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I'm guilty of nearly everything you listed at the end - on a single project. I've been working on a WWF/Scrabble type game (with some unique gameplay elements)

I'm guilty of nearly everything you listed at the end - on a single project. I've been working on a WWF/Scrabble type game (with some unique gameplay elements) since early 2012 and it continually gets picked up and put down again. I've ended up building a component-based ui engine behind it, keep adding features, try to pick it up without clear goals or tasks in mind and am probably trying to tackle far more than I should be on my first game. Thanks for the article and inspiration; it's making me take a step back and re-evaluate my approach a little bit. Congrats on shipping!

yeldarb 13y ago
I've been up to something similar for the last year or so. Man is there a lot of complexity in a simple turn-based word game than I ever imagined. I threw together a prototype of the basic gameplay in a weekend but to actually ship something you need user accounts, game history, push notifications, error handling, multiple games per user, game creation, a way to get friends into the app to play with you, screenshots, icons, copy, instructions, game win/loss screens, current game state indicators, transitions, a way to quit a game in progress, a way to nudge a dormant opponent, a massaged dictionary, and that's not even getting to the marketing side of things! Luckily it's almost ready to go... but along with that comes the anxiety that not only do you need to convince someone to play, you also need them to get a friend to install it as well! (unless you want to program a matchmaking process or AI on top of everything else which comes with its own can of worms).
- WesleyJohnson 13y ago
  You're echoing my thoughts exactly. Mine started out as a simple proof of concept using the CS area in Khan Academy and then I took it "offline" to flesh it out. That's when I started running into all of the complications you just mentioned; it really is a daunting task. I'm even struggling with a platform. It's HTML5 Canvas right now which opens up Facebook, and mobile using something like Phonegap, but I'm so inexperienced with both that I didn't think about keeping things responsive for different screen resolutions. Ugh! I'm happy to hear I'm not the only one bumping into reality, though it definitely sounds like you're further along than I. I'd love to check it out once you've shipped.
- kenjackson 13y ago
  There must be a framework for all that stuff? I have the same issue. I'm converting a single-player game I have to a multi-player turn-based game -- and man, there is a lot of stuff to do. And don't forget player ratings and other statistics. A really good framework for building turn-based games I bet would have a decent market.

yeldarb 13y ago

I've been up to something similar for the last year or so. Man is there a lot of complexity in a simple turn-based word game than I ever imagined. I threw together a prototype of the basic gameplay in a weekend but to actually ship something you need user accounts, game history, push notifications, error handling, multiple games per user, game creation, a way to get friends into the app to play with you, screenshots, icons, copy, instructions, game win/loss screens, current game state indicators, transitions, a way to quit a game in progress, a way to nudge a dormant opponent, a massaged dictionary, and that's not even getting to the marketing side of things! Luckily it's almost ready to go... but along with that comes the anxiety that not only do you need to convince someone to play, you also need them to get a friend to install it as well! (unless you want to program a matchmaking process or AI on top of everything else which comes with its own can of worms).

WesleyJohnson 13y ago
You're echoing my thoughts exactly. Mine started out as a simple proof of concept using the CS area in Khan Academy and then I took it "offline" to flesh it out. That's when I started running into all of the complications you just mentioned; it really is a daunting task. I'm even struggling with a platform. It's HTML5 Canvas right now which opens up Facebook, and mobile using something like Phonegap, but I'm so inexperienced with both that I didn't think about keeping things responsive for different screen resolutions. Ugh! I'm happy to hear I'm not the only one bumping into reality, though it definitely sounds like you're further along than I. I'd love to check it out once you've shipped.
kenjackson 13y ago
There must be a framework for all that stuff? I have the same issue. I'm converting a single-player game I have to a multi-player turn-based game -- and man, there is a lot of stuff to do. And don't forget player ratings and other statistics. A really good framework for building turn-based games I bet would have a decent market.