So i have a dream, what next?

[TheMastermind]

I've always loved video games, I play about every new game that comes out and get bored of them pretty quickly, but i still didn’t find the game I really want to play, so the obvious thing is that I'll try to make it.
I learned programming C # at school, Forms and stuff, so I don’t really know how to make graphics and crazy stuff.

But that's okay, if I want to chase after the dream then I'll do it in small steps and within my ability.
on the Economic level, putting a lot of time into the game should meaning I'll need money, that means the game will cost money one way or another, or he will be free, and sponserd by donations / advertisements. Like the people who develop games such as Little Fighter, dwarf fortress, and a few others who have a decent income because of donations from a large community or with toolbars installed with the game.

So the idea of the game is as follows: Simulation / Management / Strategy / role play game engine. You build a character and live in a world, you can do whatever you want, being a freelance assassin, the founder of an army of mercenaries, be the king of the dragons, be the Illuminati, a Greek god, the Puss in Boots, manage a factory for paper envelopes or play the person you are in free life.

How does it work? First off there is no "graphics." The game is text based with easy ui, maybe some images. The game is also not really a game, but an engine that allows users to make content such as worlds, character stats, goals and everything will be relatively convenient and easy to make and be able to integrate with content that other users have made. Therefore, the more the game community grows the more there is game content available. I won't detail the whole system and how it will work, because it's not the subject.

To understand how this is going to look, think of Football Manager, the king of dragon pass (a game where you manage a clan through resource management and event screens like "girl ran away from the tribe to marry a man from another tribe, do you 1. Refuse the marriage. 2. agree 3. kill them all "), the campaign of total war, europa universalis, crusader kings And browser games.

So as we said, small steps, we will start programming a certain number of basic systems and options, and the greater the interest, community and the time passes, we will develop them to more sophisticated things with more options.

im facing 2 problems, but a solution can be found. The first is that I'm not a C # professional, so if I'll make this game it will be developed very slowly and in accordance with my progress in programming. Of course the solution is to try anyway or to find a programmer to work with.

The second, which is more problematic if I work alone, is that I'm in the (Israeli) army, each 2 weeks I'm at home for 3 days, which doesn't give me too much time to work.

So of course, finding a partner sounds the most logical step. A Programmer and me (who does everything else, advertising, content, design, anything else), dividing 50 / 50 donations / whatever and make it happen.

Either that or I'm waiting two years for my army service to end, and begins a slow process of learning advanced programming, game development and do all these things alone.

So what should I do? Is someone sharing my dream? Where can I find people who want to develop indie game like me?

[dipseydoodle]

Well... In my opinion if you want a text-based game, this is the best way to go. You can even build an engine for this thing.!

Just my opinion, and this is the Wesnoth forum, so asking somebody to do the work for you might not always be the best way to go.

[Atz]

I'd suggest reading the articles in this thread about finishing a project, this thread about attracting artists to an OSS project (while it's about artists, many of the points are also useful in general), and the sticky about how to get art made for your add-on. Why the last one? Because it makes three key points: people are unlikely to contribute to something which is currently just a vague concept; people are unlikely to want to do more work on your pet project than you've done yourself; and it will be much easier to find people if you can make a prototype to show them.

To be brutally honest, I think you may have trouble finding someone who wishes to work on this with you, or at least someone good. Let's pretend that I'm a skilled programmer who can make your dream come true. That being the case, why would I work on your project? Just to be clear, this is not a rhetorical question. I'm saying that if you want to attract a programmer, you need to think in terms of what you are offering them.

The two main problems I see are that you seem to have a vague idea which you think is cool, but no concrete progress; and that you don't seem to have the skills or the time to make a meaningful contribution at the moment.

Like it says in the art threads, few people want to contribute a substantial amount of work to a pie-in-the-sky project which is unlikely to ever be completed or even published. You may have a cool idea, but cool ideas are a dime a dozen. Lots of people start projects like this; few make any meaningful progress and fewer yet actually get them into a "completed" state. If I were a programmer, I'd want to see evidence that you can manage this thing well and make progress. Since progress so far is zero and you admit to not having done this before, it's difficult to see what assurance you could offer me. Particularly when the internet is full of other worthy projects which are making progress.

My second point comes back to not expecting people to do more work on your project then you can do. If your time is strictly limited and you don't have the necessary programming skills, why would I work with you? What do you bring to the table? Your contribution will be minimal. I could work on my own pet project, and be in charge, and do things the way I want. Think of it in terms of "If this programmer was in charge of another project and putting together a team, would they want me to be on it?" If the answer is "no", then it's difficult to see why they would want to work with you on your project, either.

So basically I'd recommend working on it yourself and demonstrating that it is actually going somewhere and you are committed to seeing it through, before you start looking for people to do the work for you.

[TheMastermind]

Thank you Atz, the links you posted and what you wrote made me understand I need to make some prototype to show myself and others the ability to finish the game and get people excited.
Hopefully some time from now I'll open a new post and show off some of the stuff I've made.

[Caphriel]

The idea you describe is very open-ended. Open ended games are very, very difficult to implement. It's a lot of fun to imagine a game that allows the player to do anything they want, but the reality is that the game can only permit the player to do things that it is programmed to handle. Because the developers have limited time and resources available to them, the broader the focus of the game, the less polished each aspect will be. If you want the player to be able to command an army, or to be an assassin, or to start and manage a business, then you need to design and implement mechanics for each of these gameplay types. However, because you have to split your resources between those three sets of mechanics, each of them will either have less depth or less polish than if you were focusing on a single kind of game.

This is covered in that discussion of finishing games in the thread Atz linked.

I don't want to discourage you from making a game (far from it!) but as someone who has been in the situation you now find yourself in, I suggest you start smaller. Pick one aspect of the idea and implement it well, then tie on the next. Having one part of the game in presentable and playable shape will also help you attract developers with similar interest to the project. Having all aspects of the game partially implemented is less likely to help.

The fact that you're looking for someone else to do all the work on your idea is going to scare away a lot of potential collaborators. If you're serving your mandatory term in the Israeli army, consider shelving your idea until you've completed your term of service, and have more time to devote to your project.

[Dixie]

To tie up with Caphriel's comment: think of a kind of gameplay/general feel for your game, and find ways to leave some leeway/freedom in that frame. A good example that comes to mind is Romance of the Three Kingdoms (I personnall7 mostly played the 10th, on ps2, IIRC). It is pretty open-ended: although the game kinda pushes you towards empire management, you could just be a noble independant sword for hire, a lowly peasant, the leader of a small independant warband, the emperor's most trusted officer, or even the emperor himself... You can play as any historical figure and follow the course of history, or make up your own character and ignore the storyline... And although it is pretty open, the gameplay is kinda uniform in all aspects. See what I mean?

[Jetrel]

Chiming in to fully support the eloquent and factually correct responses in this thread.

Disregard them, and you will run into a lot of trouble.