This post is going to be about the decision to invest in a Proof of Concept (POC) before investing full-force into a game design idea. Read more about a POC here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_of_concept

Let me start this post by explaining this difference between a BYOND development strategy, and my development strategy. I feel it is important to describe these two because they are radically different. I also feel, naturally, that my strategy is better and thus I will have a bias towards it.

The "BYOND development strategy" in my opinion is one where the developer is about 99% open with his decisions, and updates his small fan base (or lack thereof) about what he/they are doing as they develop the game. IMO, this puts the developer in a corner of people holding pitch forks demanding x, y, and z and prevents the developer from dreaming. Dreams shattered, the developer attempts to please the 80/20 in the wrong way (read about 80/20 here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_principle ). This development strategy doesn't work for me, and I think it hurts a lot of people here. It's sorta like choosing the paint for the interior of your house, but all you've done is look at some plots of land.

My development strategy is more similar to Blizzard games; create, experiment, test, blend until you've done something worthy internally before ever going public. Be secret about a lot of details and take your time to sit or sleep on a lot of questions you can't answer right away. Add an audience when you need one, but only after you've considered the cost of doing so.

How does the POC factor into these development strategies?

Well, in the BYOND development strategy, we can see that actually a POC might be able to solve almost all of the problems associated with that. But there must be a clear line defined between the POC and the actual game. I think a lot of developers might look at their work and define it as a POC until one day it becomes the actual game. There must be a clear difference, I believe. If not, you're simply risking too much.

In the Blizzard development strategy, a POC doesn't have much of a place. The moment you've created a POC, you've given the audience too much information which could cause you to develop your self into that same corner the other developers often sit in. On the other hand it would be possible to handle this in such a way that only the right secrets are revealed, and only certain levels of feedback are looked at... What about a private POC? Maybe these have benefits for the Blizzard development strategy!

Let's explore more

1. When are POC's appropriate?
2. Who should be doing POC's?
3. What do you do if a POC fails?
4. What to do if a POC succeeds?

When are POC's appropriate?
POC's are normally used by a developer to get investor interest, which could fund the team to create the game in whole. Now days, the investor developer relationship lines are blurring, and crowd funding is becoming more and more viable as a game funding resolution. But how can a developer know if something is worth crowd funding? Maybe this is when a POC is appropriate. Perhaps the POC will build hype, but this could put the team in a hype bind. Announcing a possible game in 2012 and releasing it in 2015 is something only Blizzard seems to get away with, and in many cases, this is a BAD idea for developers relying on crowd funding sources. As soon as your crowd knows about your idea, they probably already want to play it immediately.

Who should be doing POC's?
If you're not sure an idea is worth spending money on, maybe you need to create a POC to find out. If you've got no other means of drumming up the interest or cash flow, this might be something you should strongly consider. If you have not yet created a POC but you've begun some sort of development with a distant completion timeline, perhaps you should consider a pausing point and investing into a POC. If you don't, you may run into team members leaving, lack of funds, or ideas that you thought were good turn out to be terrible. Bigger companies can handle problems like these, but you most likely can't!

What do you do if a POC fails?
Take a look at the ways in which the POC failed and then make changes to improve upon it. This may allow you to tweak and re-release your POC several times until you work your way into something you can sit and develop on. The important thing to remember is to NOT allow this to become an ALPHA and keep a lot of your eggs in the basket hidden. You are simply trying to convey your game design IDEA, not the entirety of your game! Doing this improperly could kill your hype or your chance of gaining a hype!

What to do if a POC succeeds?
Find a way to fund your creation, either via investor or crowd funding, and come up with a business plan that allows the development process for your game to take place. Use the POC to explain your game to all types of people, non-gamers, casual-gamers, and veteran-gamers. Measure their feedback and use it to better direct your development process. If you lean towards the Blizzard strategy, remember to keep your findings and your decisions secret in order to protect yourself from becoming trapped.

These are all my own ideas and perspective, and I am by no means an expert in this field. I am mostly posting this to read and interact with others who might have similar or conflicting thoughts on the matter.

This is also my own way of realizing that I should probably build a POC for Legends because now that we are very deep into development, there are many many questions we're asking ourselves that a POC could easily answer!

Feel free to share your thoughts in a reply, and thanks for reading my non sense.