My bob! that is a lot of reading to go through.... now I forgot what I read.... Oh yeah.

I'd like to note that not every idea will end up in the final game. In disney animation, storyboarders write and draw up their ideas and display them before the director and such, and not every idea is taken, sometimes peoples hard work is thrown out, sometimes entire scenes... and oddly enough, in the end, it turns out to be something much different than the original idea. (the Emporer's New Groove was originally going to be called Kingdom of the Sun, another traditional disney flick (love story and everything)... but in the end it came up to be a side splitting comedy.). This will happen in the development phaze.

Any character designs made right now are more likely not to be in the final product, than those made after the core concept is decided.... oh yeah... core concept, the first thing to decide. Now how did Bob Bates (was that the right name?) put it? Ah, yes, The high concept...er... actually that doesn't sound much different than core concept.

In his book, "Game Design, The art and the business", he says that the high concept describes the game in only a couple of sentances. That will be an anchor that helps the project stay in focus.

er... wow... I sound smart... why can't I be this smart in RL?