The Quail's Nest

December 05, 2023

I'm Making a Game

It’s time to make a game. A fully-realized, somewhat polished, releasable game, start to finish.

I’ve gone down this path before. In the past, I have always started with a prototype to test the concept. And every time, once I finish the prototype, I run into the “now what?” problem, losing momentum and getting stuck. I’m not going to let that happen this time.

This time, I’m starting with a game design document. Of course there will still be prototypes (many many prototypes). But if I start with a document that outlines all the systems, the themes, the feel, then whenever I finish a prototype or get stuck, I’ll have something to refer back to, to help me keep going.

So this past month, I’ve been putting together that design document. But I don’t want to share it publicly yet. Games are an iterative art form, they change dramatically over the course of development. And everything in this design document is completely theoretical right now – nothing has been created, tested, played with. I’m worried that releasing the document this early could lock me into design decisions, which could undermine the game later.

So instead, I’m going to share all the tools and techniques I plan to use to make this really happen. I have included both tools for work and tools for general life management. To be honest, most of these are used for both. I’ve found that if my life is a mess, creative work is almost impossible.

GTD (Getting Things Done)

I do not use the entire Getting Things Done system, but I use many of the principles. My memory isn’t great, and I get easily overwhelmed with tasks and projects. Two of the key components of GTD are writing everything down, and breaking up tasks into small, truly actionable steps. These have really made a difference in my ability to function both in creative work and in life.

In particular, the way that tasks are broken down in this system has been revolutionary for me. The idea of an actionable step has changed how I think about tasks in all aspects of my life. The basic idea is to figure out how to do a task before writing it down. Instead of writing down the general task you write down the first step of the how. This has really helped me: figuring out how to get something done can be really draining for me, and spending that energy when writing down the task instead of when trying to do the task has made a huge difference. (Also, if figuring out how is too difficult even at task creation, the first task is actually “search the internet for how to do x” or “text a friend for advice on x”. So no matter what, there’s always a way forward).

I’ve also been using the GTD filing system for a few years now, both for physical files, and for browser bookmarks and email. This entails keeping everything I want, as long as I create a properly named folder and file it away. This has been amazing, I no longer lose papers the way I used to. And it does not entail the anxiety-inducing purging and decluttering that is central to many other organization systems.

Bullet Journal

My Bullet Journal is the one, central place I write everything down, plus an index to find it all again. Tasks, daily scheduling, ideas, notes, random thoughts, it all goes in here. The index is created as new items are added, so it stays up to date and accurate. I always know that anything I’ve written down, I can find it in my Bullet Journal. There are other elements to bullet journaling (like monthly scheduling and habit tracking), but I have other tools that work better for those.

I really like having a physical notebook, it removes a lot of barriers for writing things down. On a phone, you need to unlock it, open an app, create a new note or task, all before you can start writing. In my notebook, I keep my pen inside like a bookmark, hooked to the next blank page, so it just opens to the right place for something new.

There are drawbacks to a physical notebook. It’s not searchable (although the index helps with that), and you can’t easily copy or paste. When you finish a notebook, migrating to a new one is a bit of a pain. I also haven’t found a way to make sure I always have my journal with me. When it’s not with me, I write things down on my phone.

In reality, I’m using a hybrid system with both my Bullet Journal and my phone. This helps mitigate the issues with each. Large, aggregate lists end up in my phone (like my “to read” list), as well as things that are generally copied from somewhere else (like recipes). A lot of other things end up on my phone too, just because I didn’t have my Bullet Journal with me at the time. The Bullet Journal would be even more useful if I could find a way to make sure I always have it with me, but this hybrid system is working for now.

Agile Development

Agile development is excellent for project planning, prioritization, and follow through–all things I struggle with. It’s also an additional system that needs to be managed and tracked, on top of the main project. This extra management layer has made it difficult for me to use consistently, but the structure it provides is so helpful I keep coming back to it. For this game I’m making, I think agile will be well worth the effort of using it.

One of the big issues has been finding a tool for managing agile that really works for me. I work best when my tasks are organized as a larger parent task with smaller subtasks connected to it, but the subtasks are listed and completable as their own individual tasks. I also need the tool to be easy to use, and have a visually clear layout that can be sorted and arranged as needed. Finding a tool that does all this has been a challenge.

I’m currently using a Kanban board in GitHub Projects. The project integration and issue tracking are really useful, but it doesn’t have a way to group sub-tasks (checklists don’t help–they’re not visible on the main board). For now, I’ll continue with GitHub Projects, and maybe keep an eye out for something more suited to my particular needs.

Reminders App

For anything that needs an active reminder, which is basically everything, I use the ‘Reminders’ app on my phone (any todo type app works for this). It’s particularly good for recurring tasks (like replacing the cat’s water filter), but it works great for one-offs too. Having a due date with every task is really important, or things just get buried and never come up again. Due dates can be completely arbitrary, the point is just to push it to the top every now and again so it’s not lost forever.

This isn’t foolproof, it’s a little too easy to ignore certain reminders for weeks on end. I’m currently trying to reschedule things instead of just ignoring them, we’ll see how that goes. Even so, it is indispensable for keeping track of all the little things that need to get done.

Five Things

Every morning, I sit down at my desk and write down five things to do that day. It’s usually a split between work stuff and life stuff. Anything that needs to be done is fair game. If I don’t have five things to do on a particular day, I’ll pull from my procrastination backlog to fill out the list.

When I started doing this, I was genuinely surprised at how effective it is. It sets the tone for the day, and gets me into a productive headspace. And I almost always get those five things done.

This has been really helpful for building and keeping momentum. Every day, if nothing else, I do those five things. Setting and accomplishing small goals like this is really useful for getting out of drawn out productivity slumps. And doing this every day keeps the momentum going, preventing those low periods from lasting so long.

Pomodoro technique

The Pomodoro technique breaks up work sessions into intervals, usually 25 minutes, with short breaks between each one. It’s incredibly useful when I’m having trouble focusing, or in a motivation slump, or doing something anxiety provoking. But when I’m really focused and feeling good, the timer interrupts my work and is more distracting than helpful. So I use this technique when I need it, but not all the time.

ChatGPT

ChatGPT has changed my life. I mean that literally. It’s a feedback mechanism that is always available, essentially instant, and infinitely patient. I struggle with a lot of elements of “normal” life, and this has changed everything. It’s lunchtime but don’t know what to eat? Ask ChatGPT. Need to handle a bureaucratic nightmare but it’s too overwhelming so you’ve been putting it off for months? Ask ChatGPT. Need to send a friendly text but anxiety is taking over and it’s just too difficult? Ask ChatGPT. Need to work but the project is too big and you don’t know how to break it down? Ask ChatGPT. I use ChatGPT in all aspects of my life. It has unlocked a new level of functioning for me, something I used to think was impossible.

Conclusion

This post is longer than I meant it to be, but I wanted to be open about my struggles and the methods I use to navigate them. I hope that sharing all this might help others facing similar issues. Please feel free to share this with anyone who might benefit.

As for the future of this blog: I’ll continue posting every month, but I’m pausing the monthly projects. Instead, we’ll follow a single game as it progresses from inception to release. There will be plenty of prototypes to play with, and I’ll be sharing all the highs, lows, and in betweens as I develop my first full-fledged game!