How to get into Game Dev?

[mahoroa]

First of all my apologies if this is the wrong board to post this one

Anyways. I want to get into gamedev since I've had an idea in my head for ages now. The problem is the game dev courses I find are pretty stressful and I don't really plan on being a full time gamedev.

My friend told me people get into gamedev casually but I'm not sure where to start? Any tips?

EDIT: I should've mentioned this but I want to make a platformer game (think like Kirby games). I have most of the characters sketched out and basic story outline, I'm just not sure where else to go with this idea

[ThunderPerfectWitchcraft]

The short, general answer: Get Godot and do some tutorials - https://docs.godotengine.org/en/stable/community/tutorials.html
Afterwards, do some simple games. Later, you can expand.

But depending on what you can do already (coding? scripting? graphics?) and what you want to do (2d? 3d? small? epic?) there might be better ways for you ;).

[Melooon]

I would actually go a step further back than that; game engines, art programs etc.. are really just tools that allow you to present your game in a digitised and distributable format; that's the very end of the chain.

You start by observing, researching and inventing. For example; say you wanna make a game about battling crabs in a desert (start with a very simple idea). Go to a desert, make drawings, take notes, and learn about the different kinds of deserts; do the same for crabs and fights. Keep doing that until you have one of those big A4 black notebooks filled with notes about everything you've learned.

Once you have that book; start to figure out how you can fit it into a game. Start with a board game, or even just a semi-DND type session with some friends where you talk about ideas and play out interactions. Doing that you'll learn really fast what's working and what's not working.

Once you have a set of game interactions/mechanics that you know work on paper; then you download a game engine like Godot and start trying to recreate them digitally. If you don't have digital skills like programming, this will be a really slow phase because you'll have to learn that as you work here. Once again; you'll figure out what works, what you're able to do, what you enjoy doing etc.

THEN, once you know your source material, you know your interactions, and you know your technical skills - you'll know you're ready to start actually working on your game  Annnd chances are it won't work out, and if it does, chances are it won't be anything like what you imagined at the start; you keep trying though and each time more clicks.

[shevek]

@Melooon bringing the dedicated artist study vibe!

As third person though, I have to say it makes it sound like a lot. I think it's fair to just play around with software and metaphorically put the puzzle pieces together until you find something that fits
Like okay, I make this cube move now from left to right. Now how do I make it shoot? Next, how do I apply a texture to it? Now, how would I create an environment? How do I make text appear in a text bubble? etc. and then you start replacing things, refactoring things, as your skills improve and you wanna change something.

Look at Stardew Valley creator Eric Barone - SDV was created solely by him, for years before the release, and old trailers and images are still out there. The old versions are nowhere near as polished as the final product that went over countless iterations, suggestions by others, a publisher etc. so it's just natural to always build on top of what you created.

For the beginning and to learn the basics, I think it matters less if it's a game that you would actually like to play or that would make money in any way - just something that gets you to research the things you wanna do. It's similar to website building, where adding on to it makes you increase your skills because you start to think, well, how can I maybe tilt this text?

If you do wanna work on your first dedicated project that should be worth presenting or something you enjoy, I think Melon's approach could be great. Though I laughed at

Go to a desert

Just go to your nearest desert, duh. If you want to make a game about space, go to the moon

[Melooon]

go to your nearest desert

I did mean that within your means If you're in a lot of US you can totally take a Greyhound and do long-weekend trip to a desert region.. its maybe a little more difficult in Europe, but Egypt is only a 4 hour flight away! Failing all that, a botanical garden with a cactus section and movies set in deserts are all ways to experience a desert

You're right though, it does make it sound like a lot; but whys that a bad thing? Playing games is about discovery and self-construction, so why should that not also be core to the process of making them?

[shevek]

whys that a bad thing?

I think generally it's not, especially if that's bringing a new hobby and passion into a person's life - like people who travel for photography or their drawing diaries.
But oftentimes people wanna get into a new hobby and are intimidated by what's out there because YT and search engine results are a ton. Even just here - what game engine to choose, what tutorials to follow, how much do I need to learn to code and what language(s), do I need to model the models myself, where can I get free models, 2D or 3D, etc.
It's hard to find a way in because we are scared to somehow start wrong, or start with something way too hard and burn ourselves out quickly.

So instead of someone going: "Hey, just start with this for once. Look at this documentation. Good luck and check out Polycount for questions (or other resources)", you on the other hand come up with: Well, if you wanna make games, you first need to find the time and money to travel. And don't even think about beginning the game until you have an A4 book filled with ideas and studies that you'll bounce off of the friends you hopefully have

[Memory]

My friend told me people get into gamedev casually but I'm not sure where to start? Any tips?

I suppose the first question I'd answer is: What do I want to make?

I have too many ideas for what I want to make and I quite often project hop LOL. But regardless of how "difficult" your idea is, I'd still say go for it! Try it out, what's the worst that can happen? It's too high above your current skill level? COOL, now you know what you have to learn to move forward!

As for engines and stuff, I have heard that godot is relatively easy to pick up for beginners. And even easier in my opinion is renpy! Even easier than renpy is twine. All my opinion of course, but I do think visual novels are among the easiest games for a beginner to make. You can also make your visual novel as difficult as you'd like if you wanna introduce more scripts into the mix, or you can simply focus on the art and writing.

For me, I wanted to further my art for some OC's. It made sense to create an interactive fiction game for them so I could have other people experience them in deeper ways that weren't limited to just looking at art. The answer to your question, in my opinion, is highly dependant on your wants and needs and not easily answered by anyone else. What do you want to make only for yourself? What is important for you to include? Do you have a message you want to communicate, or are you simply seeking to have fun? There are many other questions one could ask, but if I were answering your above question for myself... I'd start with: what sounds like the most fun? And move on from there !

And my best advice: Just start. I know sometimes that's easier said than done, but if I didn't do that then I wouldn't have even made a website, y'know? Sometimes you just have to give it a go with what information you currently have and then you'll quickly learn where to go from there.

EDIT: It can also be useful sometimes to just. Experiment. Don't try to make anything concrete, but just mess around with settings and see what does what!

[Melooon]

Well, if you wanna make games

My point was that making games is hard; really hard! And yes it's a lot of fun too and I'd like to encourage people to get into it; but saying "here's the documentation, good luck!" it sounds lovely, but its unfair because it sets people up to fail.

Getting a cube to jump in a game engine is easy, but after that actually turning your ideas into something is super overwhelming; you get soo many ideas all the time, you don't know what ones to pick, you want to do 5000 amazing things but you struggle just to get a single one to work <- that's the killer that pushes most people out of game dev-ing.

Doing preparatory work is the best solution to that; it gives you the foundation you need to not get overwhelmed and to actually finish with something that you're proud of. If you can do that even for one small project, you'll be much more confident to do more!

[Memory]

[removed by author]

[ThunderPerfectWitchcraft]

You're right though, it does make it sound like a lot; but whys that a bad thing? Playing games is about discovery and self-construction, so why should that not also be core to the process of making them?

I believe that there are different approaches, all with their own right - most of my games came, at their core, as spontaneous ideas out of situations or impressions, and I built upon those. You have an idea and go study the surroundings of them; a third person might have another approach. But at the core, you'll need to have tools and know how to use them (or learn to use them within your approach).

[shevek]

My point was that making games is hard; really hard!

I don't think it has to be hard. Yes, people need to pace themselves, find the right resources and not get overwhelmed with all the information and options, and not set out to make the next popular MMORPG; but there are 8 year olds making games with Scratch. Making games has never been easier, as seen on itch.io. I think it's not nice to squash the flame of curious people interested to get into it but already feeling like the courses they found are too stressful for just getting into it as a beginner, by telling them it is soooo hard and they have to do a bunch of upfront labour so it will even be worth it. It's feeding a huge negative voice that's like "Oh no, don't even bother".
From the OP, it seems like the idea is there and there aren't much or any competing ones. They just need the first tools and some good info that isn't set out to make you create portfolio pieces to get hired.

[mahoroa]

I probably shouldve mentioned in my post. But my idea is for a 2d platformer (think like. the Kirby games). I basically have most of the characters designed and the story outlined but I'm not sure where else to go.

[kurohaato]

For most larger projects (games, large portions of a site, programing assignments, etc), I follow an agile-esque (agile-esent?) system of Design -> Implement -> Test. I get some post-it notes and write all the steps I need to do to get this done on them, and move them around when they're ready for the next stage of development. If I need to add a new one, I add a new sticky note. If I don't need something anymore, I rip the sticky off the wall and throw it in the trash. Sometimes stuff will get split up, i.e. "Design MC" turns into "Make MC Concept Art" and "Make MC Sprite", that's fine. Sometimes you'll get to the testing phase and realise you have to redesign a big part of it from scratch to fit your new vision, that's fine. You don't have to make everything perfect the first time around. Just move the sticky note and try again.

Also a Not-Now-Definitely-Later thing: When you get towards the end, you might start saying "There's this one little thing that I need to add and then it will be finished". Been there, done that, there is no end. There will have to be a point where you need to say "These bugs are small enough, the color difference is only a little off, it's time to release it". If it truly bothers you or some of your players - patch it! You can make new versions you don't have to release a perfect product.

Oh and good luck with the game my guy! Don't hesitate to share it once you release it, we'd all love to see it.

[ThunderPerfectWitchcraft]

I probably shouldve mentioned in my post. But my idea is for a 2d platformer (think like. the Kirby games). I basically have most of the characters designed and the story outlined but I'm not sure where else to go.

Coding experience? If none, Godot would probably be indeed your way to go. Once you have carefully learned the basics, use https://godotengine.github.io/godot-demo-projects/2d/platformer/ either as inspiration or even as basis - it is available under a free license.

When working on 2D-Platformers, you'll need to spend a lot of time in working out the very fundamentals. Jumping, Moving, interaction with walls (stairs? ramps?) require a lot of tinkering to be really good (the demo illustrates this good, imho - movement and camera do feel a bit of). Before you go into level design itself, create a barebone room with some fundamental structures and tweak till it is fun to play your game without real content.

I also started a Kirby-inspired project using CPP and SDL2 some time ago. Project is abandoned for now, though. Would be glad to play your project :).

[mahoroa]

Coding experience? If none, Godot would probably be indeed your way to go. Once you have carefully learned the basics, use https://godotengine.github.io/godot-demo-projects/2d/platformer/ either as inspiration or even as basis - it is available under a free license.

When working on 2D-Platformers, you'll need to spend a lot of time in working out the very fundamentals. Jumping, Moving, interaction with walls (stairs? ramps?) require a lot of tinkering to be really good (the demo illustrates this good, imho - movement and camera do feel a bit of). Before you go into level design itself, create a barebone room with some fundamental structures and tweak till it is fun to play your game without real content.

I also started a Kirby-inspired project using CPP and SDL2 some time ago. Project is abandoned for now, though. Would be glad to play your project :).

Thank you so much! Unfortunately I'm swamped with college rn but when I'm free I'll def check this out!