Note: Very long post, I include both board game and video game design.
I love game design, it's pretty much like solving a puzzle that can be played once completed. It also touch various aspect from computer programming to artwork which is perfect for a Jack of all trades like me who likes to do varied tasks. Unfortunately, Game Design is also a curse, not a gift. Because you are constantly thinking about it, even when you don't want to. So I cannot prevent my self from getting new ideas, they comes in when I have not even finished producing my previous idea.
Lately with my lack of time, my low amount of completed games, and my huge amount of ideas, I have been questioning myself again if I have been doing things correctly in the recent years. Many years ago I tried to stop board game design and focus on video game design as it offered more chance getting revenue and they were less restrictive than board game design.
Now this morning I remembered something that somewhat explained everything. Many years ago I passed some profile tests, and besides learning that I am a Jack of all trades, I also remembered in one of the test that in the "Production" vs "Prestige" axis, I just sucked at both. So this could be why I fail at creating games, it's not because I don't have the skill to design or program those games, it's because I suck at production in general.
Unfortunately, game design requires production. You can design a piece of art or music and try to sell it on shutterstock or any appropriate web site, but you cannot simply write down a game idea and sell it. That idea must be produced to know if it can actually works, you have to be a genius to design a game without any playtesting at all. Now what's unfortunate, is not only I like game design but improved my skills a lot in the recent 10 years, but have have little idea how to benefit from those skills.
It's also very frustrating, because I have more than 100 game ideas on my list, and they will never be completed. They are remaining idle on my todo list which constantly haunt me even more as they never get completed and removed from my todo list.
So my question is:
"Is there another way I can use my game design skills without producing any games?"
I generally have an attention span of 2-4 weeks when I work on a project, Then I jump on the next project. I generally have the "Do and forget" mindset when I accomplish work. I tried various technique to help improve productivity and they have vaguely paid off:
Work on smaller projects: That seems logical, if the project is smaller, it should be finishable in a smaller time frame. Now the problem is that very simple ideas could end up very complicated to design. It's very hard to predict how much time it will take do design a game. Production is predictable, but not design. It reminds me of my Stock Market game idea that was very simple and offered a bit more strategy than St0ck T!cker. Even with a computer program to generate game outcome, it took me more than month to just balance the behavior of the stock market and there is still work to do. I can hardly design faster once you are assisted by computers.
Divide and conquer: Separate the projects in various milestone. For example, the game design, the artwork, the interface, etc. That would allow jumping from a game idea to another by completing different milestone on each project according to my mood. For example, I am in the mood to do art, I check which game idea requiring art and complete it. Still the divide and conquer works when you are in production status, the design phase can still last indefinitely.
Order of dependencies: Sometime programming or designing certain games can help in the production of other games. So the idea would be to determine which project to complete and in what order to make early project help later project. This could be a way to distribute the work overtime. It's like using games as milestone, still sometimes the most simple game will not be completable within a month.
Monetization is also a problem. People are not willing to pay for a small game with low quality artwork. I could probably do an Atari style game within a month, but are people willing to pay for it since I can hardly go lower than 1$. There is so much competition out there, especially in the app world, that it's hard not having a competitor that can do better than you.
There is also the "too many game syndrome" where I keep wondering if my game ideas are really worth publishing, as it might either not get any attention or simply be done by somebody else in the first place. Even I have a hard time keeping up with the so many games out there as a player, so I feel guilty in trying to add more games to the list. If I design a game, I need to bring something that did not exist before, or something that nobody else can successfully design. Recently I tried "Undermine" and realized that it was partially one of the game idea I had. I think any of my game idea could get produced by somebody else eventually, so why bother putting the effort.
The only way I could see my design see the light is if I work for a game company or if I am rich enough to pay people to do the work for me. Both cases are very unlikely to happen.
One idea I had is to maybe do blogging or something similar because I like teaching and experimenting. For example, I programmed a pass code system to generate passwords like old NES video games. It's a project that lasted 2 weeks. So writing blog post about it and post my test results is actually possible in 1 month. I also have another ideas to see how I could make a map generator. That should also be a small project that could last around a month. So in this case, I would be experimenting with video game concepts without programming any game in itself.
Some bloggers manage to gain small revenue from blogging, but it generally requires a lot of view (1000+ per day) still I don't need to sell anything. Also it might be more suitable to game programming rather than game design. I could for example post by results for balancing my stock market game, but I would have never though of doing that balance in the first place without trying to design a game. So it's unlikely to do post strictly on game design.
The other drawback, it that my 100+ game ideas remains in limbo. Another idea was to use those ideas as fake games. For example, in the "Arcadecraft" indie game, you had various arcade and game titles with themes, but you could not actually play those games. You just presume they work. If I was a better artist, I could make game covers for games that does not exists. Or assemble screen shots or make prototype of a game that does not exist or work. I don't know if there are other ways to use game ideas as fake games.
Else the only projects I could consider keeping floating are lifetime projects like my "Wizardry Legacy" video game. I generally have no pressure to complete the game, because it's a life time project and it's open source. I can also get support from the community if I need it because it's an open source game. WizCiv, my master of magic remake, would also fit in the same category.
So I am open to comments and ideas. Let me know what you think. Maybe there are some people in the same situation as I am and found another way to get around it.
I am very sorry for the late reply, I was having an intense discussion on BGG located here:
https://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/2498066/there-another-way-use-my-ga...
Here is a summary of what I have been said over there.
I generally stop working on a game idea due to some form of mind exhaustion that makes me stuck and prevent me from progressing further.
I tried to focus on small projects to have a feeling of progression and get a form of positive reinforcement. But right now, the ideas pile up faster than the production of those ideas.
Fun should be the main criteria for something to be a hobby. Since game design has been lately more work and frustration than fun, then I should stop.
I could be on the edge of a burnout, so I need to drop things from my todo list. Not thinking about game design could help.
Maybe I should be more focussing on exploration, rather than production, for the fun of it.
Since I hate selling stuff, money has never been my primary objective. I always tried to make games I like and not games that will generate income.
It seems I could be more skilled as a playtester since I have an ease in finding issues in game. But I might not be suited to design games from scratch. So becomming a playtester could be an idea.
It seems I could be more skilled at redesigning games that already exist, or creating variants since I already have a game to work with. I did a couple of redesign and variants already and it generally went well.
Another idea would be to become a game reviewer. Due to my lack of space, I would review digital board games and strategy video games.
I would need a lot of changes in my life to gain the time needed to design games. Some changes could occur in the years to come while other could never happen.
So for now, I should stick only to my 2 lifetime projects Wizardry Legacy and WizCiv.