OPEN LETTER TO WRITERS/DESIGNERS

“History of Development” is a decent enough title for this part of the website. But it might be more helpful to call it by its true name:

“How Not to Make a Game”

(or as it is known in the UnderLands of piss-poor fantasy purists:

“Ah Na LemNog Shay-Neeyor”

Which of course translates to “The Meticulous Chronicles of a Talentless Fool.”

It is truly embarrassing to share these pages of uphill failure with you. But making things is hard, and to remind people of it is really the only decent thing an artist can do.

If you are reading this letter, or delving into Spell Saga’s ridiculous history, chances are you’ve played the game, or might be developing your own. And to this I say, “How dare you!?”

Why tread across these blood soaked waters—The Sea of Good Ideas That Destroy You?

Why walk on water, if you’re only gonna drown?

The answer, of course: if you feel the need to make things, you cannot help but make those things. Creation is a childish curse that settles upon shoulders early on.

The good news is that you are not alone. Many of us were bitten by feral paper at just the right age, and spent the rest of our lives as diseased creatures, living with our lycanthropy…no wait, that’s wolves. What’s the Latin word for paper?…Chartam? …OK. …living with our chartamthropy.

And the thing is, we makers, the things we consume were made by people just like us. And you cannot make ANYTHING without first making a series of mistakes. That is how things are finished. They are a pile of mistakes that you have fixed.

I have made so many mistakes—each one more endless and terrible than the last, and so you will forgive me for extolling just four bits of advice:

1) Make new or newish things. The world already has everything that it already has. We don’t need another castle defense game—or another RPG about Them Ye Olde Times.

2) Seek advice and listen to it. Many people will have an opinion about your work. In fact, the more the better. It may seem ridiculous to point this out, but someone caring about your work means that someone cares about your work.

2B) Opinions are helpful, but not every one should be heeded (case in point, a marketing director told me to change the name of the game to “Lonely People”.

3) Making things is not worth it unless you are making art. Art is just communication. You need to remember that you are making things to communicate who you are, or how you feel, or what the world looks like to you.

4) Don’t spend time on any project that did not save your life.

Any other advice? Let’s see: show your game to more people. Why? Your graphics look like shit, the website is confusing and the rulebook is too long. And no one is trying to steal your ideas. There. That should get you started.

I hope these History of Development pages can help you navigate the tricky waters of self-made mistakes and necessary failures that it will take to make something. I wrote them in third person, as if I were only chronicling someone else with my name. It would be too overwhelming to do otherwise.

Spell Saga destroyed me, many times over. But I continue to toil. And the game continues to be enjoyed. I made art and it saved me.

-mE. 2020