I'm a dev hobbyist with a bit of coding, a bit of design, a lot of writing skill, but no artistic talent when it comes to creating my own assets. I'd like to build a portfolio to show my work off to potential collaborators. What kind of projects would do me the most good here?

Game design document.

Projects themselves are not such an issue (unless you choose a project manifestly unsuited along the lines of your post i.e.. a large scale MMO). Demonstration of your coding (eg prototypes), design and writing skills (both technical and creative) can all be demonstrated through the various sections of the document. The plus side of said document is that you have already established to any potential partner that you have stepped beyond the point of "I have an idea" and established that you have "developed the idea" into the next stage. Given the absence of artistic skills such things as place-holder and concept art can be sourced for use in your document (don't forget attributions and limitations of use (legally) where applicable).

Hope this helps :)

I'm more interested, in the moment, in creating solo projects that show off my ability to get things done. I've played with Interactive Fiction a bit, but would like some variety to showcase my talents.

I'm just not sure what does that best.

Are you looking to build a portfolio as a writer or to show off all of your skills (since you mention others in your first post)?

For now i'll assume your looking for prominently at writing. I'm not a writer myself, but approaching this from the point of view of what I would look at when choosing people to work with.

The key thing to show in my opinion isn't so much the actual project itself, but the fact that you can finish it.

For a writer, as you've mentioned Interactive fiction would be one type to have. Maybe doing one of the games suggested for beginners and putting a story to it, for example add a story to Space Invaders, would give you a game to put you story to. Using tools such as game maker would also allow you to show off your writing skills.

I wouldn't necessarily limit yourself to game related projects either. Write some short stories or a choose your own adventure (that is probably pretty similar to the interactive fiction you've already mentioned. Writing a fan fiction story is another way to go and could be a good way to show that you can work constructing a good story around already existing elements.

Possibly not even writing a story maybe the way to go and instead focus on creating a world describing the characters, environment, etc.

Lastly and this mostly relates to if your going to be looking to join with people online, eg. using Gamedev, would be to join discussions in the forums as people will be able to see some of your ideas, how you deal with people, etc.

i think you mean you can create characters on writing but cant draw and show them. if you have a good artists try to explain your mind to them and they will draw some sketches and after that you say what most near to your mind and they will complete that. even if you can work with programs like zbrush o 3dmax try to use themto show the ideas better and more obvious. if you have a big team, start to write a game design document and write as much you can

Given what you said about what you'd want to do, I'd suggest doing a small project, and finishing it, then you can release anything you want.

Yeah, that's basically what I'm looking to do, but I'm wondering what kind of projects work best to show off writing - particularly since it's just me and I'm not really able to create art assets.

I'm a writer. I've written and sold fiction. I'm looking for projects that show off my ability to tell a story, both through dialog and through events, ideally.

Have you ever heard the expression "a picture says a thousand words"?

Well, the point being it takes a few seconds to look through an artist's portfolio. It's relatively easy to determine if the artist is professional quickly. I can usually tell within a half a second of seeing the first image whether I should close the page or keep looking. Faster than I can even click.

Musicians have it a little harder; it takes almost a minute or so to flip through some of the demo reel. For people with more on their plates, they might give the demo reel a couple seconds and then close it if it doesn't sound interesting. I click ahead a little in case there was a weak start, but within a minute I should know if there's any reason to keep listening.

Programmers, well that comes to showing what they've done in terms of applications; slightly harder still, because it involves watching enough of a video or running an application to pick out features. This could take several minutes.

For a writer's portfolio, it's the most tedious job to evaluate and to really determine if somebody is any good.

The best thing for such a portfolio is to make the job easier. Prove you are good without the person having to read your writing.

This means getting reviewed. It means potentially writing short stories and novels, and getting published (by something more than a vanity press). It could mean running a blog, or writing well reviewed articles for various websites (Gamedev.net is a start).

If writing is your strongest skill, projects in the medium that can be confirmed to be good without spending the time to read them are your best bet.

In reviewing a writer's portfolio, all I'd have to go on is what other credible voices say about the writing.

Even something like a view count on DeviantArt (they take writing too) can prove that you have some ability.

You have to convince the person looking at the portfolio that there's something there, so they'll spend more than a minute on it- and you have precious little time to do so.

Hope that helps.

Yeah, I'm looking for solo projects I can complete to show off that 1. I can write 2. I can design 3. I can complete projects. My only concern is my lack of artistic ability; I don't want to be written off because the game is a visual mess.

So what are some kinds of projects/genres I can tackle where the graphics matter less, and I can emphasize writing and design?