If you want to get into the profession of game development, the first thing folks in the industry will tell you is to start making games. Fortunately, there is an abundance of tools available for artists, designers, writers, and other creators to dive into the process and craft of making games. The first games you create don’t have to be perfect, nor do they even have to be good. The point is to just learn from your successes and failures, and then continue making games.
My journey into making games comes from my passion for storytelling. I’m fascinated by how games can create unique interactive narratives that cannot be experienced in a strictly linear format. When I thought about making my first game, I wanted to draw on my existing skills as a writer and create a text-based game built that allows the player to make choices as they move through the narrative. Hoping it will help other first-timers, here are a few of the lessons I learned on the journey of making my first game, Bluebeard: An Interactive Tale.