When I designed Launch Pad, the whole idea came to me rather suddenly in surprising detail. I'm not even sure what got me thinking about the space theme. Of course, the mechanics and cards were refined over months of testing, but the overall game stayed much the same.
Once the theme and major mechanics were there, it was easy to expand that to come up with specific specialty cards that used and built on the theme of rocket building, project management, and a race for space.
If you've designed a game, I'm curious to know where your inspiration came from?
Well, since you asked... I had been searching for a game idea that would be my first attempt at a game. I had some ideas for bigger complex games - but I wanted something lite to start with - simply to work through the steps...
Well, it hit me one night as I drifted to sleep. In that quasi-awake / drifting-off state, I saw a hint of a vision. I was 'conscious' enough to tell myself to wake-up and write the idea down. A few days later, I had worked out some rudimentary playing cards for the game and began letting some people play it. So far, good reviews. It still has a ways to go until *I* am satisfied with it - but, it's a fun, casual game.
I tell people "It came to me in a dream." ...which is sort-of technically true. :)
I am sure most inspirations come from less 'foggy' origins. Since this game, I have started drafting out a few other game ideas, which are mainly based on my enjoyment of future tech. So, those have an origin of totally being awake.
Like I said at the beginning... you asked. :)
Personal Experience.
My game is a soccer (football) themed card game.
I grew frustrated with poor implementations of soccer in board/card games and I thought that my experiences playing many games could provide me with ideas for implementing the theme in a better way.
I'm currently working on a game, and the theme came to me while I was camping. I was trying to think of something that someone could collect, but hasn't been used in a game before. I think that having some sort of goal already in mind is the way to come up with a good theme.
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