How do you generate ideas?

[Mariol]

Hi All,

I've written a short article about how to help individuals and teams generate ideas here.

I'd like some feedback if possible on the content and any spelling or grammatical mistakes (can these be posted here). All will be appreciated.

More importantly, I'd like to know how others generate ideas. If you have a method that's not listed in the article, feel free to leave a comment under the article.

Thanks

[Rat King]

I play games, I watch movies, I read books, I travel -- the ideas come to me.

Though when I need new ideas I start in different ends. I've tried starting things up by deciding on mechanics I will use, what setting the game will have (and work on mechanics and gameplay from there) and sometimes I've written documents on existing books and/or movies -- just for the hell of it.

There's no right or wrong way to go here.

Though it's important to point out that a designer isn't really an 'idea machine'. There's no room in the industry for that.

[Joe2]

They mostly come to me, but they have inspirations. Sometimes you have to ask "What if this happens?" "What is the result?" "Why are things this way?"

[Joe2]

Though you did mention the word "generate". If it's just some sort of creation in a mechanical sense, you could use a dart board of a random number generator

[tsloper]

In my experience, you never need "ideas" without any kind of focus. Nobody ever says, "we don't have any problems, just come up with any kind of ideas." It's always "we need a solution to Problem X," or "we need to solve this game's lack of fun," or "what's the best user interface for Problem Y." So there's almost always a focus to the ideas, not a vague and nebulous need for ideas.
When you have that focus, just put it in your mind and go about your life. Ideas will come to you while you watch a movie or while you walk around or while you do the dishes. I had a design problem that was bugging me, and the solution occurred to me while riding a double-decker bus in Hong Kong. Go figure.

[Rybo5000]

I don't know it's kind of random; for example I thought up and entire narrative and game idea in the shower yesterday morning. I rushed out and began drawing some simple concept art before I forgot it!

But most of the time my ideas come from reading about another game and thinking "that sounds good, but what if they did this instead?"

[Bionicoct]

I like to browse inspirational websites, that inspires me and helps me generate ideas

[darkmite83]

There are a lot of ways of how someone can generate ideas. for example, if someone is looking at designing and furnishing their own houses, they can get ideas by reading a lot of magzines on interior design, furniture, landscaping, decorations, etc............ By reading these magazines alone, they can come up with a lot of ideas and also create new ideas out of the existing ideas that they already have.

Other ways of generating ideas could be by talking to people about what they think about a certain subject or going to exhibitions can also generate ideas. websites,books and many other materials out there are also great tools to generate ideas.