Whoops, I haven’t been posting much lately, have I. My apologies for my recent absence. I just wanted to check in, let you know I’m still here, still working, and give a bit of an update on what I’m working on.

I haven’t been posting much lately, mostly because I haven’t felt like writing on the blog. I’m actually working on a chapter for a new book, which shall remain nameless for the time being. It’s been really fun doing this kind of technical writing, but it’s been taking up all of my time, and I really haven’t felt like writing much else. I hope you’ll understand. I’ll provide more details on my chapter once I’m sure it’s ok to talk about it.

I don’t have much news in the way of Dapple. Things are still doing what they were doing a week or two ago; not much has changed. I’m starting to work on some things for the 1.2 update, but I can’t talk about some of them just yet. It’s a secret…shhhhh…

I’ve also been obsessing over ideas for my next project. Right now I have two ideas for games I desperately want to make, and one idea for a little non-game app that I want to make. Every day I want to work on a different one. At some point, once this chapter is done, I’ll have to make a decision and start working on one. The little non-game app will probably win out, as I think it’s something I can build quickly that will be fun to do. After that I’ll have the harder decision of which game to build.

As for that game decision, it’s a tough one. One of game ideas kind of falls under the “art game” umbrella. And honestly, I’m not sure if there’s any market at all for that on the App Store. I really want to make this game though! The other game is still a little out there, but it’s much more in line with what people traditionally think of as a game. Neither game will be remotely like Dapple.

I had an interesting experience with all of this. I posted a question on Twitter asking people whether I should make the game I really want to make, or the game of which I thought could sell more than 2 copies. What a flood of responses I got from other developers! I got responses supporting all kinds of strategies. But honestly, I was shocked by the high percentage of people who said: “make the game that will make you money!” I’m not sure why it surprised me. Maybe I thought we were all romantics at heart who put the art before the money. I guess most people are more pragmatic than that. That’s not a bad thing; it’s important if you want to create a sustainable business. But why does pragmatism and idealism have to be mutually exclusive? Can I find some way to do both? I don’t know the answer to that yet.

Ultimately, it’s not as hard a decision as I’m making it out to be, as I do really want to make both games. Either way I’m going to be making a game that I care about. It’s just tempting right now to try to make something that lets me express something that’s important to me. And really, isn’t that why I went indie in the first place?

Wow, I kind of rambled all over the place there. It must be Friday. Have a great weekend!

Owen