What is your ultimate goal in game creation? Is it to accomplish a goal which you are proud of? Write a game for the masses? Have something to do in your free time that you enjoy? Get feedback from something you've created?

If you are anything like me, it's probably a combination of all of that. Which brings me to my question... Is it possible to do that early in your game writing experiences? For those with a bunch of games out there with hundreds or thousands of plays/reviews, I ask you this: did your early games get played at first or did they get played frequently long after initially published? I'm at odds here... I'm just frustrated that some games that I've tested are flat out bad and have hundreds of plays and 5 star ratings in the same amount of time as the first game I published. Perhaps I give my first attempt at game writing more credit than it deserves (rose colored glasses are often forged from pride).

Anyway... Do I keep writing games and be patient, hoping plays and reviews roll in after I've written several more games (and countless hours later)? Regardless of your input on this one, I will keep writing games because I enjoy doing so!
Do I write a mainstream, cliche game about zombies? :/
I once read on a bathroom stall wall (which found its way into part two of Xanadu somehow, lol) something about true art is not for recognition or income. Perhaps I think too much about it. Deep breath. Happy gaming and Happy Easter!!

Obviously you have to want (be personally dedicted) to making games yourself, as recognition~popularity is not something that readily happens, nor immediately.

There's A LOT of choices of games out there (and not just amongst other text adventure games too), to compete with. Think of the real game market ~ business (and the billion dollar gaming companies involved): how many games are out there vs how many of those games become 'blockbusters' ???

How can you compete in marketing~advertisement against those companies' games, against EA, Blizzard, Besteda, Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, Enix~Squaresoft, and etc games... ???

And then there's the explosion of the mobile devices' games too and~or free online MMO games ...

(sadly a lot of really good games, go completely unnoticed, as all that advertised are those mass appeal games that make it to becoming those 'block busters' which are advertised, whereas you probably don't even know of the existence of all these other games, which can be really good games, sighs)

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as the game-making mantra is said over and over:

make a game that YOU ENJOY making and~or playing !!!

the wisdom of game making, do it for yourself, and if others enjoy it too, good for them.

I'm sort of a hybrid of "those with a bunch of games out there with hundreds or thousands of plays/reviews" - I don't have a bunch of games, but the one I did put out seems to have thousands of plays. (I think being highlighted on the Text Adventures home page is hugely responsible for that, and I can't thank Alex enough.) But I can attempt to answer your questions. You seem to have two distinct sets, so I'll give my thoughts on them separately.

First, if I had to list an "ultimate" goal, it would be to create games that bridge my passions for writing/reading with game play/interactivity in a way that appeals to a large audience (which would include, first and foremost, my wife, kids, parents and friends). And getting money for it would be great as well! There's a lot there, and I'm just at the beginning stage, that of trying to make games that I want. HK has it right there - make games that you enjoy. And if they're quality, others will too, hopefully. So I'm trying for now just to get things made that I would want to play, with the hope that some others out there will want to play them and enjoy them as well. I'm fortunate enough to be able to "roll my own" engines, so I can try to tailor things to what I want, with the added responsibility of *having* to tailor things to what I want.

On the money side - well, who knows? This is the age of the indie game developer, where the Internet and the wide availability of tools and distribution channels make it possible for anyone to put together a game and get it in front of the masses. The problem is that a lot of people are doing that, so making your signal rise above the noise might be tricky. But there are smaller audiences that have more direct channels, and that leads to your second question:

How do you get plays and reviews? I sense some frustration there, but I don't think the situation is bleak.

First, if you have an unreleased game, releasing it in the context of one of the various IF competitions is a great way to get your work in front of eyes and get reviews. From what I have seen, games entered in the competitions get numerous reviews - brutally honest ones, in fact.

If you have an existing game or one that doesn't fit the comps or one that you just want to release outside the comps for whatever reason, then I think announcing it in the various IF forums will help at least get some eyes on it. Another way to go is to announce a beta for your game and ask for testers. There is even a web site (http://if.game-testing.org/) where you can put your game out for people to volunteer to test. I've been a tester once through that site. Others just announce the need for testers here on textadventures, and people will step forward out of curiosity and a desire to help. Also, announcing a testing phase indicates your serious about your game, which boosts it in people's eyes.

If you're asking how to make your game visible to the world at large (e.g. via mobile phone distribution or other internet channels), I don't have any experience in that area yet, so you might need to look around a bit or keep asking.

I must say that it feels like IF has penetrated into the mass market to some extent now once again, with recent releases of games mentioned in the New York Times like Emily Short's "Blood and Laurels" and Inkle Studios' "80 days", voted Time magazine's 2014 best game of the year. IF is no longer this niche, underground "hobby". People are getting serious recognition for their work, and I hope it will only continue.

XanMag wrote:What is your ultimate goal in game creation?

My goal is to create MY game. I started 20 years ago with the first puzzles, developing the scenery. I have changed the game engine several times until I have discovered Quest.
Right now my goal is to finish this game. Over time, it becomes increasingly difficult to motivate myself. The last 10% are the hardest.
I write the game really just for me. If it should please other people, that would be nice but not essential. Nevertheless, my intend ia to implement high quality for example with pictures of a professional illustrator.
I hope I will be finished in the next few years.

My ultimate goal is simply to create a game I'd want to play myself. I have zero expectations of anyone else playing or reviewing it, as it seems like that would only be setting myself up for disappointment. If they do, great! But it's a niche hobby full of people who identify more as writers than players in the first place, and even just looking at IF there's a glut of other, higher profile games out there already, especially when you blur the lines and start including gamebooks and CYOAs.

It's a bit like completing a fantasy novel to self-publish on the Kindle, which is another goal I work towards on and off. It's a labor of love, but if I wasn't writing it primarily for myself there would be no point. Maybe a receptive reader/reviewer will one day stumble across it within the deluge of other self-published fantasy novels for the Kindle, but it's not something I count on. This is an unprecedented time for independent artists of every medium, but it also means we're drowning in indie stuff, 99.9% of which will go unrecognized just because who has that kind of time?