Hello, fine folks (and @hustlertwo)
@DrewWolf Haha your post reminds me things I would post a few years ago! I think most of us go through this crisis of self-doubt, loss of momentum, wondering if we bit off too much, etc. It seems like you’re doing a really admirable job of mixing up stimuli and doing what you can on a given day, based on motivation, etc.
I read your profile, and so what I say next might be helpful, or it at least might be something to consider.
After submitting 4 solo gamebooks (3 to Hosted Games, 1 to Choice of Games) and seeing decent-but-not-anywhere-close-to-a-part-time-living royalties, I’ve decided I must take the advice of regular authors:
- Build a bigger backlist. I simply can’t afford to spend 2 years on any game. I mean, if someone writes a 400k-word game, that’s the equivalent of writing 4-6 regular books, so that person, if they are seeking any sort of reasonable payment for their hard work, damn well better be confident that the payout on that one game will be in the small ball park as someone who wrote 4-6 regular novels. Then double that obviously if you write another 400k-word game. That ‘regular writer’ now has a backlist of 8-12 books, probably two or three series. Rinse and repeat. So I’m focusing on getting out smaller games. My “Fun and Games” out in February is just under 110k. My next submission, “Talon City,” will be right around the same length. Will they make as much money as longer games? Nope! But I can crank them out in reasonably short periods of time and build a backlist. Put it like this: I’d rather have 6 games out, each under 200k words, than to have 2 long games out, because if either of those long games tanks, you.are.screwed. financially speaking.
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I can’t imagine doing a game without extensive outlining. I’ve spun my wheels too much in the past. Never again! I can’t write at work (unless I bring my laptop) but I can always outline my next chapter during my lunch, and as @MultipleChoice said, that really (for me at least) gets the flow going for my next writing session. I can’t imagine sitting down for a writing session thinking, “Okay what am I writing today?” IMO, that shit needs to be determined well beforehand. For example, I know exactly what scenes are next up in Talon City, and yes there may be a few moments of ironing out details and dialogue (I hate going backward) but over 90% of my writing session will consist of actual writing. I just think it’s so much more efficient this way, BUT I realize some folks just prefer to pants and think that too much outlining can suck out the fun and “discovery” part of the process, and I understand we all are coming from this from different places.
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One last thing. If you are looking to make this your job, or even if you are just looking to maximize economic efficiencies, you simply cannot give yourself permission not to write. You have to. It’s your job. I don’t get to show up to work today and say, “Eh, I don’t feel like showing up for that hearing.” Even if I’m not feeling inspired, or fear I will lose, or don’t love the particular client, I still need to go and do the best job I can. I don’t know why writers treat this craft differently. Maybe because it’s ‘artsy?’ I dunno. But if a person is focusing on making $ with writing, then they need to crank out content even on days when they aren’t feeling it. (This is obviously totally different if it’s just a hobby)
Moving forward, I am focusing on planning, quality, efficiency, and always knowing where the story is going next, and what gamebook is coming next.
You mentioned in your bio that you wanted to take a serious run at this writing/coding thing, and so that’s why I’m tossing this all out there. Also remember that the Hosted Games queue fills up, so even when you submit a game, you will likely be waiting 3-6 months (at least) for a publication date, and huge games require huge amounts of beta testing, and huge amounts of copyediting (if going on Steam). It just makes me wonder how writing huge games is economically viable for game writers. (I suspect the folks writing the recent VtM games did very well, but there was a built-in audience so much less risky to devote that significant time).
Hope this helps!