Seeing my ideas in other games and then the thought hits me that my game will probably take 10 or 15 years to finish by myself (if I'm lucky) and by that time all my ideas would probably already be used by someone else who finished faster
If it can help: ideas are just ideas. It's the execution that counts.
For exemple, shooters have been around since the 90s and yet, people can't get enough of it.
People downvoting that must be angry to never finalize their execution, but experience indicates that you are absolutely right! Everybody has ideas, constantly, but going to the very end of it is very difficult!
That is so true and so false at the same time.
Ideas come from trends. You see 3 game mechanics in 3 different games and you think it would be amazing to put them together. That may prove as a golden idea. From that point on, the execution is the one that counts, but it will also mean that the first game to put that idea well together will have an edge.
I agree with other commenters, gamers are totally fine with replaying the same mechanics/ideas over and over in new games. All that matters is how well you implemented it and the quality of the game itself. It's basically impossible to make two games exactly the same anyway unless you intentionally try to do so.
Because you feel like you can do it just better enough to take off and accomplish what they didn't - but that's only proven by the fact that they had enough sales to demonstrate some existing level of interest.
It's weird but like when you think about it it's also not weird at all 👍
It's more the opposite for me. I often see very well received games with similar ideas that were executed far better than I ever imagined they could be. I never stood a chance.
I think about this a lot, but thankfully I've not seen an actually EXCELLENT game sell badly.
Yeah, the definition of excellent may change from player to player, but I can always point a flaw (from a market perspective) when I'm playing a underground game that I like. Easy to jugde when it's not my game, but at the end of the day there is no other reality: games that look good and play well will sell.
I mean, if for selling you need to create a EXCELLENT game as a solo developer, then that is enough to tank the motivation..
Making "excellent" games is a very difficult task for a solo developer.
There are a bunch of examples of games that went into oblivion that look very nice and are playable.
At the end it felt like gambling when you launched a game.
As with anything, ideas are just one part of the puzzle. So that shouldn't demotivate you. What about the execution, the community garnered during development?
You could make the best game in the world, if you release it cold, and have garnered zero hype or community during development, chances are it'll go nowhere.
Implementing external services, that result in a variety of incompatibility issues with different tools and packages.
Those are the situations where I don't feel like I'm in control of working out a solution.
But honestly betting thousands of hours of your work on a chance is not something that should be done (imo).
I’m terrible at art. I didn’t know jackshit about animations. I can’t say it’s my favorite thing in the world for sure. But do I need it? Yeah, so I’ll have to get going with it.
knowing what you are capable of, you can mitigate the risk by choosing project that you would be capable of deliver in good quality. I hate animations too, but i have to do them. For that I use some ready to use assets, like DoTween for unity or Feel. I don't have skills to do art, so i chose very simple minimalistic art style that I'm able to deliver. And the time is the biggest issue. I chosen simple idea and I'm trying to deliver it better than others, with an original twist. And with this approach i already have successful game. Knowing from the start that the game scope is doable motivates the best.
All of that is true, I’m not arguing about that. But. Marketing is key. Your game might be good, but if it does not get enough traction in the first place it will just become another corpse in a pile of games that flew under Steam algorithms.
Yes, some games, even the best ones won't stand out in the oversaturated niche. But that's the thing that can be avoided in the idea finding stage.
I'm doing mobile, so its even more marketing driven environment, and yet I'm able to have only organic traffic. But if there is a niche where every game looks the same, and you do something original, it could cause the game to shine. In my case i made infinite minesweeper game (the infinite board is the twist). Most minesweepers tend to copy the classic one, so my game stands out.
It doesn't scare me, I just hate it. I work as a Data Analyst for my day job and have worked with some marketing departments, I just hate it.
If someone were to offer a commission based marketing service for indie gamers, I suspect it would be (eventually) very successful.
Hey there, I am also a data analyst.
Some marketing can be more than spamming Gifs and content 24/7.
I would suggest diving into data driven marketing, which for us, can be more interesting.
For example, pay someone on Upwork to create a short promotional video for something like tiktok or Instagram. Promote the video in different regions, different variations of the video, see which one works best, etc.
I personally use Instagram ads. You post a video reel and then press "boost". You can pay 3-5 dollars per day and get thousands of people looking into your game, maybe a wishlist per day or a few.
It is sadly not cost-effective for a small game, but if your goal is to see if people would be interested in your game and to get at least an initial push so that your game would collect at least 10 reviews fast and get more traction from them, worth a try.
Thank you for the reply, but it all sounds awful! I love game development. Seeing the benefits of my work in real time within my own created universe is more rewarding than most of my day job work.
Game Dev: Hobby, love it.
Data Analyst: Job, like it and seem to have an aptitude for it (20 years as a contractor).
Marketing: Would sooner be unemployed than do that for a living, never mind as a hobby.
I know I'll have to get a handle on marketing if I ever go full time Indie Game Dev, but I don't ever see that happening.
One Youtube reviewer understood and appreciated what I was aiming for with first (and currently, only released game) and gave a very positive review...while stating it was not what people would be expecting. Unfortunately, it was a small channel at the time and didn't many views.
Spending two weeks trying to figure out why my text is not appearing on screen, even after asking for help I still can't figure out why. Gave up and working on something else. Might help me fix the problem.
I hate it when it turns out to be something really simple, like I’ve killed some time yesterday trying to figure out why my bullets are colliding with player collision box even though I set it up to ignore each other. Checked every piece of logic. Missed one tick box…
Spent hours yesterday trying to figure out why instantiated clones of instantiated objects werent working. Turns out the networking solution just doesnt support it. I was combing my code trying to learn what I was doing wrong, and the answer is nothing. After that, I made a few prefabs in a few minutes instead.
Take what you will from this, I'm just a rando on the internet. If your team has a desire to complete the game, it's not a matter of if, it's when. The game **will** be completed. Motivation + managing busy schedules is a very fleeting, hard to predict environment. If you can exercise faith and patience, it will be rewarded.
Not trying to be negative, but it's always a good idea to play for your strengths. if you feel you're not good at storytelling, perhaps there are other options rather than doing a story-driven game.
No worries. I understand what you say but it's not that I don't enjoy this aspect. It's just weaker compared to my art and programming abilities but I'm willing to improve it with time like the any other skill.
Story heavy games are the only genre that really interests me haha.
Good writing is a process that takes more work than skill. You write something bad and then re-write it until it’s good. Too many people think that good writers write good 1st drafts, and that’s what they need to improve at. Good writers write bad 1st drafts like everyone else. They are better at the process of turning them into good drafts.
Editing is vital to good writing. Cut, cut, cut. You should be aiming for the maximum amount of detail in the fewest number of words. A good guide to editing dialogue is to keep cutting words until the line stops making sense, and then put the last word you cut back in again. Try it!
My crappy work schedule which has me working third shift while saving money to get a used car
Knowing what projects I want to start off with but at the same time wondering if them and the other projects that follow are good ideas
And probably the biggest one which my major project I want to do has me wondering if it's a good idea knowing I'll most likely have to make my own game engine or try and mod No Man's Sky to be a single player action rpg that lets you switch to another character anytime in battle without the pausing the combat feature but everytime you switch there's a cooldown before you can switch again and who you switch to has five already programmed moves that they have to complete before taking full control of them. Oh and the project is based on star ocean 1-3.
I'm kind of surprised that everyone is in here talking about motivation like it actually matters. I haven't been motivated to finish a game in years. This is my job. Duty and discipline keep me working.
A million different things could have destroyed my motivation. I don't even keep track of what they might be. Because it doesn't matter. Motivation is not what finishes games.
The only thing I can think of is losing a day of work to computer hardware problems. That's not specific to game dev, but it does make me want to throw all my hardware into a river and go live in the woods.
Feeling your games will flop is a battle we all fight. Don't let it crush your passion!
I suggest you to focus on enjoying the development process, like building a world or coding a mechanic. Break down your game into small wins, celebrate each milestone, and find a community of fellow developers for support. Every project, even flops, teaches valuable lessons.
Think of it like this: build a basic playable version of your game to get early feedback, then iterate and improve based on what players say. Analyze what went wrong and use that knowledge to make your next game even better.
Hope it helps!
Just to come back to it. Sometimes I do feel this crushing feeling of “if it flops I’ve wasted so much time”. And I know it’s not wasted - I’d just play something stupid instead of doing this productive thing, but it’s still a thought.
But then I hop on the engine and start doing something and I love those little a-ha moments, when I need something to be done and wow I actually know how to do that! This gives me a ton of confidence boost and motivation - this is not a waste, I’m learning something cool and useful, and I do have fun in the process.
This is something that I’ve just felt again and decided to share, perhaps it will help someone like me.
Hitting a brick wall whenever you wanna add a feature.
I'm sure this is one of those "I have it worse" "No, I have it worse!" But as an artist, I can't just.. find free code online for what I need, especially if it's a niche issue. So often I think "I want to do this simple thing" and it takes HOURS to get it half functioning
Yeah I could take courses, but sadly I have other life priorities to do different courses atm. I just wanna have my mechanics so I can start making it pretty lmao
Oof I struggle with the same thing op. Another thing is that I might get stuck on something a bit more abstract that I can’t get right, for example game feel for shooting a gun.
Probably just working alone on it and the same as you. Working in a team you can at least bounce things off each other while working alone .. everything is on you.
Though at the same time I can't help but wonder if there's any point in making a game unless it will stand out in some way as spending who knows how much time of your life working on something that only a handful of players might play possibly... 😅
Making a new / unique game seems super difficult since it feels like everything has already been done and the actually unique games are usually far between each other
Time, inspiration, insufficient knowledge, poor computer.
I'll explain. I'm a high school professor by vocation, and gamedev during my free time. In my country, that means I have all January, half February, half July and every weekend free.
The problem is that my inspiration and time doesn't seem to align well enough. During the bigger vacations I very rarely feel inspired to advance on my projects, that means I do it during the minutes I have available during weekdays or sometimes during weekends, but I also need to grade my students homeworks or plan my future lessons and that takes a lot of the free time I have.
While I have released a game already, I still consider myself a noob. The game was very simple, and still I struggled with some parts developing it and for my future projects I keep pushing myself into unknown territory. Because while the lack of knowledge sometimes does indeed affect my motivation, I actually seek that, as I find fascinating to learn hard things.
Regarding my potatoe computer there isn't much I can do except reducing the scope of my games. And while sometimes great things are created despite the technical limitations, it's undeniably disheartening.
For example, a short time ago I wanted to try doing clothes simulation in Blender, but every time I try to run it, it CTD. Can I still get a similar effect using bones? Sure, can I just ditch the idea and use static meshes? Definitely. But the thing is that I wanted to try the simulation, it was something I was anxious to see in action. Not being able to do it, definitely damaged my motivation.
Seeing people make games I perceive as "better" in a shorter amount of time. Like I've been working on my first real game for 4+ years now and it feels like it's just now starting to look passable. Whereas I see so many other talented people make an incredible looking indie game and I read the caption and they say it took them only like 2 years.
It really sucks sometimes :\\
I think it may be because devs who have previously released a game already have a framework for future games, especially if they have similar gameplay. And some devs may be spending more money on assets and/or contract work.
To me it's dealing with engine issues or bugs. I hate it when I know I'm doing something well but an engine version changed the way it's done and I spend hours looking for solutions.
I’ll tell you what motivates me though. Seeing everybody here being wishy washy and doubtful of their abilities, hindering their production, giving me the competitive edge and motivation to finish sooner.
…… you gotta want it bad enough
…… you gotta realize that you’re running out of time every day
…..it needs to sink in that this is the youngest you’ll ever be and that if you don’t finish and release your game, other people WILL finish theirs and release it.
…….you gotta make it count. You gotta wanna win bad enough.
This barely ties in, but I always remember what Walter told Jessie in Breaking Bad, as semi irrelevant as it may be here to this situation and incorrect as the quote may be.
“We’re already going to hell, only IM NOT GONNA LIE DOWN DOWN UNTIL I GET THERE”
I read it applying it to my situation as “I’m already gonna die one day, only I’m gonna finish my game before I do.
I really admire devs who can turn an error into a feature. I tend to be a bit of a perfectionist and if something isn't working the way it does in my mind, I just throw in the towel, get frustrated and then give up completely. It could be a bug, a mechanic not quite being what I wanted, or not being able to get a sprite to look the way it does in my mind. I tend to feel like if I can't get it perfect then I'm not making the game I want to make, so just give up. It's very frustrating.
5yrs ago, I tried to find a game dev job, eventually I got an outsourcing company offer, kind of decent, but I turned it down and went to UCD for a CS master degree.
3yrs ago, I tried to find a game dev job, no offer, so I decided to write React.
now, I got laid off, tried again to find a game dev job, guess what? I cannot find a position which accepts <5yrs experience, no shipping title, not from "move2usVisa.com" or "quickHire.com"
Furthermore, I also haven't pass any Front-end interview yet.
Yes, I am quitting.
I've quit all my solo projects, just due to the time commitment and slow progress. Everyone recommends making a clone of a 2D platformer for your first game (and that's good advice), but I could never get myself to start a project I wasn't excited about.
Now I'm working on a small team, and love the rate we're progressing. It also helps that I have other people who are interested in the changes I make. With that said, sometimes I still get discouraged when some parts aren't up to the quality I want. I wonder if we'll work on this game for longer or release a game I'm not fully proud of... And it may flop either way... It's a multiplayer FPS, so, y'know, it's challenging.
I have ideas for future projects that should have a shorter dev cycle while still being innovative. If we can get some success with those, I'll feel better going back to longer projects. Really though, no matter what, I'm going to keep with gamedev, I just have periods of more and less motivation.
Look up the book "The artists way." It has techniques to call upon your motivation and creativity without depending on the stars aligning. I suffer with the same sort of struggles you do.
When life is going too well. I need a bit of friction to keep my dreams fueled. If things are too great, Ill put off the hard stuff to enjoy life and neglect my work.
On the other hand, if things get too difficult I'll lose motivation too. It's a constant stressful trapeze act with hopelessness and happiness as my counterweights.
All of my de motivators are external to game design. I absolutely love game design…but nagging from my significant other? Just put a bullet in my head. I’ll finish the game in the next life/jk
I don't think about success/failure, it just gives me unnecessary stress. I just wanna make a game and have fun making it.
What is truly damaging is my procrastination habit.
Starting to prototype on a simple game idea and realizing how illogical it is or how much work I would actually have to put in to make it something decent.
A reality check, I need to stay delusional in order to be productive.
That right there is the most accurate way to describe the fickle nature of my productivity, as well.
Seeing my ideas in other games and then the thought hits me that my game will probably take 10 or 15 years to finish by myself (if I'm lucky) and by that time all my ideas would probably already be used by someone else who finished faster
If it can help: ideas are just ideas. It's the execution that counts. For exemple, shooters have been around since the 90s and yet, people can't get enough of it.
People downvoting that must be angry to never finalize their execution, but experience indicates that you are absolutely right! Everybody has ideas, constantly, but going to the very end of it is very difficult!
And sometimes a related game can actually boost interest in your game, as the entire genre/niche can get extra eyes.
That is so true and so false at the same time. Ideas come from trends. You see 3 game mechanics in 3 different games and you think it would be amazing to put them together. That may prove as a golden idea. From that point on, the execution is the one that counts, but it will also mean that the first game to put that idea well together will have an edge.
[удалено]
Glass half full
😂
I agree with other commenters, gamers are totally fine with replaying the same mechanics/ideas over and over in new games. All that matters is how well you implemented it and the quality of the game itself. It's basically impossible to make two games exactly the same anyway unless you intentionally try to do so.
Like Bodycam did with unrecord!
Amazing games with similar ideas to yours that sells very bad
The amazing game with similar ideas to yours that sells very well is also hard to take 😀
So the grey area is amazing game with similar ideas to yours that sells very averagely?
Weirdly, yes. Sometimes.
Because you feel like you can do it just better enough to take off and accomplish what they didn't - but that's only proven by the fact that they had enough sales to demonstrate some existing level of interest. It's weird but like when you think about it it's also not weird at all 👍
It's more the opposite for me. I often see very well received games with similar ideas that were executed far better than I ever imagined they could be. I never stood a chance.
I think about this a lot, but thankfully I've not seen an actually EXCELLENT game sell badly. Yeah, the definition of excellent may change from player to player, but I can always point a flaw (from a market perspective) when I'm playing a underground game that I like. Easy to jugde when it's not my game, but at the end of the day there is no other reality: games that look good and play well will sell.
I mean, if for selling you need to create a EXCELLENT game as a solo developer, then that is enough to tank the motivation.. Making "excellent" games is a very difficult task for a solo developer.
True, but I've seen some not-so-excellent games selling well too.
I always try to think about that other game (even forgot its name :S) that did basically the same as Vampire Survivor with way less success.
There are a bunch of examples of games that went into oblivion that look very nice and are playable. At the end it felt like gambling when you launched a game.
As with anything, ideas are just one part of the puzzle. So that shouldn't demotivate you. What about the execution, the community garnered during development? You could make the best game in the world, if you release it cold, and have garnered zero hype or community during development, chances are it'll go nowhere.
Implementing external services, that result in a variety of incompatibility issues with different tools and packages. Those are the situations where I don't feel like I'm in control of working out a solution.
Knowing it's a waste of time without marketing and knowing I'll never do any marketing.
bad games can’t live without marketing, good games have a chance to be successful without it
But honestly betting thousands of hours of your work on a chance is not something that should be done (imo). I’m terrible at art. I didn’t know jackshit about animations. I can’t say it’s my favorite thing in the world for sure. But do I need it? Yeah, so I’ll have to get going with it.
knowing what you are capable of, you can mitigate the risk by choosing project that you would be capable of deliver in good quality. I hate animations too, but i have to do them. For that I use some ready to use assets, like DoTween for unity or Feel. I don't have skills to do art, so i chose very simple minimalistic art style that I'm able to deliver. And the time is the biggest issue. I chosen simple idea and I'm trying to deliver it better than others, with an original twist. And with this approach i already have successful game. Knowing from the start that the game scope is doable motivates the best.
All of that is true, I’m not arguing about that. But. Marketing is key. Your game might be good, but if it does not get enough traction in the first place it will just become another corpse in a pile of games that flew under Steam algorithms.
Yes, some games, even the best ones won't stand out in the oversaturated niche. But that's the thing that can be avoided in the idea finding stage. I'm doing mobile, so its even more marketing driven environment, and yet I'm able to have only organic traffic. But if there is a niche where every game looks the same, and you do something original, it could cause the game to shine. In my case i made infinite minesweeper game (the infinite board is the twist). Most minesweepers tend to copy the classic one, so my game stands out.
That's what I keep hoping!
A bad game won't sell well even with marketing.
Funny enough marketing does not scare me in the slightest. Perhaps we should join forces lol
It doesn't scare me, I just hate it. I work as a Data Analyst for my day job and have worked with some marketing departments, I just hate it. If someone were to offer a commission based marketing service for indie gamers, I suspect it would be (eventually) very successful.
Well isn’t that basically a publisher?
It is! And I'm an idiot! Though I meant for small indie games that publishers may not be so interested in, but yes.
Hey there, I am also a data analyst. Some marketing can be more than spamming Gifs and content 24/7. I would suggest diving into data driven marketing, which for us, can be more interesting. For example, pay someone on Upwork to create a short promotional video for something like tiktok or Instagram. Promote the video in different regions, different variations of the video, see which one works best, etc. I personally use Instagram ads. You post a video reel and then press "boost". You can pay 3-5 dollars per day and get thousands of people looking into your game, maybe a wishlist per day or a few. It is sadly not cost-effective for a small game, but if your goal is to see if people would be interested in your game and to get at least an initial push so that your game would collect at least 10 reviews fast and get more traction from them, worth a try.
Thank you for the reply, but it all sounds awful! I love game development. Seeing the benefits of my work in real time within my own created universe is more rewarding than most of my day job work. Game Dev: Hobby, love it. Data Analyst: Job, like it and seem to have an aptitude for it (20 years as a contractor). Marketing: Would sooner be unemployed than do that for a living, never mind as a hobby. I know I'll have to get a handle on marketing if I ever go full time Indie Game Dev, but I don't ever see that happening. One Youtube reviewer understood and appreciated what I was aiming for with first (and currently, only released game) and gave a very positive review...while stating it was not what people would be expecting. Unfortunately, it was a small channel at the time and didn't many views.
Out of curiosity, would you mind sharing your game?
DM'ed
Spending two weeks trying to figure out why my text is not appearing on screen, even after asking for help I still can't figure out why. Gave up and working on something else. Might help me fix the problem.
I hate it when it turns out to be something really simple, like I’ve killed some time yesterday trying to figure out why my bullets are colliding with player collision box even though I set it up to ignore each other. Checked every piece of logic. Missed one tick box…
Spent hours yesterday trying to figure out why instantiated clones of instantiated objects werent working. Turns out the networking solution just doesnt support it. I was combing my code trying to learn what I was doing wrong, and the answer is nothing. After that, I made a few prefabs in a few minutes instead.
My teammates not pulling their weight, or even worse, not showing any enthusiasm at all.
This. Really pulling me down atm.
Take what you will from this, I'm just a rando on the internet. If your team has a desire to complete the game, it's not a matter of if, it's when. The game **will** be completed. Motivation + managing busy schedules is a very fleeting, hard to predict environment. If you can exercise faith and patience, it will be rewarded.
My trash English and storytelling abilities but I'll get there..
Not trying to be negative, but it's always a good idea to play for your strengths. if you feel you're not good at storytelling, perhaps there are other options rather than doing a story-driven game.
No worries. I understand what you say but it's not that I don't enjoy this aspect. It's just weaker compared to my art and programming abilities but I'm willing to improve it with time like the any other skill. Story heavy games are the only genre that really interests me haha.
Good writing is a process that takes more work than skill. You write something bad and then re-write it until it’s good. Too many people think that good writers write good 1st drafts, and that’s what they need to improve at. Good writers write bad 1st drafts like everyone else. They are better at the process of turning them into good drafts. Editing is vital to good writing. Cut, cut, cut. You should be aiming for the maximum amount of detail in the fewest number of words. A good guide to editing dialogue is to keep cutting words until the line stops making sense, and then put the last word you cut back in again. Try it!
I will! Thanks a lot for the advice!!
Make caveman games. Grug hungry. Grug hunt mammoth. Mammoth tasty.
My crappy work schedule which has me working third shift while saving money to get a used car Knowing what projects I want to start off with but at the same time wondering if them and the other projects that follow are good ideas And probably the biggest one which my major project I want to do has me wondering if it's a good idea knowing I'll most likely have to make my own game engine or try and mod No Man's Sky to be a single player action rpg that lets you switch to another character anytime in battle without the pausing the combat feature but everytime you switch there's a cooldown before you can switch again and who you switch to has five already programmed moves that they have to complete before taking full control of them. Oh and the project is based on star ocean 1-3.
My lack of any graphic skills or even basic ability to recognize that art in my game is bad.
I'm kind of surprised that everyone is in here talking about motivation like it actually matters. I haven't been motivated to finish a game in years. This is my job. Duty and discipline keep me working. A million different things could have destroyed my motivation. I don't even keep track of what they might be. Because it doesn't matter. Motivation is not what finishes games.
The difference between professional and hobby game dev, I suppose.
Everything requires motivation. There needs to be some motivation for you to keep your discipline.
The only thing I can think of is losing a day of work to computer hardware problems. That's not specific to game dev, but it does make me want to throw all my hardware into a river and go live in the woods.
Everyone stating how hard and stupid it is to make your first game be a multiplayer one. And me still doing it because i want it to be fun
Same. I don't think I'll ever make a game that doesn't at least have a coop option. Toys are best shared with friends.
Feeling your games will flop is a battle we all fight. Don't let it crush your passion! I suggest you to focus on enjoying the development process, like building a world or coding a mechanic. Break down your game into small wins, celebrate each milestone, and find a community of fellow developers for support. Every project, even flops, teaches valuable lessons. Think of it like this: build a basic playable version of your game to get early feedback, then iterate and improve based on what players say. Analyze what went wrong and use that knowledge to make your next game even better. Hope it helps!
Great advice! 😃
Just to come back to it. Sometimes I do feel this crushing feeling of “if it flops I’ve wasted so much time”. And I know it’s not wasted - I’d just play something stupid instead of doing this productive thing, but it’s still a thought. But then I hop on the engine and start doing something and I love those little a-ha moments, when I need something to be done and wow I actually know how to do that! This gives me a ton of confidence boost and motivation - this is not a waste, I’m learning something cool and useful, and I do have fun in the process. This is something that I’ve just felt again and decided to share, perhaps it will help someone like me.
UI. It is just a lot of work for something that ideally will take only a fraction of player attention. People who make great UIs - my deepest respect
Hitting a brick wall whenever you wanna add a feature. I'm sure this is one of those "I have it worse" "No, I have it worse!" But as an artist, I can't just.. find free code online for what I need, especially if it's a niche issue. So often I think "I want to do this simple thing" and it takes HOURS to get it half functioning Yeah I could take courses, but sadly I have other life priorities to do different courses atm. I just wanna have my mechanics so I can start making it pretty lmao
For me it’s doing the art and animations. I like to write code
bugs i can't manage to solve alobe or when i want to implement a feature but don't find free tutorials for it
Oof I struggle with the same thing op. Another thing is that I might get stuck on something a bit more abstract that I can’t get right, for example game feel for shooting a gun.
Crunch Pro tip: Don't
Probably just working alone on it and the same as you. Working in a team you can at least bounce things off each other while working alone .. everything is on you. Though at the same time I can't help but wonder if there's any point in making a game unless it will stand out in some way as spending who knows how much time of your life working on something that only a handful of players might play possibly... 😅 Making a new / unique game seems super difficult since it feels like everything has already been done and the actually unique games are usually far between each other
Time, inspiration, insufficient knowledge, poor computer. I'll explain. I'm a high school professor by vocation, and gamedev during my free time. In my country, that means I have all January, half February, half July and every weekend free. The problem is that my inspiration and time doesn't seem to align well enough. During the bigger vacations I very rarely feel inspired to advance on my projects, that means I do it during the minutes I have available during weekdays or sometimes during weekends, but I also need to grade my students homeworks or plan my future lessons and that takes a lot of the free time I have. While I have released a game already, I still consider myself a noob. The game was very simple, and still I struggled with some parts developing it and for my future projects I keep pushing myself into unknown territory. Because while the lack of knowledge sometimes does indeed affect my motivation, I actually seek that, as I find fascinating to learn hard things. Regarding my potatoe computer there isn't much I can do except reducing the scope of my games. And while sometimes great things are created despite the technical limitations, it's undeniably disheartening. For example, a short time ago I wanted to try doing clothes simulation in Blender, but every time I try to run it, it CTD. Can I still get a similar effect using bones? Sure, can I just ditch the idea and use static meshes? Definitely. But the thing is that I wanted to try the simulation, it was something I was anxious to see in action. Not being able to do it, definitely damaged my motivation.
Hardware issues. I need a better computer because my game lags to shit when I playtest it and not for my friends with better computers.
Seeing ai being more and more powerful that it can replace us in the future
Seeing people make games I perceive as "better" in a shorter amount of time. Like I've been working on my first real game for 4+ years now and it feels like it's just now starting to look passable. Whereas I see so many other talented people make an incredible looking indie game and I read the caption and they say it took them only like 2 years. It really sucks sometimes :\\
I think it may be because devs who have previously released a game already have a framework for future games, especially if they have similar gameplay. And some devs may be spending more money on assets and/or contract work.
To me it's dealing with engine issues or bugs. I hate it when I know I'm doing something well but an engine version changed the way it's done and I spend hours looking for solutions.
Catastrophizing. What if…What if…What if…
Comparison is the death of joy
I’ll tell you what motivates me though. Seeing everybody here being wishy washy and doubtful of their abilities, hindering their production, giving me the competitive edge and motivation to finish sooner. …… you gotta want it bad enough …… you gotta realize that you’re running out of time every day …..it needs to sink in that this is the youngest you’ll ever be and that if you don’t finish and release your game, other people WILL finish theirs and release it. …….you gotta make it count. You gotta wanna win bad enough. This barely ties in, but I always remember what Walter told Jessie in Breaking Bad, as semi irrelevant as it may be here to this situation and incorrect as the quote may be. “We’re already going to hell, only IM NOT GONNA LIE DOWN DOWN UNTIL I GET THERE” I read it applying it to my situation as “I’m already gonna die one day, only I’m gonna finish my game before I do.
This familar inner voice echoing that my game art, story and gameplay will all be just good enough like my skillset — but nothing more.
The incoming enviroment crisis is pretty Bad for my motivation
Exhaustion. Extreme tiredless and lack of sleep is the #1 enemy of any progress I can make.
Producers or CEOs thinking they are game directors and just using buzzwords and out of the ass ideas (lack of vision) ruining the project.
I really admire devs who can turn an error into a feature. I tend to be a bit of a perfectionist and if something isn't working the way it does in my mind, I just throw in the towel, get frustrated and then give up completely. It could be a bug, a mechanic not quite being what I wanted, or not being able to get a sprite to look the way it does in my mind. I tend to feel like if I can't get it perfect then I'm not making the game I want to make, so just give up. It's very frustrating.
Depression :(
Creating 3D assets because I suck ass at it.
5yrs ago, I tried to find a game dev job, eventually I got an outsourcing company offer, kind of decent, but I turned it down and went to UCD for a CS master degree. 3yrs ago, I tried to find a game dev job, no offer, so I decided to write React. now, I got laid off, tried again to find a game dev job, guess what? I cannot find a position which accepts <5yrs experience, no shipping title, not from "move2usVisa.com" or "quickHire.com" Furthermore, I also haven't pass any Front-end interview yet. Yes, I am quitting.
Aww I'm sorry to hear that! I guess that's why so many people do it on the side. It's just too difficult to get a toe in the door.
Gaming lol
Fanbases. And one of the biggest motivations? Fanbases. Usually for the same games.
Realizing I'll have to design environments/levels and UI. Two things I have no talent for.
I love making it, but i know that other people will not like it. I need to focus on not starving first before focusing on being happy.
I've quit all my solo projects, just due to the time commitment and slow progress. Everyone recommends making a clone of a 2D platformer for your first game (and that's good advice), but I could never get myself to start a project I wasn't excited about. Now I'm working on a small team, and love the rate we're progressing. It also helps that I have other people who are interested in the changes I make. With that said, sometimes I still get discouraged when some parts aren't up to the quality I want. I wonder if we'll work on this game for longer or release a game I'm not fully proud of... And it may flop either way... It's a multiplayer FPS, so, y'know, it's challenging. I have ideas for future projects that should have a shorter dev cycle while still being innovative. If we can get some success with those, I'll feel better going back to longer projects. Really though, no matter what, I'm going to keep with gamedev, I just have periods of more and less motivation.
Hitting a problem that's solvable, but would be very tedious to do so. Executive dysfunction will throw the whole project into the trash.
Seeing only 30% of my gross revenue actually land in my bank account.
Trying to engage with people earnestly on certain subs, getting attacked by trolls, and getting banned for "abusing the report button"
My job, Ive been coming home too exhausted to even try to learn stuff for game dev
Health issues, very consistent in ruining my motivation
Having to wait to do something driven by motivation. If I can't something immediately I lose the spark and it's not as interesting anymore
Look up the book "The artists way." It has techniques to call upon your motivation and creativity without depending on the stars aligning. I suffer with the same sort of struggles you do.
When life is going too well. I need a bit of friction to keep my dreams fueled. If things are too great, Ill put off the hard stuff to enjoy life and neglect my work. On the other hand, if things get too difficult I'll lose motivation too. It's a constant stressful trapeze act with hopelessness and happiness as my counterweights.
All of my de motivators are external to game design. I absolutely love game design…but nagging from my significant other? Just put a bullet in my head. I’ll finish the game in the next life/jk
I don't think about success/failure, it just gives me unnecessary stress. I just wanna make a game and have fun making it. What is truly damaging is my procrastination habit.
Starting to prototype on a simple game idea and realizing how illogical it is or how much work I would actually have to put in to make it something decent.
Bugs that I struggle to solve. Nothing more demotivating than having a problem and having no idea where to begin solving it