Making a Game Without Graphics?

Question

Is it possible or even constructive to make a game without any graphics (but is intended to become graphical)

I'm not good with graphics at all, so I'd like to write the skeleton for the game then have a graphics programmer/artist fill in the rest. I could write up all the major classes, and their interactions, and all the major functions/parts of the game.

If so, what should I do to make it easier to integrate graphics into the game later on (every drawn object should have a Draw, Rotate, Collide, etc method) ?

Answer 1

I used to play NetHack (ASCII Characters), Castle of the Winds (top-down graphical), and Diablo (2-D but viewed from an angle). The gameplay for all was similar. They were all tile based. They all had similar equipment, spells, fighting, exploring, random maps, etc. However, the graphics increased in quality.

The game, Adventure was a text based adventure game with text commands for "go north", "look", "get rock", etc. Then, the King's Quest games (all graphical) started with walking around but still typing commands. In the later games, you had a standard menu icon for "look here", "walk here", "pick up object", etc instead of typing.

This doesn't really answer your questions, but some examples of games with similar gameplay but added graphical features as time went forward.