I was not nearly as detailed in my instructions as I thought I had been.
I made the mistake of comparing a feature I wanted to a feature in an old game. There is a new game with the same name that comes up in a search that is completely different. I hadn’t looked up the game of course because I knew what I was talking about. This made me feel a little silly.
When you are hiring someone else to make something for you, you must be extremely clear with what you want.
You cannot have too much clarity when describing something to a programmer.
If you are vague, you will either get their best guess or they will wait for clarity before continuing.
Time is money when you hire someone else. It could even be your time as you manage them. In this case, the first version of the game the developer created was not even the right genre. If you have high clarity, you will get what you want in a timely manner.
Here is how you create clear instructions for fiverr contractors.
#1. Google your own instructions and examples and see what the first result is.
If the developers are not familiar with what you are talking about, this is likely the first thing they will do.
After you Google this, grab the links to the sites that have the info you think will be relevant and add them to your instructions.
#2. Add images to your instructions.
Visual references add so much value to your written instructions.
Get the Google images results from the same searches that you did in step 1 and add them to your instructions.
#3. Ask a friend or family member what they think each instruction means.
Not everyone thinks the exact same way. See if you can have someone else tell you what they think you mean from your instructions.
After several passes I finally ended up with a game surprisingly close to what I had envisioned. You can get something built too if you will take the time to make it clear what you want.