Good day all. N/A thank you for your time. [Edited by - duncan_b on January 15, 2009 2:56:47 PM]

I dont think it's so much about the skill. A complete retard may have the most awesome idea. It's about liability with very sensative intellectual property. The game company has no way to verify that your idea is truely your own. So they leave the idea making up to the publishers who have a team of lawyers to sort through IP rights.

Quote:I'm going to say the answer to both questions is a resounding No. Companies generally don't care to work with people with no relevant skills or education, let alone basic experience.

That said, if your main interest is to see this idea in development, then let's hear it. Posting it here might be a way to get the attention of someone from the industry, if it is truly as good as you now have us believe.

Quote:Original post by duncan_b
my knowledge of design and conceptualization is non existent.

If that is true, then you don't really have an idea. Sorry.

I don't think it's really true, though. Rather, you're probably just allowing your claimed laziness to prevent you from exploring what you can design and conceptualize. Designing things doesn't really depend that much on knowledge, anyway; it does depend on (a) close examination of existing similar things; and (b) thinking and communicating.

Laziness is curable, but (oddly enough) others can't cure it for you. You might start by getting in the habit of starting sentences with a capital letter. :)

duncan_b, you yourself started by saying you were lazy. Why take offense when Zahlman says laziness is curable, and politely hints to try to type clearer?

And even if you took offense at his remarks, it's somewhat childish to start insulting every programmer... "if there was somebody in there basement who know this stuff".

Anyway, to answer your questions:

Quote:1. has there ever been an open call for ideas by any game development company.

Yes, rarely. I only recall it happening twice, and both times the developement companies required the people submitting ideas to program their own prototypes (demos, basically) of their ideas before submitting them.

Quote:2. are there any company that would work with some one who might have an idea for the next best widget.

I'm not sure what you mean here. A widget is different from a game. Are you talking about a commercial game like you play on most game consoles, or are you talking about a little game embedded in a widget that people put on their Facebook/Myspace profiles?

The first, no, no company is willing to work with someone in that manner, for legal and financial reasons. If you meant a game like you see on a Facebook profile, I don't think those aren't too hard to make, although I've never made one personally. If you just pitch your idea to a solo programmer, he or she might be willing to make it for you. Especially if you were willing to pay them real money.

The time to educate yourself in a programming language enough to make a real game, like you see on consoles, would take years. The time it takes to make even small games for the computer would take a year or so. It's very much worth it, however, if you wanted to learn.

Quote:my knowledge base is in another area and i see benefits to using games and current tech to improve the area i specialize in.

What area DO you specialize in?

Quote:where I have the knowledge of what a good end result may be I have no idea how to get there. my post here is an attempt to spark some interest.

Well, you can't spark any interest without first providing the fuel (IE: your idea).

The amount of work that goes into making things like games, even small ones, is frequently underestimated. It takes months of work. Nobody wants to work for free, they need to support themselves. When they do work for free, they want to work on their own ideas, more often then not.

If I had a great design for a mansion, I need to spend years learning how to build a house: pouring the foundation, putting up the walls, insulating, figuring out exactly how much weight that beam can hold, doing the wiring, sheetrocking, mudding + texturing, laying the raw flooring, carpeting over that, installing the outlets, making sure the amount of electricity is enough for what's plugged into the outlets, running the plumbing, making sure the water can travel uphill to the second/third stories, making sure there aren't any leaks, making sure the stairways don't creak, making sure all the windows fit the window openings, making sure there isn't any insulation holes with heat can exit the house, installing the heating system and running the vents everywhere, and alot more I'm sure I've missed.

Oh, did I mention that I'd need to ensure everything is within the standards of the specific area I live in, and those standards vary from town to town, and state to state? Also, I'd have to pull some fifty different permits and pay fees for all of them. I better hope my mansion design isn't so much as a single foot over the maximum height allowed by the city, or else they will force me to lower the height.

Programming professional games is similar. The gameplay design of the game isn't even 1/100th of the work involved. If we need to do the hard work, we should get the joy of at least doing the work on our own designs.

Ask yourself: Is your idea so groundbreakingly new, that you are willing to change your career to bring it to life? There's a incredibly slim chance it'd ever see the light of day unless you make it happen yourself, and the work involved is alot more than you imagine.

I'm not telling you this to discourage you, although I admit it is discouraging to meet alot of resistance were you though there would be none. I'm telling you this to let you know that if you want something done, you got to do it yourself. If you decide to do that, then I wish you the best of luck! We can help you do it yourself, by pointing you in the right direction, but we wont do it for you.

Quite frankly, I doubt there has ever been a case of a game development company adopting an idea from outside. Most game development companies are started for the purpose of developing a specific title, and then move on to sequels or titles with similar themes. The chances of getting your idea developed by a company with the resources to license rights to develop for something like the Wii -- especially without experience -- are zero, or close enough to call it that.

I'm going to be brutally honest: You're looking at nearly insurmountable odds. The chances of you ever playing your game as things stand now are very slim. With that said however, if you're really intent on seeing your idea become a reality -- and I do mean really intent -- and are willing to invest most of your free time in it there are ways.

I suggest you read, read and read some more. Learn everything you can about game design, and game development as well. See if your idea stands up to a rigorous examination based on the principals of game design, and if you're still sure that it's a genuinely good idea then you just might be on to something.

Next write down every thought you have related to your game idea, organize them all, and write a design document. Modify your idea into a PC game, keeping in mind that the Wiimote has been adapted for use with the PC. Read the design documents to yourself a few times and make adjustments as necessary, then find someone to review it; Right here at GDNet wouldn't be a bad place to look.

Once your idea is documented and proven viable in the eyes of others, then you can start assembling a team with the skills that you don't have. Conveniently GDNet also offers a service specifically for that purpose. This step will be your trial by fire, but if you can get enough people genuinely interested in your idea, then you've got a pretty decent chance of success.

But don't think your work is done yet. Once you have a team it's be your responsibility to ensure that everything runs smoothly, which may be trying at times. If someone quits for any reason, for example, it's up to you to fill the void in whatever way you can. You'll have a lot on your shoulders, but if you stick with it you'll be well on your way to a finished product.


If all that sounds like too much, then I'm sorry to say it but you're probably better off to accept that you're just another average Joe with an idea, and forget about the whole thing. It's unfortunate that so many great ideas get passed by, but the simple fact of the matter is that there aren't enough man hours to develop every game idea out there. In the end it's only the ideas by the people with enough money or motivation to see them through that get made, so you need to either be one of those people or give it up.

[Edited by - Puck on January 15, 2009 5:51:01 PM]

In regards to some of your (now edited out) questions, it takes several years to get "up to speed" with programming (or design, or audio engineering, or any profession). Becoming a professional developer isn't something you can sit down and do in a weekend, you'll actually have to work at it, just like anything else in life.

If you feel that this time line is "not profitable", then please feel free to give up. Games, like any non-trivial piece of software (or anything, really), take effort. You seem very averse to actually putting any effort into realizing your idea, so the only conclusion I can draw is that it isn't a very worthwhile one.