Ren'Py I feel like I'm stuck in development forever

NesteroV said:

Hey. As a person who never created games before, I ask for your advice.

I am confident in my writing skills and overall game ideas. Yet any time as I go further than that, I begin to plateau. Basically it is almost never comes to an actual content phase. Suddenly idea seems to be dumb or too complex for me to do, I don't want to fuck up good characters or plot, etc. Seems to me like I am afraid to waste time or good opportunity, yet I can't just keep drawing cool pictures and hide it in my cabinet. My current financial situation doesn't allow me to.

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write a script for the game, as completely you can, before starting to make any renders. at least if you already have a vision in mind. that will make it easier to set goals and subgoals, as you make your way towards making a complete game out of it you will also avoid having to change much because the "players" didn't like it. it is you game, your story, and you will present it exactly as you envisioned it from the start. Good luck.

That's why you need to start from writing a Game Design Document

Brainstorming -> Game Design Document -> Actual game making (scripts and such)

NesteroV said:

...My current financial situation doesn't allow me to.

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Sorry, but what?...
Making a game is not going to make you tons of money. Don't expect any kind of financial boost from developing a game. Of course there are exceptions where there are strokes of luck involved. But most developers have to follow what we call the "marathon path". You have to be lucky, patient and have tons of time because you have to be consistent or else people won't trust you. I've just started making a little over $100 a month after more than 6 months of work. And I think I've been lucky because there are many others making less than me after a couple of years.
Improve your financial situation and then make the game.

Consider the following:
And then release it to gather feedback. This process can motivate you to stick to a project as well.

Also,

AllNatural939 said:

Making a game is not going to make you tons of money. Don't expect any kind of financial boost from developing a game.

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Pretty much this. It's like picking up a guitar and expecting to play on a big music festival next year.

Don't worry too much about getting everything right on the first go. Your first game is going to be a learning experience, so I suggest treating it as such, that's what I'm doing anyway. Mistakes will happen, the game will be flawed, and that's okay. As long as you learn from every mistake, it's time well spent.

Of course, you still want to do your best to make a game others like. Just be okay with it not being perfect. Perfectionism is the enemy of productivity.

I feel you are taken the wrong road here. You said it yourself: you feel confident in your ability as a writer. Making games is a totally different medium than writing a story/book. Yes there are visual novels , but they are using the visuals as fluff for the main part: the story. Publishing your own stuff in electronic formats for e-readers etc might be a better and more fruitful endeavour for you, as making it a game requires to invest time and effort on top of writing the story. And not every story can be easily made into a good game, some stuff simply doesnt work well enough in a game but might be a great read.

Sir Gary Bummer said:

Don't worry too much about getting everything right on the first go. Your first game is going to be a learning experience, so I suggest treating it as such, that's what I'm doing anyway. Mistakes will happen, the game will be flawed, and that's okay. As long as you learn from every mistake, it's time well spent.

Of course, you still want to do your best to make a game others like. Just be okay with it not being perfect. Perfectionism is the enemy of productivity.

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Personally that sums it up for me perfectly. Instead of creating my actually game i started a "learning game". After the first 50 Pictures and 1000 lines of code i deleted all and start over again. Doesn't matter how much time you spent reading tutorials and stuff at the end you have to make your own experience, create your own workflow etc.