Area 161

Groove’n

// May 18th, 2011 // By Archon // Game Design, iDevBlogADay

As the other half of Area-161, it was inevitable that I would be contributing to this blog at some point.  Like my partner Tom, I’ve yet to publish a game though.  That being said, we’re making this happen.  Of course we talk, and we share ideas.  Collaborating with a friend is exponentially beneficial.  Though my part of what we do is being the game guy.  I’m charged with thinking up games, game mechanics, and trying to strike that fun chord that used to make me drop another quarter.

What I’ve recently learned about creative thought is that you aren’t necessarily hit with a stroke of brilliance.  Though you won’t get hit with anything unless you want to be.  Tom used to tell me that I should just think of games, and someday it would hit me.  What I didn’t get about that though, is that the trick is you need to actually do it.  I would think “oh yeah, I need to come up with something”, but do nothing.  Then I started thinking about games, and what we’re looking to do with device interface as I was falling asleep.

That happened over a few months of casual sleepy thought.  Recently though, I started having an idea that was cool, but I was falling asleep, and it seemed cool until I woke up the next day.  I was telling Tom that I almost had a cool idea, but I think it was just the lucid state I was in.  I started to tell him what it was, and that I didn’t know what to do with it, and that it wasn’t exciting.  Though I also started talking about how the game interaction could happen.  It was then that, as I spoke, the rough idea fleshed itself out and a mechanic of gameplay was born.  It’s as if my subconscious was working on it, and didn’t tell me until I described it to someone verbally.  I went to bed thinking upon that, and the whole game came to life in my head.  I can see it, I can play it, and it’s because I wanted it to happen.

The ideas were strung together over time, and my brain was tying stuff together that I didn’t even see.  My starting point, the lucid dream one, which got me excited, is nothing like the final game.  It was thought process, and willful intent that got me to the end point of a game.  Opening my mind and being receptive to where it wanted to play, and going back to that playground if you will, over and over.  It’s interesting how the process works, because it’s more about wanting it to work, and working it from that angle.

We are all capable of so much more, we just need to find a way to tap into that super consciousness.  My particular lucid dream path may not be yours.  Though this much is certain, you have to want it, you have to seek it out willfully, and you have to persevere.  The great power in that, is that it can be applied to many types of goals.  When the time is right… you’ll really feel that creative/productive groove.