I think this 90 day challenge is a nice idea that can bring some excitement to your channel and business. A tip is maybe you could've teased this at the start of the video, because it's exciting enough for people to stick around to the end to hear about it.
Thanks so much! I'm excited, should be a lot of fun and yea definitely a huge learning experience. Your comment on my earlier video is what ultimately led to this idea, so thanks for that, cheers man
nice videos bro... as someone who had the same dream as you, and someone who quit college and came back home with $150 in his pocket to try and make video games... I realized in the very beginning that making a game that will sell and have a steady income is not that easy when you lack a ton of other skills like marketing... that's why I started selling digital products like courses, then I opened my game dev studio for mobile games, did that for a while but it didn't turn out the way I wanted... now I'm launching my asset store for game developers, and we're also going to launch our first game soon... I didn't record any making of the game nor did I talk about it because I learned to make money in other ways... Most game dev creators and other creators in general do this... in your first video where you talked about finances and such you mentioned thomas brush, he does the same thing, in fact I strongly believe that he makes more money from selling his courses than he's ever made from selling his games so that tells you something... The only way to sky rocket quickly in the game dev space is to have viral videos like Two Star did with choo choo charles... dani was on a good way to make the same thing but it seem to me he was kinda stuck between being the game dev mr beast or actually creating a game which ended in a burnout where he's not doing anything at the moment... All in all, you need something to sell and not depend on youtube or patreon or something similar to that... also I think you're investing too much time in your videos which at the end of the day don't go viral, I had the same problem and I'm talking from experience and good heart to help you out... just turn on the camera and start talking and that's that... Also, if you need any help, advice or whatever, I will gladly help you out just reach out to me developer@awesometuts.com... I've been doing this fulltime since 2015 so I know a thing or two about making this work...
From a game developer to game developer, here's what I've done to work towards the SAME dream you have which is to make games for a living and this is an idea that has worked for me: I drive a school bus to accomplish my goal. Everyday, I work from 6 am to 8:30 am in the morning and work from 3 pm to about 5:30 pm in the evening. So thus, between 8:30 am to 3 pm, I get a VERY BIG six to seven hour break EACH day. So, guess what I be doing within that 6 to 7 hour break!! I work on my game and not only do I work on my game, I could go back to sleep or basically do anything I want between that time. And $25 per hour in the Midwest USA is not bad and I get paid every week. Plus, I get weekends off, summers off, I will have Spring Break next week, I got Christmas off, Thanksgiving off and all kinds of holidays that schools normally get off. Thus, that's more time to work on my game if I need (or go traveling). And there is a HUGEEEEEEE shortage of school bus drivers or CDL drivers of all kinds. With a CDL B school bus license you could go anywhere you want to go. The hard part is studying to get the CDL and getting used to driving that big bus (or truck). But, such could be done within a few weeks and it's not hard after you get used to it. So, while I'm trying to accomplish the same goal as you, this is how I have a bit of income coming in. And even still, driving a school bus is kind of fun too. It can be an ideal job for gamers. Driving a bus can be A LOT like playing a video game lol. That coordination that you got from playing video games could be monetized lol. And while I'm driving, I sometimes play video game music in the background. And even more, the students I transport are pretty cool!!! Because, guess what: They're gamers too. So, when you mention Mega Man, Metroid, Street Fighter etc., a bunch of those students will know what you're talking about. And we're always talking about games on the bus. And we might go see the Super Mario Brothers movie that's coming out. So, it's win win. And not to mention it's great getting out and traveling around sometimes and getting some fresh air and take in some warm weather while having fun driving around. Thus, this is just the what I've been doing to accomplish the same goal as you. And this is just my 2 cents.
I wouldn’t quit my job unless I got a publisher deal, that’s a little insane to burn through savings and not knowing if my game is even going to succeed or not.
I know of a local game studio that does contract work and freelancing jobs for about one year until they have saved up enough money to work on one of their own ideas for about one year. Their own ideas always fail so they always get back to contract work after releasing one of their own products. But only until they have enough money to try it again. Of course their games always drop something and even their old games are selling every now and then, so they don't have to do as much contract work as the first time. You could apply the same. It's pretty save to work that way and while working for others you gain quite some experience on the cost of someone else.
As a solo dev, who has a playtest on Steam, I would recommend that you put your main game on Steam as a playtest. Set it up as an open playtest so players can get right in to try what you already have. I work in Unreal so I'm not familiar with how Unity does patches. I don't think the 90-day challenge is the way to go if you're short on time, make the really tough decisions about your game and kick it out the door. Do early access if the core of your game is there and all that's really needed is more levels/maps for your game. I'm certain your game is far better than you're giving yourself credit for, but you won't know this until others get a chance to play it!
@tivasthegamer9817 I'm making a game in ue5.1 with networking for multiplayer , ai and much more its going to be a AAA game check it out by joining us and hmu and I can help to create you some assets free of charge on my freetime.
This is why I'd say that being a software developer first is better, then steadily build income streams using your skills as a dev before quitting everything and working on your passion projects. But this is my opinion. I applaud you guys for your decisions and I can understand the struggle. Best of luck, and I can't wait for the Steam Next Fest. Will definitely give the game a try when it launches❤️
"This is gonna be so much fun" seems like foreshadowing lol. I'm excited to track along with your progress making the game! Your videos are also so well done. I don't understand YT as well as I thought I did but sometimes things just pick up seemingly out of the blue. But even if that never happens, it's easy to tell you're building an actual community. I've seen even the smallest communities do mighty things. Much love brother, you've got this. As far as I can tell, you're doing everything right.
Oh what I have in mind should make this a hectic/super fun experience. I just hope I can pull it off in time! I'm keeping the scope small while (hopefully) the replay value high. Thanks for all your encouragement and advice man, it's all been really helpful and means the world to me. Talk soon man!
I came across your channel last night and a lot of what you discuss resonates deeply with me. I am also an indie developer, and i just passed the 1 year mark of plunking around. I hardly ever come out of lurking to post, but let me just say this: based off of what i've seen so far you've got an eye for polish (looking at your awesome flaming grapple skill as an example - man, that thing rocks!). Do NOT sell yourself short. When playing other games, it's easy to think "Oh man, I don't know if I have it in me to do something like this". But take a step back and look for things that you could and have already done better. Once i started filtering everything through that glass half full lens, it was shocking how many commercially successful games i've played that i can now see some pretty complicated systems and say "Wow, I actually implemented that in one of my projects, and mine is much better."! Or, "Wow, they never figured out problem X and it is still glaringly present in the their release". One last note, In one of your other videos you mentioned that you got sucked into a black hole of fixing stuff. Last year's you created something and current you can code so much better. I think there was a garbage can and some mock puking. I have recently caught myself doing this all the time. I like to think of this as a "skill level up." YOU guys got this, and are doing awesome work. :) Hang in there!
And the old adage, don't optimise something that shouldn't exist. It's like editing as you go in writing when you might throw that chapter away 6 months down the line. Half of my doors open the wrong way, or walls don't line up etc, but it's not important until an improve/polish phase.
Did you speak to anyone else before making such a life-changing mistake? It really is a mistake, too. No matter how great your game is... This was a naive decision. A noble one. Fun. But not feasible.
Agreed, and I saw his game too, not trying discourage him, this man is more passionate about his craft than I ever will be, but still selling his house was a naive decison. I have seen his game and it's nothing special. The art is really generic.
I don’t think the 90 days challenge is the way to go. Not for a new game anyways. It would be better to spend 90 days creating a vertical slice of the main game for players to demo and Wishlist. The benefit is now you also have a demo for publishers and even Kickstarter - 3 birds one stone. You’re also not thinking about the stress of the release of the new game and handling bugs and other issue which will definitely pop up from a 90-day game. Answering customers, fixing issues, maintaining forums. Worst case: the new game doesn’t sell well you’re going to be discouraged and then also think you wasted 3 months and the clocks ticking down. Hopeful case: you make enough money from new game to make back money you lost from the 3-month dev time and living expenses and then some for more time to focus on main game. Best case: it goes viral and you're set to fund main game for 3 years you think it needs.
I think we're seeing the logical conclusion that people were warning you about all the way back in the beginning. While there's definitely no right way, many indie devs opt for the infinitely safer route of keeping their day job and working on that first product. See, they create the first product, *then* they start the studio, after its success is proven with that first product. You skipped that step, and it has obvious consequences that you're running into. I know that this sounds harsh, but you should plan for eventualities that you yourself have talked about. - There is a chance the game is not done in 2, or even 3 months. - There is a chance it makes no money I definitely get the appeal of making games, I'm doing it too, I just wish you had been smarter about how you went about it. Starting a new project in hopes it miraculously saves the studio, and then that project being -- for lack of better words, *just another action platformer*, it's not looking good.
Yeah it’s not easy finding quick success in game development. I love this channel but I can already tell it’s going to be a tough time, both games have low community group numbers as well, which means low wishlists. Plus making a game in 90 days isn’t a great solution. Rushing a game isn’t a good idea. This is going to be more stressful than he could ever imagine. I do wish him the best.
I believe you can hold onto your dream of building your main game, Veil of Maia, create shorter projects for multiple streams of income, and be a good husband and father, all at the same time. I also believe in miracles. I believe in prayer. And I believe in you guys.
I don't want to insult you, but selling your house and just blindly hoping you will survive in an industry notorious for being hard to make profit in is just bad life decision. If it works, then congratuliations. But if it won't, I fear you'll regret that decision. I hope you will succeed and I wish you the very best of luck.
Really relatable - indie dev with a small UA-cam channel myself and I've been thinking about doing smaller projects for a while, instead of one big one. At least until I feel comfortable enough to start the multi year process on one project. I wish you both good luck!
I did notice your channel is a lot about psychology behind motivation and persistence and some tutorials. Or at least, those are the videos UA-cam is feeding me. While tutorials are helpful, I don't think mainstream audience is interested in them that much. What I'm thinking is, maybe show progress of the game, some creative challenges and obstacles, the thought process behind some gameplay decisions. Try to get feedback on game mechanics, look and feel and other elements. Include the audience. Make it all easily digestible, try to transmit your excitement for the game so viewers can get excited for your game. After watching more than couple of your videos, I honestly have no idea what the game is about, how it plays and what any one level looks like. I know a lot about struggle, psychology behind pushing such a project and risks you took. These videos are great too, powerful reality check, but maybe concentrate on presenting the game itself a bit more. I know, I know, nobody asked me for advice. However, I'd like you to know that it comes from a good place, and if anything feels harsh, it more of a "English is not my native language" issue than it is on purpose. I feel for you guys and I wish you all the best. Cheers!
You guys and Jonas are my favourite game devs on UA-cam. I'm currently studying Games Design and Art and always have your videos on in the background now and again. I think the best thing is that you're realky realistic when it comes to the process of developing a game but also extremely motivational.
Good Luck for the project, even more for your lives. I just want to point out that those youtubers with 100s thousands of subs that you talk about have your same amount of videos not because they're lucky or more appealing or just blessed by the Algorithm, but because generally they put on private or remove the older videos in order to leave only the best to be seen, like in a cool shop window. Probably they had undreds of videos that just didn't do well enough before they start to get traction... By the way, I can relate with everything you say and I feel the same, except I've decided to stay calm and wait for my game to form naturally till the end, even if it's going to take years... It's hard to resist the inpulse of just sacrifice everything else and work full time on my things, but I know that if I would do it, I would just burn in advance the cances of succeding... I really hope that you guys will find the solution your way...
I thought I was the only one, can't even play games anymore without sizing up their systems to see if I'd be good enough to implement them. Really ruined playing games for relaxation, impossible now.
If you have a full year of game dev full-time; I think having small projects always helps. Right now I only work a day job for 4 days a week maybe 25 hours a week; so a lot of free time with enough income for bills. But I have my big project then I've been finishing prototypes and polishing small games on the side. So far I have like 3 games that are decently polished and some gameplay. If all else fails, you get a lot more options for success.
Two things. One is you should set up a SubscribeStar because a lot of people don't use Patreon due to their ideological banning rather than being a neutral subscription platform. The other is that this 90-day deviation directly goes against your prior videos about not dropping your project when things get hard and boring to do a new fun one. I'm not trying to be an edgelord calling you a hypocrite: I just noticed that you may be falling into a trap you've addressed before. Perhaps this new game is a bad idea. Obviously I am an outsider who wasn't privy to your discussions about this decision, so I am in no position to judge or advise. Perhaps the publicity is important. However, perhaps a 3-month deviation with 12 months of savings left that is publicity for a game that isn't the one you're trying to put out and that necessarily will be very rough around the edges and rushed will be what kills off your studio. Thoughts?
I thought that. Seems a bit like procrastination/distraction, along with all the other stuff and taking too much on. UA-cam alone is a massive time sink taking away from game dev. It wouldn't surprise me if the games are never released and it's just a channel about making games like Game Maker's Toolkit. I follow to see how things pan out, it'll all be a success or a cautionary tale.
I know there is so many different ways to be an indie dev, but my strategy is 'keeping the day job', but my spare time/chillax time is dedicated to the 'hobby of gamedev'. Because I dig the dopamine hit from these small dev 'wins', this is enough for satiate my creative desire. A day-job limits my available time, but gives me the financial stability, which allows me to pursue the hobby, increases the importance in smarter solutions, smaller scope, working smarter and not harder. It also gives me 'time' in between to think about solutions. I come right off the buzz of an intense study of 4 uni courses in 3 months, so it's this knowledge of time-management and drive of building a folio that displays 'what I can create', and the personal understanding of knowing 'what I can fit in around a dayjob', that motivates me, that this is very doable. Enjoying your candid chats while I create. Cheers man.
Game dev is brutal. Unless you are incredibly lucky and/or are already rich. The amount of unpaid hours beginning game developers throw in every week would be criminal in any other industry. At least you aren't alone! Good luck my friend.
Definitely looking forward to seeing the process behind this challenge! And I really hope this pays off for you and your family. I keep thinking of ideas for a big game I'd like to build and the more I think about it and the more game dev channels I watch the more I realize that I think it'd be smarter for me to create smaller games first. Especially since I'm lacking the experience necessary for a large project anyway. I hadn't even thought of them as portfolio pieces to prove to potential publishers. That's really smart as well. Anyway, good luck, man!
i always thought that the actual point of making a youtube dev blog was to expand your audience and put eyeballs on the game. Never thought this was about the money… but seeing how little it is, yeah, its brutal out there :(
Median for games from most games released in the last 365 days varies from 2k to 8k so yeah it is brutal out there. Fookin. Brutal. My advice is to fail early. fail fast. fail often. Or don't fail and hit a home run first try that works too.
Spending 2-3 years on your first commercial game is a bad idea. Even getting a publisher or doing a kickstarter is a bad idea with your first game. I know because thats what I did. I been working on a UA-cam channel for 3 years myself, but I do way less videos. Recently I came to the realization that UA-cam is not worth it, only the shorts, long content is extremely hard to grow with. I pivoting to short form content here and on TikTok. The return on views and followers are way way higher.
Why didn't you move somewhere cheap? A small rural town can't possible also have high rents. If you had 1 year worth of savings... then why do a 4 year game? Even if the game would take 1 year to complete, that's a huge gamble. You should've aimed for 4 games in 1 year instead.
This video resonated with me a lot as someone who has also took the plunge and is trying to go full-time so thank you for making it. I can't offer much due to similar financial binds, but I subscribed and liked the video. It seems you have grown a good bit since this video, and I wish you all the success moving forward.
I love the series so far! Its not often when game devs go through the hardships of this industry and takes a lot of bravery to share! Def will keep track of this
I am shocked that your videos aren’t more popular! The video quality and style is good and keeps me watching, I wonder if it’s possibly more to do with youtube algorithm because the only way I personally found your videos was by searching for something specific. You should try making a podcast style episode every once in a while like Thomas Brush where you just invite other developers to talk about their story, maybe even invite Thomas Brush himself since you guys seem to have some similarities with how you started game dev, maybe he’d be willing to talk with you!
Thomas has been quiet lately. I like this channel and think it will keep growing. Some channels seem to plod along and then you check again and there's like 10x the amount of subs.
Please don't give up being a Game Developer you are so important to me, I want to learn and understand Technology so I can create games. You have inspired me to get there so I can keep doing what I love which is entertaining and inspiring people with my video games that I might have in the future.
Thank you for sharing, indeed it's a very hard space and you're doing great! I do believe that the game genre being developed and devlogged is also a big player in how interested viewer would be, metroidvanias, hollow knight clones, platformers and puzzle games are amongst the lowest viewed devlogs since recently a lot of new cozy, mining, crafting and sandbox games are trending, driving view numbers and subs. I wish you good luck with your endeavor and i'm very excited to follow your journey.
Keep in mind that every game can only join Steam Next Fest once, so even if you _did_ have a demo for Veil of Mana then it would be better to wait until it's closer to release or early access. Making a separate game for it should be fine though, will be a nice way to get some passive income, though you might end up with even less than from youtube.
Keep it up! Rooting for your guys :) Hope everything pans out like you want it to! Looking forward to the 90 game series - would love to see what you come up with!
This is absolutely terrifying! And I relate to every single word. Because I am in the EXACT same position. 💀 That being said, I absolutely believe you guys have got this. You seem levelheaded, perfectly analytical and realistic about your situation, and so I HAVE to believe you're gonna be just fine. You've got the skills and the perseverance to handle whatever comes your way (even if it requires a pivot or two) 🙏 At least I hope so. Because, if not, I'm screwed too. Hah! I'm rooting for you with all my heart! Subbed, and sending good vibes!
Your videos are very motivating (discovered your channel within the last half hour), I am a student studying to be a game designer whilst also working on my dream indie game (which is going to be an estimated 40ish hours to complete the entire trilogy but currently I'm just aiming to get the first act to a point that I'm happy with it before seeking funding (I am completely working solo on this)) one thing I will admit is that I have zero art skills but I do have writing skills (and my design is driven by insanely large ambitions (multimedia)(thankfully I'm on disability support pension where I live(Aus) though I will admit I am terrified of what the government could do to my game (due to the content of its narrative being very dark and graphic in nature and Australia being very strict with ratings (rimworld for example has been completely blocked in Australia from purchasing
So looking forward to seeing the process of making the game in 90 days, but also you guys entering Steam Next Fest (and playing the game)! I really enjoy reading/watching game 'post mortems', so can't wait to see these! You guys are doing great, keep at it! (A fellow Ontarian :) )
as a fellow game dev i feel you. making games is hard. making games while marketing it is even harder. and doing it while being financial depended on it is pure stress. so yeah take care not to burn out. the game itself looks good. the world graphics look nice and it also looks like fun. even though i think the main character maybe needs some visual iterations. maybe in form of being affected with shadows / highlights or let him feel more alive
I know this is an older video, but I wish you and your family the best! You are living a dream, that many of us wouldn't dare to imagine. Keep it up 💪🏼
Saw you mentioning 1 year of living from selling the house and just wanted to check if you considered any country in Europe to move to, it could be 5+ years in some of them and infinity in others 😅
I've written this before, but I'll say it again. You and your wife don't stop. Perseverance and consistency will lead you to success with 100% probability. Good luck with your followers, many wishlists and generally good luck to you in everything. You inspire me with every video and I don't give up and keep making my first game. Yes, it is simple from the point of view of development, but this is already the first step in this career. Sometimes I want to send everything away, but thanks to you and a few other UA-camrs, I'm moving on.
I'll be watching this 90 day challenge with interest! I've seen other devs do this and considered it myself, but it never felt like a long enough time to make a game with enough content to be attractive to players. Would love to hear about design, marketing plans, price points, etc.
90 day challenge is an awesome idea. If I can give any sort of advice going in: Scope for 30 days. You will certainly run over 30 days and any time remaining after the game is done can be used for polish and additional content.
This is a larger issue with all artists. Society demands so many ads, movies, commercials, animation,marketing, yet the average artist is seen as a dead skill. Society needs to make more outlets for artists rather than youtube pennies, patreon, and donations.
As a sw dev I totally understand your desire to make things perfect before releasing stuff; but what I’ve learned in the past decade is releasing something imperfectly is sometimes a valid strategy too. One example I built an api a while ago; nobody was waiting for it. It took little time to develop and test. Turned out to be the most sold interface so far. For another application I programmed almost 2 years. I wanted to make it perfect. It runs as imagined and I’m happy with the outcome; but nobody bought it. I think you should release earlier and bugfix/extend your game. Sure people will be annoyed and hateful, but filing bankruptcy because of a personal desire isn’t worth it.
Never mind your games, you deserve far more subscribers and viewers just for your thoughtful advice and considered opinions about working and surviving as an indie game dev. I really hope your channel blows up to provide some sort of ongoing income. I'm off to check out your Patreon now. (The games do look great though!)
Brandon, your story is inspiring. I hope it pays off in the end. Consistency and perseverance is key. Best of luck to you and your wife for the 90 day challenge!
The thing is I wonder if you could look into reducing your burn rate and look into areas with lower COL somehow... I mean if we are assuming your monthly expenses are 3k then for 12 months it would be 36k Which means you aim to generate a net income (not gross) of 36k for Samurado? Seems quite a feat for 3 months... not including marketing... but you do have 2 people so that's more like 6 months worth of manhours... Seems rough honestly. If I had prescience I'd make a vampire survivor clone in 2022 but now that trend has mostly cooled.
One of your unity tutorials showed up in my recomendation videos because I wanna become a solo gamedev too someday xD btw you've got some really good tutorials :) the only thing I can do for now is subscribing, liking your videos and wishlisting your game, of course when you release it you can count on me purchasing it ^^ good luck :D
I think this guy needs a producer/production manager to keep the project on track. If he has one year left of money on a project that is far from complete he either needs to raise money from private investors (not crowdfunding) or pay for help to get the game released more quickly - preferably both. It sounds like he's putting way too much into it in terms of content. Also, why so much effort with his UA-cam videos? He could just talk to camera with a couple of game clips in the background and still get these numbers. 2-3 years from now who knows what everyone will be playing, or how easy it will be to make a game like this? He needs the 90 day challenge to be to get this one finished. Also change the name to something simple that won't cause the search problems that other people have mentioned. Hopefully he got some grant funding and was advised on the Canadian tax breaks for games.
Man, I wish you the best of luck. Your videos help me a lot when it comes to motivation and general game dev stuff. Keep up the hard and great work you do 💯
I want to start by wishing you all the best for your upcoming project. I hope it turns out to be a great success. At 6:43 in the video, when the topic of monumental task, I noticed that the monument being shown is ‘The Pakistan Monument’. Also, I know it’s irrelevant, but I was paying full attention and noticed that the two people in the photo are siblings and founders of Pakistan - Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Fatima Jinnah.
My unsolicited advice.... You need to focus on finishing the game. I understand you need to build a community, but focus on the game first. All solo game devs say the same thing... Keep the scope small, have a plan, and don't deviate from the plan, You seem to be shifting from dev to revenue streams in the middle of the process. I get it it, you sold your house and need the revenue. With a limited time frame this is a recipe for disaster. I truly wish you and your family the best of luck... I wishlisted your game and will buy it upon release.
I feel I am following your same steps one year behind, but instead of trying to make one big game I am doing 1 game a month, hopefully your new game works the way you are looking for, making a game in 3 years is too risky.
Yeah I thought that, but at what point is someone ready to focus on the 2-3 years project I wonder? I'm estimating mine will take 12-18 months but a big part of me wants to release a crappy cut down version with fewer mechanics and a couple hours play time. Seems kind of pointless and a distraction though and not fair on buyers.
I know it easier said than done, but you should stop worrying about these numbers and predictions. No one can predict our future and what is going to happen. Your videos are absolutely amazing and of great quality, keep grinding and I am sure the audience will come. Trust the process.
Looking at your other videos, aren't you kinda trying to do too many things at once? I don't think it's great for the UA-cam algorithm when you attract multiple different audiences(tutorials, devlog and lifestyle/business content). As far as I know, it looks at how a video performs in regards to your sub count(including things like retention, engagement, etc) and compares it to the data of other channels. So channels with the same amount of subscribers, who are all interested in the same content, are performing better than channels where some subs come for a specific subset of videos. UA-cam will then prioritize the "better" videos. It's also why so many UA-camrs split into separate channels for different types of content.
If I may make a random suggestion, I think you should try talking with other gamedevs and kindred spirits. Fighting a battle against the blackbox void of the internet is even less fun by yourself.
What about an early access launch on steam to generate a little cash and momentum, or a demo even, and build and upgrade the game from there? Just a thought, not done it myself.
@@dreambadger I'd wait in general, I was going to release my game in Early Access until a read a blog about it in How to Market your Game. I'm also going to participate in June Next Fest, you can check my game "Shape Shipter" on Steam. xD
Best of luck to you and your studio. I know making a game 90 days is tuff, but doable. For future use, you can export your own made assets that you used in your current game to your new game
Hey I followed a bunch of your tutorials and eventually got recommended this video, I just checked Samurado's page and no release date has been set yet, what happened with it?
Hi. Sorry if i aks idiot question, but what kind of platform you write your game? I Just checked your game steam page and when I wanted to push the whislist button there was a huge orange warning message as : "To play Veil of Maia, you need controllers. Keyboard and mouse not supported." So I missed the whislist now, because I'm not sure I can play on computer with it.
I have twice as many videos as you but less than half the subscribers. Of course this is a side-gig for me so not as urgent to grow but it's still agonizingly slow growth.
I hope this doesn't come across like I'm reality checking you, as you and your wife know best. But selling a house (fully paid off and your only stability - asset) and moving to the most expensive region in Ontario / paying rent (liability) to develop from home doesn't make sense. For me to stay afloat because I got nothing to sell, I have to move far away from GTA, live in a studio, and my 2 year goal is to leave Canada entirely, and move where currency and expenses is 1/7th the dollar, so are homes. Ie; 1 year of expenses will last me 7 years. This affords me time. Your burn rate sounds kinda crazy. Regardless, you've possibly come quite far along in the last 11 months and I'm looking forward to your other videos, as I'm also in a similar situation.
comparing your sub number is no good, it's kind of like the survivor bias, you are a lot more likely to find a more popular channel than one with fewer subscribers
This and the other video are exactly what i needed i've been developing DR4X for almost 4 years and its in Early Access and it gets hardly any visiblity depsite postive reviews. I had a really low day today :(
It's an online festival where a lot of developers will live stream their games, and it's just a way to get some eyeballs on your steam page by getting your demo promoted (demo required to participate)
I think this 90 day challenge is a nice idea that can bring some excitement to your channel and business.
A tip is maybe you could've teased this at the start of the video, because it's exciting enough for people to stick around to the end to hear about it.
yessszs excited
That's a great challenge! Whatever ends up being the final result it is guaranteed you will learn a ton.
Best of luck!
Exactly, thats a good point.
Thanks so much! I'm excited, should be a lot of fun and yea definitely a huge learning experience. Your comment on my earlier video is what ultimately led to this idea, so thanks for that, cheers man
Good luck to you and your family
The legend Code Monkey has entered the chat!
nice videos bro... as someone who had the same dream as you, and someone who quit college and came back home with $150 in his pocket to try and make video games... I realized in the very beginning that making a game that will sell and have a steady income is not that easy when you lack a ton of other skills like marketing... that's why I started selling digital products like courses, then I opened my game dev studio for mobile games, did that for a while but it didn't turn out the way I wanted... now I'm launching my asset store for game developers, and we're also going to launch our first game soon... I didn't record any making of the game nor did I talk about it because I learned to make money in other ways...
Most game dev creators and other creators in general do this... in your first video where you talked about finances and such you mentioned thomas brush, he does the same thing, in fact I strongly believe that he makes more money from selling his courses than he's ever made from selling his games so that tells you something...
The only way to sky rocket quickly in the game dev space is to have viral videos like Two Star did with choo choo charles... dani was on a good way to make the same thing but it seem to me he was kinda stuck between being the game dev mr beast or actually creating a game which ended in a burnout where he's not doing anything at the moment...
All in all, you need something to sell and not depend on youtube or patreon or something similar to that... also I think you're investing too much time in your videos which at the end of the day don't go viral, I had the same problem and I'm talking from experience and good heart to help you out... just turn on the camera and start talking and that's that...
Also, if you need any help, advice or whatever, I will gladly help you out just reach out to me developer@awesometuts.com... I've been doing this fulltime since 2015 so I know a thing or two about making this work...
From a game developer to game developer, here's what I've done to work towards the SAME dream you have which is to make games for a living and this is an idea that has worked for me: I drive a school bus to accomplish my goal. Everyday, I work from 6 am to 8:30 am in the morning and work from 3 pm to about 5:30 pm in the evening.
So thus, between 8:30 am to 3 pm, I get a VERY BIG six to seven hour break EACH day. So, guess what I be doing within that 6 to 7 hour break!! I work on my game and not only do I work on my game, I could go back to sleep or basically do anything I want between that time. And $25 per hour in the Midwest USA is not bad and I get paid every week. Plus, I get weekends off, summers off, I will have Spring Break next week, I got Christmas off, Thanksgiving off and all kinds of holidays that schools normally get off. Thus, that's more time to work on my game if I need (or go traveling). And there is a HUGEEEEEEE shortage of school bus drivers or CDL drivers of all kinds. With a CDL B school bus license you could go anywhere you want to go. The hard part is studying to get the CDL and getting used to driving that big bus (or truck). But, such could be done within a few weeks and it's not hard after you get used to it.
So, while I'm trying to accomplish the same goal as you, this is how I have a bit of income coming in. And even still, driving a school bus is kind of fun too. It can be an ideal job for gamers. Driving a bus can be A LOT like playing a video game lol. That coordination that you got from playing video games could be monetized lol. And while I'm driving, I sometimes play video game music in the background. And even more, the students I transport are pretty cool!!! Because, guess what: They're gamers too. So, when you mention Mega Man, Metroid, Street Fighter etc., a bunch of those students will know what you're talking about. And we're always talking about games on the bus. And we might go see the Super Mario Brothers movie that's coming out. So, it's win win. And not to mention it's great getting out and traveling around sometimes and getting some fresh air and take in some warm weather while having fun driving around.
Thus, this is just the what I've been doing to accomplish the same goal as you. And this is just my 2 cents.
I wouldn’t quit my job unless I got a publisher deal, that’s a little insane to burn through savings and not knowing if my game is even going to succeed or not.
I know of a local game studio that does contract work and freelancing jobs for about one year until they have saved up enough money to work on one of their own ideas for about one year.
Their own ideas always fail so they always get back to contract work after releasing one of their own products. But only until they have enough money to try it again. Of course their games always drop something and even their old games are selling every now and then, so they don't have to do as much contract work as the first time.
You could apply the same. It's pretty save to work that way and while working for others you gain quite some experience on the cost of someone else.
As a solo dev, who has a playtest on Steam, I would recommend that you put your main game on Steam as a playtest. Set it up as an open playtest so players can get right in to try what you already have. I work in Unreal so I'm not familiar with how Unity does patches. I don't think the 90-day challenge is the way to go if you're short on time, make the really tough decisions about your game and kick it out the door. Do early access if the core of your game is there and all that's really needed is more levels/maps for your game. I'm certain your game is far better than you're giving yourself credit for, but you won't know this until others get a chance to play it!
Thank you for sharing this. I was not aware nor considering this option. Glad I came across this comment.
@tivasthegamer9817 I'm making a game in ue5.1 with networking for multiplayer , ai and much more its going to be a AAA game check it out by joining us and hmu and I can help to create you some assets free of charge on my freetime.
This is why I'd say that being a software developer first is better, then steadily build income streams using your skills as a dev before quitting everything and working on your passion projects. But this is my opinion. I applaud you guys for your decisions and I can understand the struggle. Best of luck, and I can't wait for the Steam Next Fest. Will definitely give the game a try when it launches❤️
"This is gonna be so much fun" seems like foreshadowing lol.
I'm excited to track along with your progress making the game! Your videos are also so well done. I don't understand YT as well as I thought I did but sometimes things just pick up seemingly out of the blue. But even if that never happens, it's easy to tell you're building an actual community. I've seen even the smallest communities do mighty things.
Much love brother, you've got this. As far as I can tell, you're doing everything right.
Oh what I have in mind should make this a hectic/super fun experience. I just hope I can pull it off in time! I'm keeping the scope small while (hopefully) the replay value high.
Thanks for all your encouragement and advice man, it's all been really helpful and means the world to me. Talk soon man!
I came across your channel last night and a lot of what you discuss resonates deeply with me. I am also an indie developer, and i just passed the 1 year mark of plunking around. I hardly ever come out of lurking to post, but let me just say this: based off of what i've seen so far you've got an eye for polish (looking at your awesome flaming grapple skill as an example - man, that thing rocks!). Do NOT sell yourself short. When playing other games, it's easy to think "Oh man, I don't know if I have it in me to do something like this". But take a step back and look for things that you could and have already done better. Once i started filtering everything through that glass half full lens, it was shocking how many commercially successful games i've played that i can now see some pretty complicated systems and say "Wow, I actually implemented that in one of my projects, and mine is much better."! Or, "Wow, they never figured out problem X and it is still glaringly present in the their release".
One last note, In one of your other videos you mentioned that you got sucked into a black hole of fixing stuff. Last year's you created something and current you can code so much better. I think there was a garbage can and some mock puking. I have recently caught myself doing this all the time. I like to think of this as a "skill level up."
YOU guys got this, and are doing awesome work. :) Hang in there!
And the old adage, don't optimise something that shouldn't exist. It's like editing as you go in writing when you might throw that chapter away 6 months down the line. Half of my doors open the wrong way, or walls don't line up etc, but it's not important until an improve/polish phase.
Did you speak to anyone else before making such a life-changing mistake? It really is a mistake, too. No matter how great your game is... This was a naive decision. A noble one. Fun. But not feasible.
Agreed, and I saw his game too, not trying discourage him, this man is more passionate about his craft than I ever will be, but still selling his house was a naive decison. I have seen his game and it's nothing special. The art is really generic.
the game looks like a downgraded hollow knight, significantly downgraded XD
I don’t think the 90 days challenge is the way to go. Not for a new game anyways. It would be better to spend 90 days creating a vertical slice of the main game for players to demo and Wishlist. The benefit is now you also have a demo for publishers and even Kickstarter - 3 birds one stone.
You’re also not thinking about the stress of the release of the new game and handling bugs and other issue which will definitely pop up from a 90-day game. Answering customers, fixing issues, maintaining forums.
Worst case: the new game doesn’t sell well you’re going to be discouraged and then also think you wasted 3 months and the clocks ticking down. Hopeful case: you make enough money from new game to make back money you lost from the 3-month dev time and living expenses and then some for more time to focus on main game. Best case: it goes viral and you're set to fund main game for 3 years you think it needs.
I think we're seeing the logical conclusion that people were warning you about all the way back in the beginning. While there's definitely no right way, many indie devs opt for the infinitely safer route of keeping their day job and working on that first product.
See, they create the first product, *then* they start the studio, after its success is proven with that first product. You skipped that step, and it has obvious consequences that you're running into.
I know that this sounds harsh, but you should plan for eventualities that you yourself have talked about.
- There is a chance the game is not done in 2, or even 3 months.
- There is a chance it makes no money
I definitely get the appeal of making games, I'm doing it too, I just wish you had been smarter about how you went about it. Starting a new project in hopes it miraculously saves the studio, and then that project being -- for lack of better words, *just another action platformer*, it's not looking good.
Yeah it’s not easy finding quick success in game development. I love this channel but I can already tell it’s going to be a tough time, both games have low community group numbers as well, which means low wishlists. Plus making a game in 90 days isn’t a great solution. Rushing a game isn’t a good idea. This is going to be more stressful than he could ever imagine. I do wish him the best.
These things, like UA-cam channels and paying the rent with game development take about 5-10 years on average I think.
Seeing this comment from early 2023 and that the new tentative release date is summer 2024. May be harsh but was very true.
I believe you can hold onto your dream of building your main game, Veil of Maia, create shorter projects for multiple streams of income, and be a good husband and father, all at the same time.
I also believe in miracles. I believe in prayer. And I believe in you guys.
I don't want to insult you, but selling your house and just blindly hoping you will survive in an industry notorious for being hard to make profit in is just bad life decision.
If it works, then congratuliations.
But if it won't, I fear you'll regret that decision.
I hope you will succeed and I wish you the very best of luck.
Really relatable - indie dev with a small UA-cam channel myself and I've been thinking about doing smaller projects for a while, instead of one big one.
At least until I feel comfortable enough to start the multi year process on one project.
I wish you both good luck!
I did notice your channel is a lot about psychology behind motivation and persistence and some tutorials. Or at least, those are the videos UA-cam is feeding me.
While tutorials are helpful, I don't think mainstream audience is interested in them that much.
What I'm thinking is, maybe show progress of the game, some creative challenges and obstacles, the thought process behind some gameplay decisions. Try to get feedback on game mechanics, look and feel and other elements. Include the audience. Make it all easily digestible, try to transmit your excitement for the game so viewers can get excited for your game.
After watching more than couple of your videos, I honestly have no idea what the game is about, how it plays and what any one level looks like. I know a lot about struggle, psychology behind pushing such a project and risks you took. These videos are great too, powerful reality check, but maybe concentrate on presenting the game itself a bit more.
I know, I know, nobody asked me for advice. However, I'd like you to know that it comes from a good place, and if anything feels harsh, it more of a "English is not my native language" issue than it is on purpose. I feel for you guys and I wish you all the best. Cheers!
You guys and Jonas are my favourite game devs on UA-cam. I'm currently studying Games Design and Art and always have your videos on in the background now and again.
I think the best thing is that you're realky realistic when it comes to the process of developing a game but also extremely motivational.
Good Luck for the project, even more for your lives. I just want to point out that those youtubers with 100s thousands of subs that you talk about have your same amount of videos not because they're lucky or more appealing or just blessed by the Algorithm, but because generally they put on private or remove the older videos in order to leave only the best to be seen, like in a cool shop window. Probably they had undreds of videos that just didn't do well enough before they start to get traction...
By the way, I can relate with everything you say and I feel the same, except I've decided to stay calm and wait for my game to form naturally till the end, even if it's going to take years... It's hard to resist the inpulse of just sacrifice everything else and work full time on my things, but I know that if I would do it, I would just burn in advance the cances of succeding... I really hope that you guys will find the solution your way...
I thought I was the only one, can't even play games anymore without sizing up their systems to see if I'd be good enough to implement them. Really ruined playing games for relaxation, impossible now.
If you have a full year of game dev full-time; I think having small projects always helps. Right now I only work a day job for 4 days a week maybe 25 hours a week; so a lot of free time with enough income for bills.
But I have my big project then I've been finishing prototypes and polishing small games on the side. So far I have like 3 games that are decently polished and some gameplay. If all else fails, you get a lot more options for success.
Two things. One is you should set up a SubscribeStar because a lot of people don't use Patreon due to their ideological banning rather than being a neutral subscription platform. The other is that this 90-day deviation directly goes against your prior videos about not dropping your project when things get hard and boring to do a new fun one. I'm not trying to be an edgelord calling you a hypocrite: I just noticed that you may be falling into a trap you've addressed before. Perhaps this new game is a bad idea. Obviously I am an outsider who wasn't privy to your discussions about this decision, so I am in no position to judge or advise. Perhaps the publicity is important. However, perhaps a 3-month deviation with 12 months of savings left that is publicity for a game that isn't the one you're trying to put out and that necessarily will be very rough around the edges and rushed will be what kills off your studio.
Thoughts?
I thought that. Seems a bit like procrastination/distraction, along with all the other stuff and taking too much on. UA-cam alone is a massive time sink taking away from game dev. It wouldn't surprise me if the games are never released and it's just a channel about making games like Game Maker's Toolkit. I follow to see how things pan out, it'll all be a success or a cautionary tale.
I know there is so many different ways to be an indie dev, but my strategy is 'keeping the day job', but my spare time/chillax time is dedicated to the 'hobby of gamedev'. Because I dig the dopamine hit from these small dev 'wins', this is enough for satiate my creative desire. A day-job limits my available time, but gives me the financial stability, which allows me to pursue the hobby, increases the importance in smarter solutions, smaller scope, working smarter and not harder. It also gives me 'time' in between to think about solutions. I come right off the buzz of an intense study of 4 uni courses in 3 months, so it's this knowledge of time-management and drive of building a folio that displays 'what I can create', and the personal understanding of knowing 'what I can fit in around a dayjob', that motivates me, that this is very doable.
Enjoying your candid chats while I create. Cheers man.
Game dev is brutal. Unless you are incredibly lucky and/or are already rich. The amount of unpaid hours beginning game developers throw in every week would be criminal in any other industry. At least you aren't alone!
Good luck my friend.
Good luck you two, you took a big risk most of us wouldn't dare try! I hope it works out for you and I'm sure you'll get there!
Definitely looking forward to seeing the process behind this challenge! And I really hope this pays off for you and your family. I keep thinking of ideas for a big game I'd like to build and the more I think about it and the more game dev channels I watch the more I realize that I think it'd be smarter for me to create smaller games first. Especially since I'm lacking the experience necessary for a large project anyway. I hadn't even thought of them as portfolio pieces to prove to potential publishers. That's really smart as well. Anyway, good luck, man!
i always thought that the actual point of making a youtube dev blog was to expand your audience and put eyeballs on the game. Never thought this was about the money… but seeing how little it is, yeah, its brutal out there :(
Median for games from most games released in the last 365 days varies from 2k to 8k so yeah it is brutal out there. Fookin. Brutal.
My advice is to fail early. fail fast. fail often. Or don't fail and hit a home run first try that works too.
@@TESkyrimizer that's a very interesting statistic, where did you find it? I'd love to see more info like that.
Spending 2-3 years on your first commercial game is a bad idea. Even getting a publisher or doing a kickstarter is a bad idea with your first game. I know because thats what I did.
I been working on a UA-cam channel for 3 years myself, but I do way less videos. Recently I came to the realization that UA-cam is not worth it, only the shorts, long content is extremely hard to grow with. I pivoting to short form content here and on TikTok. The return on views and followers are way way higher.
Why didn't you move somewhere cheap? A small rural town can't possible also have high rents.
If you had 1 year worth of savings... then why do a 4 year game? Even if the game would take 1 year to complete, that's a huge gamble. You should've aimed for 4 games in 1 year instead.
This video resonated with me a lot as someone who has also took the plunge and is trying to go full-time so thank you for making it. I can't offer much due to similar financial binds, but I subscribed and liked the video. It seems you have grown a good bit since this video, and I wish you all the success moving forward.
Always great to see the transparent story of what you’re going through. Too often we just see the success stories with no “blood and dirt”.
I love the series so far! Its not often when game devs go through the hardships of this industry and takes a lot of bravery to share!
Def will keep track of this
I am shocked that your videos aren’t more popular! The video quality and style is good and keeps me watching, I wonder if it’s possibly more to do with youtube algorithm because the only way I personally found your videos was by searching for something specific. You should try making a podcast style episode every once in a while like Thomas Brush where you just invite other developers to talk about their story, maybe even invite Thomas Brush himself since you guys seem to have some similarities with how you started game dev, maybe he’d be willing to talk with you!
Thomas has been quiet lately. I like this channel and think it will keep growing. Some channels seem to plod along and then you check again and there's like 10x the amount of subs.
Please don't give up being a Game Developer you are so important to me, I want to learn and understand Technology so I can create games. You have inspired me to get there so I can keep doing what I love which is entertaining and inspiring people with my video games that I might have in the future.
Thank you for sharing, indeed it's a very hard space and you're doing great! I do believe that the game genre being developed and devlogged is also a big player in how interested viewer would be, metroidvanias, hollow knight clones, platformers and puzzle games are amongst the lowest viewed devlogs since recently a lot of new cozy, mining, crafting and sandbox games are trending, driving view numbers and subs.
I wish you good luck with your endeavor and i'm very excited to follow your journey.
Keep in mind that every game can only join Steam Next Fest once, so even if you _did_ have a demo for Veil of Mana then it would be better to wait until it's closer to release or early access. Making a separate game for it should be fine though, will be a nice way to get some passive income, though you might end up with even less than from youtube.
Keep it up! Rooting for your guys :) Hope everything pans out like you want it to! Looking forward to the 90 game series - would love to see what you come up with!
This is absolutely terrifying! And I relate to every single word. Because I am in the EXACT same position. 💀
That being said, I absolutely believe you guys have got this. You seem levelheaded, perfectly analytical and realistic about your situation, and so I HAVE to believe you're gonna be just fine. You've got the skills and the perseverance to handle whatever comes your way (even if it requires a pivot or two) 🙏 At least I hope so. Because, if not, I'm screwed too. Hah!
I'm rooting for you with all my heart! Subbed, and sending good vibes!
Your videos are very motivating (discovered your channel within the last half hour),
I am a student studying to be a game designer whilst also working on my dream indie game (which is going to be an estimated 40ish hours to complete the entire trilogy but currently I'm just aiming to get the first act to a point that I'm happy with it before seeking funding (I am completely working solo on this)) one thing I will admit is that I have zero art skills but I do have writing skills (and my design is driven by insanely large ambitions (multimedia)(thankfully I'm on disability support pension where I live(Aus) though I will admit I am terrified of what the government could do to my game (due to the content of its narrative being very dark and graphic in nature and Australia being very strict with ratings (rimworld for example has been completely blocked in Australia from purchasing
So looking forward to seeing the process of making the game in 90 days, but also you guys entering Steam Next Fest (and playing the game)! I really enjoy reading/watching game 'post mortems', so can't wait to see these! You guys are doing great, keep at it! (A fellow Ontarian :) )
as a fellow game dev i feel you. making games is hard. making games while marketing it is even harder. and doing it while being financial depended on it is pure stress. so yeah take care not to burn out.
the game itself looks good. the world graphics look nice and it also looks like fun. even though i think the main character maybe needs some visual iterations. maybe in form of being affected with shadows / highlights or let him feel more alive
Why don't you just keep a half-time job and do game-dev on the side without much stress?
I know this is an older video, but I wish you and your family the best! You are living a dream, that many of us wouldn't dare to imagine. Keep it up 💪🏼
Saw you mentioning 1 year of living from selling the house and just wanted to check if you considered any country in Europe to move to, it could be 5+ years in some of them and infinity in others 😅
I've written this before, but I'll say it again. You and your wife don't stop. Perseverance and consistency will lead you to success with 100% probability. Good luck with your followers, many wishlists and generally good luck to you in everything. You inspire me with every video and I don't give up and keep making my first game. Yes, it is simple from the point of view of development, but this is already the first step in this career. Sometimes I want to send everything away, but thanks to you and a few other UA-camrs, I'm moving on.
so much motivation packed in one video, I dont understand why you got so little subscribers, you can do it, I know you will achieve your goals
What you're doing sounds very risky. I couldn't make the plunge, that's for sure. I'll keep you both in my prayers. 🙏
To be totally honest, I feel a little bit clickbaited by CodeMonkey in the thumbnail. And then you didn't even mention him.
I'll be watching this 90 day challenge with interest! I've seen other devs do this and considered it myself, but it never felt like a long enough time to make a game with enough content to be attractive to players. Would love to hear about design, marketing plans, price points, etc.
90 day challenge is an awesome idea. If I can give any sort of advice going in: Scope for 30 days. You will certainly run over 30 days and any time remaining after the game is done can be used for polish and additional content.
This is a larger issue with all artists. Society demands so many ads, movies, commercials, animation,marketing, yet the average artist is seen as a dead skill. Society needs to make more outlets for artists rather than youtube pennies, patreon, and donations.
As a sw dev I totally understand your desire to make things perfect before releasing stuff; but what I’ve learned in the past decade is releasing something imperfectly is sometimes a valid strategy too. One example I built an api a while ago; nobody was waiting for it. It took little time to develop and test. Turned out to be the most sold interface so far. For another application I programmed almost 2 years. I wanted to make it perfect. It runs as imagined and I’m happy with the outcome; but nobody bought it. I think you should release earlier and bugfix/extend your game. Sure people will be annoyed and hateful, but filing bankruptcy because of a personal desire isn’t worth it.
Ah, the drama in this video is on the level of Halt and Catch Fire. I'm bringing out the popcorn. 🍿
Never mind your games, you deserve far more subscribers and viewers just for your thoughtful advice and considered opinions about working and surviving as an indie game dev. I really hope your channel blows up to provide some sort of ongoing income. I'm off to check out your Patreon now. (The games do look great though!)
Brandon, your story is inspiring. I hope it pays off in the end. Consistency and perseverance is key. Best of luck to you and your wife for the 90 day challenge!
"Pivoting & detouring" such essential keys in life. Good luck for the 90 days challenge.
Me from the future: subscribed today.. binged a bunch of your vids.. hope you’re still in this mindset.. and I hope my .175 per view today helps!
Best of luck, I'm rooting for your success with the new title!
i think it will be btter to move to somewhere less expensive like thailand ,that way you can cut your expense signifacly
The thing is I wonder if you could look into reducing your burn rate and look into areas with lower COL somehow... I mean if we are assuming your monthly expenses are 3k then for 12 months it would be 36k
Which means you aim to generate a net income (not gross) of 36k for Samurado? Seems quite a feat for 3 months... not including marketing... but you do have 2 people so that's more like 6 months worth of manhours...
Seems rough honestly. If I had prescience I'd make a vampire survivor clone in 2022 but now that trend has mostly cooled.
One of your unity tutorials showed up in my recomendation videos because I wanna become a solo gamedev too someday xD btw you've got some really good tutorials :) the only thing I can do for now is subscribing, liking your videos and wishlisting your game, of course when you release it you can count on me purchasing it ^^ good luck :D
Thanks so much!
As a fellow game dev, I take a great deal of inspiration from you both. Can't wait to see how things go!
I think this guy needs a producer/production manager to keep the project on track. If he has one year left of money on a project that is far from complete he either needs to raise money from private investors (not crowdfunding) or pay for help to get the game released more quickly - preferably both. It sounds like he's putting way too much into it in terms of content. Also, why so much effort with his UA-cam videos? He could just talk to camera with a couple of game clips in the background and still get these numbers. 2-3 years from now who knows what everyone will be playing, or how easy it will be to make a game like this? He needs the 90 day challenge to be to get this one finished. Also change the name to something simple that won't cause the search problems that other people have mentioned. Hopefully he got some grant funding and was advised on the Canadian tax breaks for games.
I'm a guy watching this from the future and after the past couple of weeks, I hope you're still doing well, even with the engine you are using.
Man, I wish you the best of luck. Your videos help me a lot when it comes to motivation and general game dev stuff. Keep up the hard and great work you do 💯
I'm so hyped to follow along with this. I would so good luck but you don't need it, you're gonna smash this!
I understand you completely, I am working on my own game with Procedural Generation
I want to start by wishing you all the best for your upcoming project. I hope it turns out to be a great success. At 6:43 in the video, when the topic of monumental task, I noticed that the monument being shown is ‘The Pakistan Monument’. Also, I know it’s irrelevant, but I was paying full attention and noticed that the two people in the photo are siblings and founders of Pakistan - Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Fatima Jinnah.
My unsolicited advice.... You need to focus on finishing the game. I understand you need to build a community, but focus on the game first. All solo game devs say the same thing... Keep the scope small, have a plan, and don't deviate from the plan, You seem to be shifting from dev to revenue streams in the middle of the process. I get it it, you sold your house and need the revenue. With a limited time frame this is a recipe for disaster. I truly wish you and your family the best of luck... I wishlisted your game and will buy it upon release.
Authentic Content, I Respect That, I will share with my friends and family too.
It will be a hit 🎯 and here's my congratulations 🎉
I feel I am following your same steps one year behind, but instead of trying to make one big game I am doing 1 game a month, hopefully your new game works the way you are looking for, making a game in 3 years is too risky.
Yeah I thought that, but at what point is someone ready to focus on the 2-3 years project I wonder? I'm estimating mine will take 12-18 months but a big part of me wants to release a crappy cut down version with fewer mechanics and a couple hours play time. Seems kind of pointless and a distraction though and not fair on buyers.
Would be cool to get an update now that its a year later. Looks like youre still going strong with youtube.
I know it easier said than done, but you should stop worrying about these numbers and predictions. No one can predict our future and what is going to happen. Your videos are absolutely amazing and of great quality, keep grinding and I am sure the audience will come. Trust the process.
Looking at your other videos, aren't you kinda trying to do too many things at once? I don't think it's great for the UA-cam algorithm when you attract multiple different audiences(tutorials, devlog and lifestyle/business content). As far as I know, it looks at how a video performs in regards to your sub count(including things like retention, engagement, etc) and compares it to the data of other channels. So channels with the same amount of subscribers, who are all interested in the same content, are performing better than channels where some subs come for a specific subset of videos. UA-cam will then prioritize the "better" videos.
It's also why so many UA-camrs split into separate channels for different types of content.
Sounds like a great plan. Can't wait to see The devlogs! ✌️😃✌️😃
Are you from Quebec? What a Surprise! 😮
If I may make a random suggestion, I think you should try talking with other gamedevs and kindred spirits. Fighting a battle against the blackbox void of the internet is even less fun by yourself.
What about an early access launch on steam to generate a little cash and momentum, or a demo even, and build and upgrade the game from there? Just a thought, not done it myself.
Hi, I'm a solo Dev working on my first game, Early Access is a "trap", your game still requires around 7K wishlist on launch to "succeed".
@@Abyssal_Tree Interesting. Is it better to just hold the game back from a release until you hit that kind of threshold, do you think?
@@dreambadger I'd wait in general, I was going to release my game in Early Access until a read a blog about it in How to Market your Game.
I'm also going to participate in June Next Fest, you can check my game "Shape Shipter" on Steam. xD
@@Abyssal_Tree Cool I'll have a look. I'm not even at the store page yet but I've made a start.
Wishing you both the best of luck!
Probably I just missed your answer, but why don't you start a kickstarter campaign?
This is absolutely the right decision. Keep it up!
Best wishes! :)
Best of luck to you and your studio. I know making a game 90 days is tuff, but doable. For future use, you can export your own made assets that you used in your current game to your new game
Hey I followed a bunch of your tutorials and eventually got recommended this video, I just checked Samurado's page and no release date has been set yet, what happened with it?
I really wish the best of luck to you both on the indie game industry.
Wished list the game ;)
Hi. Sorry if i aks idiot question, but what kind of platform you write your game? I Just checked your game steam page and when I wanted to push the whislist button there was a huge orange warning message as : "To play Veil of Maia, you need controllers. Keyboard and mouse not supported." So I missed the whislist now, because I'm not sure I can play on computer with it.
You should do a merch store. With game dev memes.
So. Much. Good. Luck. And. Blessings!! 🙏🏼🦋👏
Have you ever considered moving to a cheaper country?
I have twice as many videos as you but less than half the subscribers. Of course this is a side-gig for me so not as urgent to grow but it's still agonizingly slow growth.
I hope this doesn't come across like I'm reality checking you, as you and your wife know best. But selling a house (fully paid off and your only stability - asset) and moving to the most expensive region in Ontario / paying rent (liability) to develop from home doesn't make sense. For me to stay afloat because I got nothing to sell, I have to move far away from GTA, live in a studio, and my 2 year goal is to leave Canada entirely, and move where currency and expenses is 1/7th the dollar, so are homes. Ie; 1 year of expenses will last me 7 years. This affords me time. Your burn rate sounds kinda crazy. Regardless, you've possibly come quite far along in the last 11 months and I'm looking forward to your other videos, as I'm also in a similar situation.
comparing your sub number is no good, it's kind of like the survivor bias, you are a lot more likely to find a more popular channel than one with fewer subscribers
Can you make a tutorial on how to make a game like Noita?
175/week for food in the US and thats in the midwest
This and the other video are exactly what i needed i've been developing DR4X for almost 4 years and its in Early Access and it gets hardly any visiblity depsite postive reviews. I had a really low day today :(
I hope you guys make it. I will buy all your games
Epic video! I hope you guys succeed and have a great time with it! Also, what is Steam Next Fest btw?
It's an online festival where a lot of developers will live stream their games, and it's just a way to get some eyeballs on your steam page by getting your demo promoted (demo required to participate)
@@sasquatchbgames That sounds pretty neat. Thanks for the info 👍
Keep it up guys!
I'll admit veil of Maya isn't really my type of game but samurado is so I'm excited