Setbacks, Delays and Trying to Rise Up

Well, the inevitable has happened: I decided to push back my beta "launch" (snicker) for Project WOTAN to March, and quite possibly April or May, of next year.

I did virtually zero work on it in November as I was engaged in the cruder work of making money. Working 14-hour days out in the wilderness with bare access to electricity, let alone the Intertubes, is not conducive to making progress on an ambitious PBBG.

Even if I were able to make up the time this month, alas that is also not happening as I returned to find myself soon to be divorced, separated from my child and homeless leaving me scrambling to find a way just to stay alive. Again, not exactly an ideal situation for creating a browser game.

Rest assured, however, that unless my body washes up on a beach half-eaten I will continue to persevere in my effort and send Gungnir flying true. Of course, the inevitable mediocre anonymity the site will enjoy is not exactly a great incentive, but at least I will be able to say I finished it.

I have continued to develop my long-term idea for the project, and I am not sure if I will be able to make a MUD-for-the-web idea work; I'm not sure how well it would work even with more people (who know what they are doing) working with me. It is a dream, perhaps someday it will be a reality, but I do not believe so with this project.

Rather (long term), I am focusing on creating more of a combination of a single-player RPG and a social networking site. This was the original idea, I envisioned something maybe vaguely similar to Guild Portal. Rather than a guild organization and communication tool, though, it is a place to play and create text adventures as well as store the character(s) you use in the adventures and communicate and organize with others making and playing them.

To that effect, I am going to be setting up the main site for the project in the near future. I will need to get a VPS, and while at the lower levels they are not expensive, it is not exactly an expense I want jump right in and sign up for considering I am a very-soon-to-be homeless person. But running the game, especially how I envision it as a finished site, demand it. In fact, considering operating costs and my lack of a solid business plan, it's enough to make me hope for anonymous mediocrity.

I shouldn't underplay the business aspect of the game too much, but that is part of my extreme self-effacing nature. I actually have some really good ideas about how to make it pay for itself - none of them are original, but that also means I am picking from established practices.