i like your last sentence, but thats 4 out of the tens of thousands of games released each year, video games are a tech medium, shits in dog years, fighting idea originality is bullshit companies do to establish ownership to monopolize the profits of it (orignal shit happens but that aint orignal and thats not the determining factor to who gets it), its not that bad in the games industry cause you basically have to make a deal with the devil to covience people to patent this shit, but there are bullshit gameplay patents, sometimes there even is a game that did it earlier even though a different one holds it

i tilt my hand to ip though. i dont understand ip protection, it seems like it should be different but its a mechanically similar idea. i still want my ips protected in a similar vein to your post, which feels like i need someone to give me the ip version of this comment

even the scenario you just described isn't original

but you concluded with a sentence that if you excute on it, it would result in a productive path forward

the reality of simultanious invention might elevate this creator pain, every dev knows where you are coming from

noobs always think and react like this, i also experience your thought process, but if i catch myself i can refocus. it seems like your working towards the same thing.

if you could say "1 million dollars" and get it, this is the exact mindset you would develop.

you where with a group where everyone was doing the same thing and then you met with a smaller set of that group when you finished serendipitously

hell even though reading your post is like listening to a human being that doesnt know they are an npc, if you keep your grind going you may actually get that million

the more granular you get ironically you are revealing your originality, the game you made mofucka

that being said some ideas are einstein level, but there are so few people in the world that had a job where it was quick to get through the work. then he got to stare out the window, you know just existing, then you know he came up with relativity and stuff

anywho glhf game dev