I have way too many projects.

Not even actual projects, really. Half of them are folders on my computer, GitHub repos with three commits, or ideas I’ve spent more time planning than I ever spent building.

Tonight I almost added another one.

I’ve always wanted to make an open-world game. Not some giant realistic 3D thing, but something more like Stardew Valley mixed with RuneScape. Top-down 2D, multiplayer, skills, quests, an economy, houses, trading, all that shit. Basically a world where you can go kill monsters if you want, or spend six hours fishing and selling your catch to other players.

I started talking through the idea and, naturally, within an hour I was trying to decide whether the server should be written in C# or Java.

There was no game.

I hadn’t opened Godot.

I hadn’t made a character.

I hadn’t drawn a single tile.

But somehow I was already thinking about authoritative multiplayer servers, PostgreSQL, how the world would be divided up, how the economy would work, and whether players should be able to make a living hauling resources between cities.

I even named it Wilderune.

This is apparently what I do.

I Really Like Starting Things

The beginning of a project is always the best part.

There’s nothing broken yet. There aren’t any annoying bugs you’ve been putting off for three weeks. You don’t have users telling you something doesn’t work. You don’t have a giant list of boring shit that needs cleaned up.

It’s just an idea, and the idea can be anything.

You get to pick the stack, make folders, research things, sketch out features, make a roadmap, come up with a name, and convince yourself that this is definitely the one you’re going to stick with.

That all feels like work, too.

Technically, it is work.

The problem is that I can spend an entire night doing it and still have absolutely nothing to show for it.

I’ve done this enough times that my computer is basically an archaeological record of things I was extremely interested in for anywhere from three hours to three months.

Meanwhile, I Already Have Shit To Do

That’s what finally hit me tonight.

I’m finishing my computer science degree. I’m trying to actually get better at programming instead of just getting through classes. I’m building Arnett Digital and haven’t even gotten that where I want it yet. I have old projects I could improve, a personal website I’m actively working on, and plenty of other things going on outside of a computer.

So obviously the logical next move was to build a multiplayer RPG.

I think Wilderune is a genuinely cool idea. That’s almost what makes it worse.

If it were a stupid idea, I’d forget about it tomorrow.

Instead I can already picture what the world would look like, how the skills would work, what it would feel like to walk into a town and see other players running around doing their own thing. That’s exactly the kind of project I can disappear into.

And right now I probably shouldn’t.

An Idea Can Just Be An Idea

This sounds incredibly obvious written down, but apparently I needed to figure it out.

I don’t have to build everything I think of.

I also don’t have to throw the idea away.

I can write it down, save what I came up with, and go back to what I was already doing.

Maybe I build Wilderune someday. I’d actually like to. But if I do, I’d rather start it when I’m a better programmer and have actually finished some of the things sitting in front of me now.

For the moment, it can live in the pile.

Arnett Digital needs built. I need to finish school. I need to keep learning. There are things I’ve already started that deserve my attention before I create another giant one.

I’m sure I’ll have another brilliant idea tomorrow and immediately start researching domain names for it.

But maybe I’ll get slightly better at closing the tab.