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[Biag]

From my experience I can have them have personal problems, but I don't think you start on a game having personal problems, or do you?

I imagine you wouldn't turn down a paying job because you were having trouble with the wife.

If your characters have no problems, they will have no inner conflict, and if they have no inner conflict they will have no development, and if they have no development they will not be as deep and interesting as they might be otherwise. I would spend some Serious Writing Time just getting to know your characters. Get an idea of them in your head, how they dress, how they talk, how they see the world, and then just write a couple page-long vignettes to flesh them out a little bit.

Most stories with interesting characters and no plot are comedies. Most stories with interesting plot and no characters are history books.

Also, a thousand times this.

[Supermikhail]

Except that it's stories with interesting plot and medium to little characterization that sell. Although I remember I wasn't going to sell mine anyway, it's too nerdy for that, would do better online.

Anyway, as far as I can tell, I've been getting to know my characters during the whole last attempt - about 60 pages. Meaning I intend to rewrite it all to hell. And still they don't seem enough-dimensional. I hope they will become this attempt.

LordBucket, thanks, I appreciate the effort put into these plots. I could use one of them or parts. Only I've been having doubts about whether two distinct genres such as fantasy and realism can coexist in one novel... And I myself am not too keen on realism. So it's the demon plot for me, which is close to what I had the last attempt. Only this time the demon is more evil.

[Sabin Stargem]

I can certainly see some tension if the game studio was trying to develop a game funded by an single person.  On the side of the studio, concerns about the difficulty of implementing ideas, how well they mesh with gameplay, time spent, worries about losing the funding, and just plain getting fed up with the benefactor.  The person funding the studio's game could be spending his or her entire fortune, lose a job that was making the funding possible, or be worried about the game not turning out right.  Whatever the case, it is pretty likely that person could serve as a major flashpoint for events getting out of hand.

[Biag]

Except that it's stories with interesting plot and medium to little characterization that sell.

I submit to you Firefly, the Harry Potter series, and the Song of Ice and Fire series. Plus there's Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which had a series of frankly meh plots that were made fantastic by the virtue of its characters. You could argue Twilight as a counterexample, but most of the critique there stems from two sources: 1) Stephanie Meyer is not a great writer, and 2) Stephanie Meyer fights with her characters all the time.

Besides, it seems like you're really determined to write this story. Even assuming what you're saying is true, would you rather make it marketable or good?

[Neonivek]

which had a series of frankly meh plots that were made fantastic by the virtue of its characters

Ahh yes Character stories. Where the main source of interest is on the characters and how they interact more then anything else.

Also Stephanie Meyer is best described as an Great author who doesn't know how to write. She instinctively knows what her audiance wants and knows how to give it to them, but she writes terribly. It is sort of what would happen if you were all talent but no skill.

[Supermikhail]

the Harry Potter series, and the Song of Ice and Fire series.

Strangely, it's Harry Potter who was on my mind when I was thinking about strong stories. Well, in the sense of many plot twists etc. But maybe I haven't read or watched Harry Potter in a long time. And I have never watched or read Firefly (whatever it is)... Ah, I guess I couldn't tell good characterization if it was staring me in the face, because thinking about the Song of Ice and Fire which I picked up quite recently I can't really tell what its strong points and weak points are. Well, there is sure a lot of characters and probably more inner monologue than outer dialogue and action, but I remember hanging on the edge of my seat for its plot points, at least in the first book which is the only one I've read except the prequels. e: I guess the plot is not very strong. Maybe presentation?

For some reason I wanted to say "incidentally" but right now I can't see how it connects, well, one of the reasons I became dissatisfied with my previous attempt is because I failed to keep consistent third-person subjective in the video game portion which I thought should be there for completely philosophical reasons whereas in the real world sections it should be objective.

So I want to say that I'd like my writing to first be good, but... well, I started on this story because I thought it was my most marketable one. All the rest of my ideas are depressing and philosophical (if I may), but this one I almost abandoned until I decided that this is the only one I'd be sure to sell, because it's supposed to be humorous. So, if it were possible to separate quality from marketability right now I'd much rather sell this story, than polish it until it's painful to look at it.

Unfortunately I imagine marketability with this story will come much later than the time when it's monstrously painful for me to look at it.

[Vactor]

Don't be misled into thinking that you desire to know what is about to happen in a story because you care about the plot.  It is that the plot is the events that are happening to characters who you care about.  The most interesting plot will be painful to get through if you aren't interested/invested in the characters to whom it is happening.