It seemed like a good idea in the beginning (read reviews instead of playing them, conserve time), but as the time went by it became more & more stupid. Why? It was really time consuming, and no matter how I changed my plans it would take a lot of time to read a hell lot of game reviews. It was so time-consuming that it got in the way of actually playing games, let alone learning to design them...
Well, NO MORE! I just realized that it's been six months since I last played a game, and told myself: "hey! how much is this actually going to take???" and decided to overhaul my schedule.
That overhaul means that I will read at most 14 reviews per week. one in the morning, one in the afternoon. It doesn't matter that I won't be able to read all the reviews this way: they're not all that important. I've written a program fo myself, and I'll follow this program for the time being...
Changes in my beliefs:
(Red text represents further information, and you can skip it)
So what do you do when you want to reach a destinations?
Basic Belief: You move towards it, and you'll eventually get there.
My Belief: That's just too simplistic. Just when exactly is "eventually"? and what guarantees that you'll get there in the end?
I'm a logical guy (and a programmer), so when I want to get somewhere, I carefully plan my approach to it, I make a plan, and then follow it. I'll use facts (ie: the place you want to reach is 4 meters away), and logic (to make it there in 4 seconds, you have to move at a speed of 4 m/s) to create my plan.
I used to put a lot of thought into my plans, and then carefully follow them, I thought it's the best way to reach your destination, since it's based on facts & logic. (both of them are absolute, so you'll get an a plan that's "absolutely" the best)
However, I have to correct myself. Having a plan is absolutely better than not having one, But this approach is not efficient enough for me. So I have to modify it, in two ways.
01-Prioritize: This comes in handy when your plan is made up of different elements. In order to make the plan efficient, instead of following the plan instructions one by one, you'll have to choose which part of the plan plays a more major role in getting to your destination, and spend more time & attention on it.
Example: You want to go to a mall in a snowy day, the best logical plan is to wear something warm, get a car, use geometry to find the fastest route, and then move in the said route. This plan is made of three different elements. 1-warm clothing, 2-a car, 3-moving towards the mall. If you start following this plan, you need to put on some warm clothing. Now if somehow you couldn't find something warm enough, you wouldn't be able to follow your plan, and it will be useless. That's the same if you find out that your car doesn't start. That's when prioritizing comes into the picture: Your goal is reaching the mall, so moving towards it has the highest priority. Now while moving towards it, you'll want to stay healthy, so warm clothing comes next, and after that you'll want to save time so the car comes last. "Priority: reaching your goal> staying healthy > saving time". So if you really want to go to the mall, the most important thing you have to do is moving towards it so it has the highest priority. The next is keeping warm, so you'll look for warm clothing, and wear it "if you found it". If you didn't, you have to go outside without wearing something warm, since moving has a higher priority. The same goes to the car: you use it if you can, and if you can't you just walk there. Because this example plan was so simple (made of 3 elements), you can unconsciously plan something without putting much thought to it. However if your plans get more & more complex (a plan that's made of 50 elements), prioritizing plays a major role in it...
02-Feedback: By "Feedback" I mean "use a streaming input to continuously correct your output."
You use feed back in your everyday life: use this experiment to understand what I mean: put an object on a table, stay 1 meters away, and look where the object is. Now close your eyes and try to grab it. You'll most likely fail, and hit somewhere near the object, instead of grabbing it the way you intended.
So what does this mean? You know where the object is, so you create a plan for grabbing it. (stretch you arm about 1 meter, then put it down) You then execute your plan, but because your arms and brain have some faults, you are not able to execute your plan the way you intended to.
However when you normally want to grab something, you stretch your arm, your eyes see your hand, and give the input to the brain. your brain analyzes the picture and if you're moving your arm in the wrong direction, it will reconsider your arm's approach and send the new signals to your arm. This happens continuously, so you reform your plan continuously before you reach the object.
(You see the placement of your hands and the object, you create a route, move your hand in the direction you want for a very little bit, then you use the new picture captured by your eyes to create another route and move your hand in the new route for another little bit, when these actions are strung together, it seems like your hands are moving straight towards the object.
In this case, output is your plan, and input is your surrounding's events. so you constantly reform your plan based on current conditions. (Example: you're going to mall, you see that there's heavy traffic on your desired route, you change your plan and decide to go there from another route)
My Current Belief: So what do I do if my "destination" is "game designer"? I create a plan. I prioritize the important elements (it's designing mods for now), and I use the info I get from internet using reviews, news, game sales and popularity, and other info, as a feedback to continuously correct my plan's faults.
This approach certainly has it's faults, as I'm just a normal human and humans make a lot of mistakes. However I'll use this approach until I find a better one...
Picture of the day:
E74 has infected my X360, again