I always knew that your state of mind affects your productivity. Had a pretty rough week last week and work on my prototype suffered for it. But in the end, I realized time was a-wasting. You have to keep at it regardless of how you feel that day/week/month, because at the end of the day no one is asking you to do this. I never doubted that working on indie games would be difficult and you should approach it just like any other serious job, but it’s now becoming clear how to approach it. I have to set aside all the daily BS that’s going on in my life and whatever is currently on my mind and focus for 3-4 hours a night on one specific goal. But enough about that…
XNA community games seems to be on the horizon and I’m pretty excited about it. Should prove to be interesting to see what the community will come up with. In other news, I was suckered into buying N+ knowing full well the free flash game exists on the PC. N+ on the 360 is amazing though. I bought it for the co-op play and the convenience of sitting on my couch instead of a computer chair :).
I’m zeroing in on my final concept for a game I plan to develop for 2008. It’s certainly got me thinking though. It’s a 2D shooter, which in the casual game space is not popular at all. So on one hand, I love shooters and I’m intrigued by the type of shooter I have as a prototype [a slightly different take on the typical 2d shoot-em-up]. But on the other hand, I feel no matter the amount of effort put into it, it’s not going to sell well. But I like to think my meager market research just doesn’t have the right type of data. I’ve been looking at distributions on some of the bigger portals, but they tend to have a different type of audience. I need to focus on a lot of the smaller more ‘niche’ portals to possibly make this worthwhile, not to mention developing my own web presence. I’ve got 1-2 other ideas currently that I know I could go with, and about a ton of others I’d still have to prototype to see what works and what doesn’t. I hope, in the next couple of months, to have some actual content to put here. But until then, just smoke and mirrors ;).