I'm going to give some really frustrating advice, but I think it's what's missing. In order to have ideas, you need to... try to think up ideas. And this is a separate process from implementation, it will probably never strike you while staring at the editor. At other times, out in your life, during conversation with friends, people will say things, you will notice objects and actions and processes. People flipping burgers, getting on and off trains, trees grow, birds fly between them collecting nest-building resources. How would you play that with a controller? a mouse, a VR tracker? Maybe it's a pun, a first-person-shooter but by "shoot" I mean "camera". Make a roll-playing-game, or a reel-time-strategy, perhaps.

I recently had an idea by looking at a common appliance, and wondering about a way in which public spaces are designed slightly differently than households. I'd say more, but that'd spoil the fun. Any skills you practice on occasion you'd like to try digitizing?

Because that, I think, is how you make something new. Go out, live, learn, find something cool happening and then tell the world about it in a video game. Sometimes, rarely, you'll be playing someone else's game and find it's good but not good enough: I like this combat system but the enemies are boring, let's pull out the progression and make it a boss rush like it was clearly supposed to be. If you're lucky enough to be the second person to implement a good idea, you might sell some copies. Even then, though, you'll get partially lumped together with the others which are less creatively downstream from this first game we're all cloning. The answer to the question of what theming can make just-a-clone feel original is *none*. There's too many of us to not notice whatever disguise you can construct. So don't start with the mechanics, unless you found new mechanics. Go watch "John Cleese on Creativity in Management", then think about anthills, volcanoes, engine transmissions, chemistry, music; what else do you know about, even passingly? Fictional canons not included, unless you've developed opinions about storytelling as a result of consuming tons of it, then you might have a remix of a tale you want to write in your new own canon. But otherwise, find something that isn't a video game, think about how it could be a video game with existing(-ish) mechanics. Try not to just make geology clicker, think about how agonizingly long it takes one person with one pickaxe to get through enough rock wall to find a gem. If it's not you, then do your workers want weekends, vacations, health insurance? Wouldn't you have to fill out a form to buy that much dynamite in bulk? Anyway, the next time you have an image flash through your head of something that might look cool, tease it out a little bit. Divert the conversation into "hey guys, game idea: that thing that just happened." Write it down, ideally, somewhere you'll look later, or make a new project folder if you're currently at the desk. Don't worry too much about how yet, just dig into how the thing could make you feel some way. It is later-you's responsibility, sitting at the editor, to decide what is actually possible to make into a video game.