Don't Give Up On Your Game Dev Journey
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- Опубліковано 20 чер 2023
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Game dev is not easy, but you never truly fail until you give up.
To late 👍
This one hit home man.
It can be such a struggle trying to develop a game on your own. This video perfectly points out the highs and lows an indie dev goes through. Thanks for the motivation to keep going.
Being a game dev is a journey. Keep going and don't give up!
i think one part of giving up is because at some point you realise you are staring at the same thing for hours, day after day after day and it just makes you sick..
I have been trying to get back to game dev for almost a year now, but whenever I think of all the art work and design work that needs to be done I just feel exhausted and never get back. I just hope at some point I will have the energy needed to make it work once again.
I've been there before. Thinking about all of the aspects that go into a game. Maybe try working on something that excites you. I really like level/environment design so when I'm stuck I'll just start a new project and design a world just to get my creative juices flowing. It also helps when there's support from others. There's little point to creating something if we never share it with someone else. Try working on something you can share with your friends or a small project you can put somewhere like on itchio.
I felt like that. I've always been primarily an artist so I used to start with the art, which I realized not-so-quickly is a bad idea. This time I'm making some sort of progress because I'm focusing on the gameplay instead of the art, and doing it in bite sized chunks. I'm also being VERY liberal with using bought or free assets instead of wasting time making my own art for now, because I'm just trying to prototype atm. The fancy stuff can be updated later after the essentials of the game is in place.
So maybe try it from that point of view and see if you can get a bit farther next time the urge hits.
@@KhroMcKrakken Haha the thing is, I already have like 3 prototypes made that I liked and want to work on. One of them is even multiplayer and works surprisingly well (i even got donations for it lol). Unfortunately it lacks a lot of polish, graphics that are not bought assets and levels to make it a decent enough game to sell.
Ty for sharing your experience though!
@@kilthrallWhy not take some of the ideas that @ElusivePandaGames says in the video and try working on more smaller projects working on the specific part that you like and also using it as a place to experiment with the things that your previous games have lacked in?
@@kilthrall Hey I am in the same boat know what you are going though The game I been working on and off for over a year + is a survival game my problems are i want the characters to change clothes in game if they get cold or warm unreal store does not have what I am looking for. So did the next best thing was hired a person to fit the clothes to my character. Its cheap to do. Try checking out CGTrader You can upload what you need done and will get many people who will offer to do the work for you its a great site to start with hope this helps.
Thanks for the motivation and uplifting words!
I personally never wanted to be a game developer, it was a decent pastime activity of mine during my early teenage years. I gave up only to realize that my life kept hovering around it, doing what fueled my passion for games and finding the spark in doing it again.
It was essentially a journey of personal discovery.
Thanks for the video it was inspiring to say the least. i've Been working on my first project for 2 years now and its ambitious for me and man you hit every points i wanted to quit so many times but what kept me going is that i knew i needed a win and that pushing to the finish line will be worth it eventually and may change my life for the better in ways i wouldn't imagine.
My advice:
- Don't take too long to think about what the game is cause most stuff you'll figure out when you're making the game.
- Set short term goals that you can actually finish, small wins matter they keep you motivated to reach bigger wins in the long term.
- keep your scope in check, there's so much aspects of the game that require your attention and if you try to do "too much" you may never get there, so always try to limit your game to a few mechanics and focus on them well.
- when you want to make levels the best way is to inspire from other games (i also use artstation and pinterest) and add your touch but start with "White blocking" (with primitive objects like cubes, cylinders, spheres in unity i use pro builder for that) never try to make assets early on cause you're gonna have to change them and if they're not simple primitive objects you'll be losing valuable time trying to change something that may not be in the game in the first place.
- one of the biggest mistakes i made was making levels before the mechanics of the game were set in stone which made me lose time because i had to remake the levels to accommodate for new mechanics/features.
- If you get stuck in something don't be afraid to ask others for help you may be surprised what you can accomplish with that, and also sometimes its better to take a break and clear your mind then get back strong to fix the problems you encountered.
I hope that helps and happy developing see you on the finish line everyone !
Thanks for your comment and for all of the advice you gave. Your first point is something I hadn't thought about but makes total sense. I can't tell you how many times my games have changed throughout the development process.
Sounds like you've made good progress on your game. I'd love to check it out if you have a steam page or website.
@@ElusivePandaGames Hey thank you for the reply and your interest, i'm currently still at the blocking stage so i still have no art made but i got all the mechanics made and when i make a vertical slice i'll put up the steam page and start marketing.
Btw i didn't know you were also making a game the combat looks amazing for a small indie game i'd love to give you feedback too.
also i can share with you what i'm going for:
-The game is inspired by Journey and Rime, so third person puzzle linear exploration with stylized style.
-it doesn't have combat but there is a force to encounter and make your way around
-Light plays a big role in the game .
Given up when I simply lost interest in games. I stopped playing games and so I was no longer motivated to work on my game. But I never stopped experimenting with different game engines and frameworks. It is become my hobby just to learn how different game engines and frameworks works and to learn different programming languages. I did attempt to team up with game developers, designers to help them implement the logic they need but did never get further than a prototype ever because people always give up game dev due to lack of time, lack of money, I never had a chance to meet someone who didn't give up.
dude this hit hard
sometimes i do little bits maybe 1 time a week but you helped me think about this, thank you
You recently helped me with something on your discord. And I was stressing hardcore. 😅 this was a much needed video 😂 I’ll send it to my other classmates
I'm glad I could help. Thanks for the support!
This video came to me today. To be honest I'm a 31 old guy who dreams to create a game since I was 16 and learned that games could be created by a regular human like me, without having to be working in a Triple-A studio. My insight came while reading an interview from a game developer that I used to follow (and play his games as well) called Adventure Quest Worlds (AQW) from Artix Entertainment.
Every year I repeat the same process on "I'll create a game this year" or "This year will be my year!" and then suddenly I get scared of the engine/coding and given myself lots of excuses on why I'm not moving forward. Excuses like "I do not know how to code" or "I need to be an artist to do this as well" or "I'm too old" or the most common one "I do not have time, I have to focus on my body and mind before".
Getting frustrated a lot about this, but every year I'm coming back to try it.
I'll try it this year, again. Hoping that I do not give this huge break from learning.
I got cvid a week ago, my brain stopped working properly, my project felt weak, wrong... i tried but it was like i was disconected to it...
My pc was slow, full of stuff...
I uninstalled everything, changed engine, and started brand new, new ideas, new perspectives, im starting again, and i understand the felling.
Its overwhelming, but its what i love to live doing in all my available time. Lets go
I get up at 2pm go to work and finish around 10pm. I then race home and fire up my pc to work on the game I 've been working on for over a year now. I stay up till 5am adding features, fixing bugs and optimizing my game. Every day I feel like i'm getting closer to my goal, i'm so close to releasing my game on itch and very excited.
Strongly said, my short story on this path is as follows. Started working on a project with great results, motivation, passion, drive. All of this while at a full time job. No past knowledge of programming or 3d modeling. For 6 months was fine, then family/home life got in the way. Now can’t seem to find a way to get back into the groove again. Very upset, mentally destroyed trying to find a solution and a way to get back to working on my project into my happy place again.
I feel like I've gone through what you're going through. Never having time to focus on game dev and then when I do get time I struggle with motivation and drive to stay on task. It took me awhile to get out of that funk but what helped me was starting a completely new project. I also went back to my workflow I used for publishing my last game, which was focusing on story building first - then level design - then logic. I feel like the story gets me excited and keeps me on task. Then the level design helps me to visualize the story and then eventually I come up with ideas for features and systems to implement in the game. Another thing that's helpful is just having pushed through learning and tutorial hell. I feel like I'm in a good place with my level of experience and I can build entire systems without having to go down rabbit holes of tutorials. This is crucial as I feel like when I was trying to build other projects that were outside of my experience level I kept having to interrupt my workflow to look up how to make something. Best of luck to you. Keep pushing and you'll eventually get to the place you want to be.
@@ElusivePandaGames Thank you greatly for responding to my comment. As well as taking the time to read my comment. At this point I have 6 levels, enemy ai, main player, NPC working. But a few bugs here and there. I do not feel like I want to start a new project. My goal was to start and finish this one. Time, motivation, and drive is the problem. Family/Home life is my biggest problem. But the points about story, level design, and only then logic is on point. I’m a father and husband. I think that I need someone, that I can talk to, and be able to bounce idea and thoughts with. Thank you again, so very much!
Great video you nailed it
Good video man! Nice voice and storytelling style!
Thank you! 😃
been working on game development for over a decade. have not produced one game sold but i have been constantly learning. now i am at the point i am confident i can make whatever game i desire but that is my new problem. what do i love and what do i want to make. writers block i guess it can be. i have been trying to make a game ever since starforge let us down. they were just 3 dudes so i figure what the hell some knuckle heads made something work sort of maybe i could too. 10 years later im still going and have been sticking with unreal engine since it became free to use for everyone. before that i was compiling directx sdks into boring nothing projects with a triangle or a guy that cant move because you have to code his movements. game dev has become very "easy" since then as long as you can learn one of the engines. i havent released any games yet based on my own views that i only want to release one game ever and maintain it forever. thats why it's so important that i pick the perfect game i want to make and that i will love playing for years on end. it's been rough staying motivated through the unreal 4-5 upgrade. unreal 4 got dumped off before it was completed. 4.27 is full of bugs that will remain. unreal 5 was full of hella bugs and still is. we are in a weird spot. unreal 4 and 5 are both an incomplete mess full of half working features. what is most sad is that some things cannot upgrade to unreal 5 ever and so the abandonment of unreal 4 stings for many users across the board. unreal 5.2 came out and it seems to be really good to me so far but i always find something somewhere eventually. 5.2 is blazing fast it seems to me compared to 5.1 compiling shaders feels 2-4x faster. maybe they upgraded to the new dotnet framework i hear its way faster. keep at it guys if you run into bugs thats normal always read the errors closely and google what you can report what cant be googled. the best part about having an engine is you can just tell your users "hey unreal engine is just this way" and move on to fixing more important things.
ps the unreal engine can eat your hard drive alive. i am developing with 2tb space and very cramped. recommend 10tb if developing with megascans. a 100gb project with megascans can shrink to 20gb when compiled due to both nanite and oodle compressor we have a lot of headroom to fill up our projects but these megascans also bloat the project file with compiled space. my city sample goes from 100gb to 250gb and then when compiled its finally 20gb. so be ready to need TONS of space. its also advised to have quixel mixer to retexture things and that is hefty hard drive space too. you also need as much ram as u can get! good luck guys
Great motivational video!
Good one. I too published couple games with no success. Made me give up. But that dream still burns inside me. I'm a creator. I can't live just consuming content, I need to create it too.
My issue was that game dev requires at lot of time and its not rewarding money wise. I make a huge amount as a software developer. If I put my time in reading software development books and do more leetcode I can progress in career even more. Not to mention software engineering is also my hobby. So I had to made a choice.
NIce video man
I have a kid and man its tough, I want to make huge games but that's just not possible. I almost gave up recently with a fps game, but somehow I started a new project and now it has a steam page, so hopefully this one will get done!
I hear you man, I have two little ones myself. If I don't get up at 5am I'm likely not making any progress that day haha. What's your game on steam called? I'll add it to my wishlist!
@@ElusivePandaGames its called Rat Catcher :) Thank you so much
@@CloudlessStudio I love the early 90's art style, getting some intense Doom vibes. Excited to try this one out when you're finished!
@@ElusivePandaGames I really appreciate the kind words! do you have a discord?
@@CloudlessStudio Yeah! Link is in the description!
I developed 2 games with my friend but he gave up. I started a few projects since then but never finished. I feel like my own 2 legs can't handle the weight to carry a project to the finish line.
Thank you for sharing your experience. I think every indie dev can relate to being overly ambitious to the point where a project never gets finished. I know it's been said over and over again but starting small really is the key to finishing a game on your own. Something else that helps is having a clear plan. Before you open up your game engine, start writing out the details about your game. Whats the goal of the player? What actions can the player take to achieve said goal? Only add features to the game that you are confident you can implement within a reasonable timeframe. Creating a game design document also speeds up development as you already know what you need to work on before development.
Are you a godot dev by chance or unreal because I wouldn't mind making games together
@@crabbite3093 I'm more of a Unity dev. I used to learn Unreal but didn't get very far (started from ue3).
epik
I still have the dream
An 16 ❤
It hit home😂😂
🙌🏾
i have trying to learn making game , for 5 or 6 years ,i install unity and after 3 weeks i give up and i try 6 mouths later and i give up .this is happneing for 6 years . something is wrong here i dont know what
😞 i think i need a break..
Nah i gave up long ago, lot of great ideas but i don't know what the fuck to do with all those buttons, i got discouraged long ago
Any persons helps me make cyberpunk game Cyberite 😳
any German here to team up with?
Hey kann deutsch. Wäre interessiert bin aber noch ein ziemlicher anfänger.
@@battleburger8937 Das ist perfekt! bin noch nicht weit und zusammen können wir relativ schnell lernen!
@@crabbite3093 was ist dein discord?
@@crabbite3093 wie können wir miteinander kommunizieren. Für mich wäre Discord am besten.
@@battleburger8937 Wie siehts aus?