Thanks, everybody, for all the help.  I'll be checking out the recommendations.

One of the main reasons that I decided to go ahead and give this thing a try
after all these years is that I didn't want to be what I call a "genre bigot".
I know SO many people who are sure that opera could never be anything but
boring, even though they've never been to one... or who are SURE that a graphic
novel sold in a comics store could never have any real intellectual or aesthetic
worth even though they've never actually read one. Frankly, my original
outsider's impression of the video game world was not very positive. I did not,
however, want to adopt a position of uninformed certainty that "video games are
made by and for a bunch brainless subhumans who get their jollies pretending to
hack, shoot and blow various things and people to bits".  There is certainly the
potential for video gaming to be an outlet for meaningful creative expression.

This being said, I've become fascinated with the game "Dragon Quest VIII" as a
mysterious anthropological artifact.  Mysterious? Yes. If it was just plain
awful, there would be no mystery.  There's plenty on drivel in the world and
one more piece could be circumnavigated much as one avoids the calling card of
a poorly supervised dog. Here's the mystery: How could the same people who
could create art and story components which display virtually indisputable
evidence of rather advanced aesthetic and intellectual sensibilities produce
and publish a game in which the player is compelled to spend the great majority
of playing time in INSANELY frequent and absolutely pointless battles with silly
monsters?

Their HAD to be (IMHO) artists and writers saying, "This is really STUPID and
it's wrecking the story!" and marketing "people" saying, "We need to sell
gazillions of these to the masses... No continuous monster bashing means no
gazillions of sales... No gazillions of sales means no project".

I would very much like to see the proliferation of free and inexpensive graphics
software and reusable game "engines" lead to a thriving "cottage industry" of
creative game writers who are able to make a decent living developing niche
games that have not had their stories dumbed down and the violence ratcheted up
for marketing to the billions.  I tend to believe that there's more hope for
this happening for the PC than for dedicated games systems for which licensing
and distribution is controlled by few large companies.  Sony and/or Nintendo
MIGHT see the wisdom of developing the whole market by supporting some games
outside of the old mainstream chestnuts, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

It has occurred to me that there's a lot of potential "alternative game" talent
right here in this group.  I think that, personally, I stand a decent chance of
making some fairly significant contributions in the specific areas of graphic
design, story development and (my only relevant technical skill of any note)
developing interactive natural language generation algorithms to replace
repetitive libraries of "stock dialog". I couldn't even BEGIN, however to
manage such a project due to a lack of both time and a variety of necessary
skills.

So... should there be anyone out there who DOES have the gumption and
wherewithal to be the driving force behind such a project, PLEASE SPEAK UP.
Although the chances of producing some sort of "blockbuster" that will lead to
wealth beyond the dreams of avarice are slim to none, I'd be willing to throw
in on the basis of it being a good learning experience and an opportunity for
creative outlet.

Best Regards,
Mike C.

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