I get the feeling that the problem is not so much you lack the motivation to make games, but the motivation to START learning how to make games. It's the same with any huge task, the hardest part is starting. The best way to do it is to just dig in. People who climb mountains start by taking one step forward. Start with a simple tutorial on youtube, then another, and another. Then mess around with those tutorials on your own. Here's a good one:

L.Spiro's advice might sound a bit harsh, but she has a point and sometimes people need to hear the un-sugar-coated version. Your love for the activity is your motivation. You love the thing you do and you want to learn all about it, and work on it every chance you get, and read about it when you can't work on it, and be the best you can possibly be at it. So I guess the problem is not motivation for game developement, which comes from a love of game development, but motivation to begin a huge task.

I indeed like the journey, and I am motivated once I get started, but the start itself is very difficult for me.

How many years have you been trying to learn it? What's the longest time you've stuck with it (For at least 2 hours a day) in that time? Did you honestly enjoy it during that time? Why did you stop?

You might find you just want to play videogames, and wish you had better games to play.

I indeed like the journey, and I am motivated once I get started, but the start itself is very difficult for me. I need some ideas to motivate me through the first difficult steps, maybe some kind words that everything is all right, game design is manageable, I can do it if I try, it is possible to make a living with it, in time, depend on how much time I invest, things like that. Also, some techniques would be helpful to build and maintain motivation during these first few steps. Its interesting how much you try to convince me that game design is not for me, even if you don't know me.

Actually, I did try game journalism for a few months. I had my own website, and I wrote about 100 articles. But I realized that its not something I truly enjoy doing, so I stopped.

I have the same problem with motivation. That's part of the reason why I have an account on this site. I don't have anyone else to talk to about game development, so posting here and getting feedback really motivates me to continue working hard and learning everything I need to know to turn my concepts into implementation, and dreams into reality. So that's the first thing that helps me with motivation: support.

But that's external. I agree that there has to be some sort of internal thing that you want, and that'll help you with motivation as well.

I'm about to go on a tangent, but I'm a self-taught guitarist (that only means that I never took lessons). I was given a guitar that a family member found at a thrift shop. It sat in the corner of my room for a year or two. One day, I decided to pick it up. I wanted to play that riff I heard on the radio, but I had no idea how to play the guitar. When I tried, my fingers hurt and I couldn't get a good sound out of it. Discouraged, I gave up for a few months...then I decided to try again. I went online and searched for how to play notes. I learned how to read music, play scales, play chords, and finally, finally, I learned how to play that song I liked. Not only that, but I learned how make my own songs too. It was a slow, tedious process, but I remembered what my end-goal was. I wanted to play music, and I wanted it to sound good.

That's your goal. You want to make a game, you might want to make a specific kind of game, and you want it to be good. There's a lot to learn along the way, but if you remember where it is you're trying to go, you'll get there eventually. So that's the second thing that's helps me with motivation: remembering my goal.

Another thing that motivates me while I'm working on a game is getting graphics on the screen. There'll no doubt be a point where you go, "I've stared at code for long enough, and I just want to see this guy run around and swing his sword." There's no better motivation than visible progress, I'd say. I'm working on a website right now, with very little knowledge of web development, and I can tell you that when I finally started styling the page, changing plain text to cool layouts, I was too excited to sleep properly. If you want to make an RPG, go for it. Right now. Seriously. If text-based games don't excite you, don't make them. There's little chance that you'll be motivated to work on a personal project that you could care less about. I don't think there's anything wrong with starting with a 2D game. Just take it step-by-step. You'll have to learn how to put graphics on the screen eventually, so why not start right now? If you watch a YouTube tutorial related to coding in your chosen language (C# in Unity?), then they'll likely teach you the basics there (What's a variable? What's a string? What's an integer? How to I make a function? What's a data structure? What's an If-Statement? etc.). If you have a question, or hit a wall in productivity, you can search the forums or ask for help.

Games typically look like this, when simplified:

Loop <-----------+

|

Display_Output() |

Handle_Input() |

Handle_Logic() |

|

Loop ------------+

The process might be less intimidating if you think of it like that. Just one more thing. A while ago, I had to learn the difference between a game designer, and game developer. You can be both, but the latter actually makes the games. If you read all of that, I'm sorry. No I'm kidding. I hope this helps!

On Rye

Thank you, On Rye, very good advice. I'm happy to see someone who understands my troubles.

Listening to smart people talk about relevant things always works for me.

Nice analogy, Glass_knife, thank you. So, you say to just do prototypes without meditating too much on it, and in time everything will sort itself out, if I understand the analogy correctly.

Sometimes people need breaks from doing the things they enjoy. If that is your case, then take a break and do something different.

But it may be something more.

There is some advice I cite often enough: Go get a copy of the book "What Color is Your Parachute?". It has been a best seller every year for decades, so you can find multiple copies at your local library and also find copies at your local used bookshop if you prefer. The book has a nickname, "The Job Hunter's Bible".

Inside the book, find a section called "The Flower Diagram". It gets moved around in different editions, but the content is the same.

Work through the exercise. Done right it requires soul searching about what you do for fun, what brings you satisfaction, and what you are naturally motivated to work on.

If you take the task seriously and spend time seriously reflecting and evaluating your life, it can take one or two weeks to complete.

The result is a list of your key attributes and skills -- the things that are at your central core of interest, coupled with what you are interested in, where you are interested in, the groups you are most comfortable working with, the values, purposes, and goals you are want in your life, your preferred responsibility level, and more.

Over the years I've seen several people invest time and effort getting into games. Some people worked incredibly hard for years, struggled their way through school, and force themselves to do things they didn't really want to do in the hopes that making games would be something they enjoy.

One of these people left games to teach music. We all had some obvious hints that games were not his passion, as he had a guitar in his cubicle and we could often hear him playing tunes.

Another one left games to go into botany. The person had worked in a greenhouse to put themselves through college and realized that they actually hated everything about programming. They hated all the courses during college, they hated build demos, but they did it because they thought that making games would be fun.

Another one left games (he was an artist) to go teach art. He had mentored a few people in the studio and was an art director, but decided that he would rather spend his time teaching others and so he got a job as a professor at the university.

Go do the work of the Flower Diagram. Figure out what it is that you really want in your life. From your description it probably is not game design.