Concept Development

Things to know:

• This is NOT an advertisement forum.
• This is NOT an advertisement forum.
• This is NOT an advertisement forum.
• This is NOT an advertisement forum.
• This is NOT an advertisement forum.
• Advertising here will piss off the staff.

The Rules:

Observe All Global Rules While Posting In This Forum

No Advertisement Ever
We can't stress this enough.   This is not a promotional forum.   You are not allowed to post promotional materials such as random screenshots, demos, recruitment ads, or links to any such material regardless of where it is located.   The aim of this forum is to provide critical feedback for concept materials, not gather fans  or minions for your team.   If that is all you want to do, I suggest you go to project discussion.

Do Not Post Your Topic Prematurely
If your topic is filled with empty spoilers and sections that read coming soon, with little content to comment on it will be locked.   Don't post until you have all your ducks in a row, please.   Thanks.

Do Not Post Non-descriptive Content
We don't want to see non-descriptive lists of features, characters, ect.   Make sure that what ever you post there is enough material for a thoughtful comment to be made on.   If the readers have to ask the most basic of questions you are not being descriptive enough.

Do Not Bump Your Topic Unless You Have Made A Substantial Update
In general unless you've added new content to your thread, don't bump.  

Be Receptive To Honest and Thoughtful Feedback
You do not have to agree with everyone's opinion on your work or try and implement everyone's ideas, but if you treat legitimate criticism like a personal insult you will be warned and your thread may be locked.   If you don't want to hear criticism go elsewhere.

Provide Thoughtful and Helpful Feedback
Speaks for itself but here are some examples of what to do.   And here are some examples of what not to do.

FAQ

Q. What is this forum for?

A. Concept development is for the development of game concept materials such as stories, character, setting, and general gameplay mechanics.   This forum is for you to post your ideas and receive feedback on any of these aspects of game design.

Q. Why should I spend time developing concept material, and how shall I go about it?

A. Read this.

Q. How will I get people to want to play my game or join my team if I can't post random screenshots?

A. Post a thread in Project Discussion.   We aren't interested in providing ad space for you in this subforum, sorry.

Q. Ok, I get the whole no promotional screens thing, but what about concept mockups of huds, battle interfaces, and story boards and such?

A. Those are exactly what we are looking for.   All concept art is fine as long as you are looking for feedback for how it pertains to the whole of your game design.   If you are concerned about artistic makeup of the product you may want to use Art and Graphics instead to get purely artistic feedback.

Q. I have a thread in Project Discussion, am I allowed to have a thread in concept development, too?

A. Yes, so long as that thread doesn't break the cardinal rule of being an ad thread it will be fine.   Its perfectly OK if you want to have a thread to get feedback on your story ideas or battle system concepts.

Q. Can I have more than one thread devoted to the same project in concept development?

A. Yes, so long as they are threads that focus on different aspects of that project.   So you could have one thread dedicated to plot, and then one dedicated to gameplay ideas.  

Q. My initial post went over the character limit so stuff was cut-off can I double post to fit all of the content?

A. Yes.

Q. I want to get feedback on my mapping can I post screens of those?

A. No, use the mapping improvement thread in RM discussion.

Q. I wrote a script/made a sprite/made a bgm can I put it here for feedback?

A. While you could, you would probably be better off posting it in script analysis (in the case of scripts) or resource analysis (for other resources).

Q. I have a non generic problem.

A. Use the report button.

Example Threads

Examples of Good Concept Development threads:
http://hbgames.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=350011#p350011
http://hbgames.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=442063#p442063
http://hbgames.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=442063#p442063
http://hbgames.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=487610#p487610
http://hbgames.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=482770#p482770

Examples of Bad Concept Development threads:
http://hbgames.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=508387#p508387
http://hbgames.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=501669#p501669
http://hbgames.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=500211#p500211
http://hbgames.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=495107#p495107
http://hbgames.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=490822#p490822