Creativity

Creativity is, obviously, vital to creative endeavours such as game development.

Unfortunately, it seems like sheer luck of the draw as to who possesses the capacity for great creative output. Of course, some people say that creativity is a skill that can be practised, but they often give no leads as to how to even start such a task as practising creative thought.

My brain is wired in such a way that I enjoy following things from a definite start to a definite end. This is reflected in my own affinity for mathematics, a relatively robotic and logical game where the mathematician has a "toolbox" of actions and processes to be applied to a given problem, and the rest comes down to pattern recognition to know when to use a hammer and when to use a wrench.

Of course, I have had creative thoughts in the past. I have made creative things in the past. However, they come as seemingly random bursts of information in my mind rather than anything prepared or even expected. Is this what creativity is? I am hesitant to believe that creativity is indeed so spurious and unpredictable - there has to be some semblance of reason to it.


This is where Google and philosophy fail me. I only know my own mind, and to imagine the mind of another hardly makes sense to me. Trying to emulate the particular patterns of thought and the neural connections so prominent in those who call themselves "creative" is obviously a fool's game. I can only ever achieve true creative ability by way of trial and error.

And that's pretty damn disappointing.