I’ll participate with a paragraph:

Why is marketing so hard for indies? The core of marketing is simple to understand: get the word out about your game. In practice, it’s much harder that you might first thing. The most effective media are expensive to use. Cheap marketing takes time and a lot of effort, resources that seem better spent on improving the game. I think this is the real power of the portals, if you’re lucky enough to get star attention and get in the “Top 10″ list or whatever, it’s basically free marketing. But, then the portal takes their pound of flesh because you happened to get lucky. So, how can indie developers get better at marketing?

Carry on..

So call it what you will… writer’s block, artist’s block. Sometimes you get in a funk and your personal creative process gets in a corner. I started looking around and found that there are many time-tested exercises for breaking creative block (SCAMPER, Idea Box, etc.). There are many sites and books devoted to these. After hearing it recommended at GDC this year, I just picked up the book “A Whack on the Side of the Head”. Seems a bit dated, but looks like a quick read, so we’ll see how it goes. I was disappointed to learn that there are no iPhone apps featuring these standard exercises (hint: someone make a simple Idea Box app for me!). There are a number of apps that help out with narratives for books, including character development and plot, which, although a lot more detailed than I was looking for, promise to help develop interesting characters and scenarios. I usually end my by sitting down with material I’ve gathered throughout the day about creative thinking exercises, and even a little poking around can get ideas flowing again.