes I pictured. Coming up with a goal for a player would be a good start.

I would imagine the hardest part in creating this kind of game is coming up with original, compelling puzzles. Neal Stephenson had a good series of puzzles in his novel Diamond Age, which were all based on binary code – about as simple as you can get. The movie Labyrinth used classic brain-teasers as minor plot points, and Asimov’s I, Robot is essentially a collection of logic puzzles disguised as a story.

Writing is such an Id-based occupation, you know? Want an island fortress? Describe one. Wish you had magical powers? Presto! The goal is to find a large enough audience that wants the same things you do, and realize it to everybody’s satisfaction. There’s an economic model for creative types that states you only need 1,000 hard-core fans in order to make a good living off of your creative product. Release $50-$100 worth of stuff a year, and you’ve got yourself a pretty decent salary.

So if/when we ever get this game together, I’ll tell you, and you can tell 999 of your closest friends.