Naturally, I've just googled Stair Quest! Definitely going on the download list... that's a lot of stairs  

My sincerest condolences. Pour one out for KrunchyFriedGames. We hardly knew ye.

I've thought about it before but based on stats (YouTube videos of games I like, forum threads of games I like, etc.), there just would be zero interest, which would kill any motivation for me.

I've thought about it before but based on stats (YouTube videos of games I like, forum threads of games I like, etc.), there just would be zero interest, which would kill any motivation for me.

If you want to make games, as a starting indie developer, you really should not make games based on statistics and your impression of what interest there would be in the game you haven't made. It's a very common way to think, but it really is backwards! It's very common to think this way, but what you should do is make the game YOU want to make and YOU would want to play, and then see how much interest there is for it when you release it. (And do all the marketing work, which is part of the whole indie gamedev thing.)

I guarantee you there's going to be SOME interest. It might not be much, but there will definitely be some. Then you start making the next game, improving upon it through what you learned from making and releasing the first game. Then you make a third game that is an improvement from the second one. And so on.

So start small. Download AGS or Visionaire Studio, and make an adventure game that's only a maximum of 5 rooms. Set your goal metric to whether or not you personally consider it to be fun to play. And then you take it from there.

Absolutely true.

The most important thing I learnt during my academic education so many years ago, was the following: "Even if you only reach (touch) one single person with your creation out of the whole audience - it is enough."

Whatever people say about your game, or if they just ignore it - you will have learnt something new while developing it. You will have grown.

Oh. And then you can say that you are a game developer!

Yes, exactly!

And internet comments and stats are practically useless when it comes to forecasting whether or not your game is going to do well, because at the tiny indie level it's mainly based on whether you can make a good game, and how well you're able to market your game. At best you can get some insight into which game genres do better than others, which is only useful if you don't want to make a certain type of game. Like an adventure game, for example.

Dave Gilbert made six freeware games before he made The Shivah, and then made the first Blackwell game after that. Scott Cawthon made 78 games of various size and genres before he made the first Five Nights at Freddy's game. Whether you measure success through sales, renown, or player count, it practically never happens on the first try. And in cases where it seems to be the first try, it's almost always because the developer created the game they wanted - not a game they thought everyone else wanted.

So for anyone interested in making games, whether adventure games or otherwise: Just get started! Make a simple game first, and make it one you yourself would like to play!

Funny, this actually reminded me that the very first choose your own (text) adventure I created is older ... maybe from the year 2001. Probably written in MS Word as well back then, but I put it as html with hyperlinks on my website. It was in German, so even if I find a playable version again, it wouldn't make sense to share it here.

Making it playable on a kindle is a pretty cool idea.

Please do share. Even if people don't speak German, they can copy and paste into Deepl! It must have been so much harder developing a passable game in 2001.

You asked for it ... and actually motivated me to dig it up! I had to force my old broken external hdd to surrender these files to me before it died.

I needed to make a few fixes to make it work again, added some css styling and an English translation. BUT: The game is still bad (not passable), written badly, a kitschy vampire story I would never create in that way again by now. But it is a memory I hold dear and didn't want to get lost:
https://hexenwerk.itch.io/the-night-of-death

Talking about memories: For me, game development still is fulfilling a very old dream of mine. Even though I am working in the industry, which can kill any love for something, I still love it. I am not developing my own games in the hope to sell them or have success. I am doing it because there is so much you can learn while working on a game. Creating 2D graphics, working with Blender and create and animate 3D models, and bringing them to life in some game engine. Creating atmosphere with sounds, and be creative with writing (where you have no limits at all which awesome dramatic "special effects" you can create in the imagination of the player).

I would say this is an awesome time for getting into game development, because there are so many tools available that make it easier than it was years before to tell your story in an interactive way.

But yes, it also takes a lot of time, and it is a decision against other hobbies or vocations you could follow instead.

I am curious about that stairs game now ...

Space Quest Historian has successfully completed 12 different adventure games as part of The Adventure Think Tank. This is an extremely excellent ratio from 5 billion, in my humble opinion. 13 games if you also count Stair Quest, but we do not speak of that one.

Thank you. I didn't design any of Stair Quest, though. I only wrote some of the in-game dialogue for when you type stuff into the parser. Mostly the dirty stuff.

If you want to make games, as a starting indie developer, you really should not make games based on statistics and your impression of what interest there would be in the game you haven't made. It's a very common way to think, but it really is backwards! It's very common to think this way, but what you should do is make the game YOU want to make and YOU would want to play, and then see how much interest there is for it when you release it. (And do all the marketing work, which is part of the whole indie gamedev thing.)

I guarantee you there's going to be SOME interest. It might not be much, but there will definitely be some. Then you start making the next game, improving upon it through what you learned from making and releasing the first game. Then you make a third game that is an improvement from the second one. And so on.

So start small. Download AGS or Visionaire Studio, and make an adventure game that's only a maximum of 5 rooms. Set your goal metric to whether or not you personally consider it to be fun to play. And then you take it from there.

This is the best advice. My leap from hobbyist to professional was realizing that not everyone will appreciate what I do, but many people will. If you make something with heart, it will be much better than 99% of the slop on Steam.

Mostly the dirty stuff.

That's hilarious and awesome!

If you make something with heart, it will be much better than 99% of the slop on Steam.

This 100%!

Just want to point out that there are programs for creating your own text adventure games, which in the nature of things requires far less graphical work than graphical adventures (but far more skill in writing as an artistic endeavor).