I haven't read all the replies as I have only 5 mins to spare, but I'll tell you this. I tried to make a 'perfect' game once. But then I realised that my first game was already 'perfect'. And my next full game shall be a perfection of the first.
See.. you have your reasons for starting on creating games. Maybe you wanted to make a game of some type. Action, RPG, whatever it is, you liked it and you wanted to make your own. So, just take a look at that game and improve it. Build on the world. If it's an action game like GTA, expand the cities, the world, the characters. If it's an RPG, build more fantasies around your fantasy.
Your first game should be perfect. But perfection is not about having everything just right. It's about having something that you can improve on infinitely.
Disclaimer: Any sarcasm in my posts will not be mentioned as that would ruin the purpose. It is assumed that the reader is intelligent enough to tell the difference between what is sarcasm and what is not.
I think the plot needs to develop a litlle. What would a criminal gang need money for if they own the city? Add a litlle more background: Where do they excpect this character to get 500G from? Is there another story behind the cidnapping? Maybe they just want to kill the son for revenge. Doing it just for the money would be kind of shallow (not to mention a tidy bit cliche), and it would be pretty amateurish of the gang to cidnap a random kid and excpect either a paycheck or a kill (at least in the eyes of some people). Revenge is also starting to become a cliche really soon, so you'd might prefer to complicate matters a litlle further. Maybe they even like to see people struggle for the love of their family as a sport.
Did I really say "Good plot" two years ago? I must have been trying to get rid of him. Gamewack was hilarious, and I'm indebted to RaphX for getting rid of him. I think I still have the chatlog somewhere...
Wow... 2003. Amazing how little I've changed since then . Should've realised that the guy's probably dead instead of making new games.
Phizzy, what I meant was that it had the potential to be infinitely improved. A lot of games are pretty dead ended. Bad games like um... those clones, Barbie games, Serious Sam have nothing to improve on. They started bad and there's just nothing you could build on.
"Perfect" games like Everquest, Final Fantasy, ADOM, Half-Life, have plenty to build up. Games like FF can never be perfected because they're limited by the combat system and old ways. The only way you can perfect a bad game is by making a remake of it.
Disclaimer: Any sarcasm in my posts will not be mentioned as that would ruin the purpose. It is assumed that the reader is intelligent enough to tell the difference between what is sarcasm and what is not.