I've been working on a game in my free time recently[0], and I can't stress enough how important it is to identify a "critical path" for developing. Games are such a visual and auditory medium that you can make a really polished and interesting experience that falls flat on it's face when it comes to depth or game mechanics.
Get to the very core of what you want your players to feel, their mindset, etc... and then build on top of it.
Part of doing this well is playtesting (note that this is not QA or usability testing, and especially not focus testing). Think of game designs as hypotheses and playtests as experiments. You can learn an absolute ton about your game just from doing this every week or two. I've found that using Steam's Remote Play Together feature made this quite feasible during WFH.
Get to the very core of what you want your players to feel, their mindset, etc... and then build on top of it.
Part of doing this well is playtesting (note that this is not QA or usability testing, and especially not focus testing). Think of game designs as hypotheses and playtests as experiments. You can learn an absolute ton about your game just from doing this every week or two. I've found that using Steam's Remote Play Together feature made this quite feasible during WFH.
[0] Link in bio if anybody is interested.