Game development

[/home/user/]

Video games! Zoop!

Do you develop them? Do you plan on developing them? Have you already developed them?

If so, let's see them!

I think video game development fits in super nicely with the web DIY subculture, especially when it's about smaller indie projects that can be completed by a single person in a reasonable time-frame without it becoming their job. There's engines out there these days that let you develop super small games for under-powered hardware like the Playdate. Or GBStudio, which lets you develop for the original GameBoy. Or plenty of other ways to make a worthwhile single-developer game!

[TheFrugalGamer]

One of my new year's resolutions was to finish developing a game, actually. I was doing some goal organizing last year I realized that having a finished game--NOT one I started and then walked away from :omg:k:--was something I'd always wanted to accomplish. So I've been working on a little thing in GBStudio about a goat who wants to eat everything. I've also been playing around in Bitsy game maker, which is even simpler, but I'll probably finish the GBStudio one first.

[Melooon]

I think video game development fits in super nicely with the web DIY subculture

No one remembers that this forum was created for game development (Thats why there are two games in the top left!!)

[sig]

No one remembers that this forum was created for game development (Thats why there are two games in the top left!!)

the melonland forum lore goes deep

I'm definitely interested in making video games! Haven't done it a lot though. What's holding me back the most, aside from a general 'not doing it', is my lack of programming knowledge. I might go and study computer science though, so I could apply the knowledge from there and be able to create my own things. I know that's not the only way to go about it but having the external motivation to get crackin' and get a degree at the end of it seems pretty sweet to me lol

I have joined a game jam once with a friend who did the art, so if anyone is interested in that you can find it here: https://sigmatic.itch.i:ha:demon-fishing-demo
It's a small little demo, barely even a game but it was still fun to work on so I'm glad we made it! (Also I still think the hand-drawn fish are the coolest )

Also as far as you can call it a videogame, I keep having ideas for a story to build in Twine which is an 'open-source tool for telling interactive, nonlinear stories'. I should probably actually get started on it but I keep trying to build on ideas in my head instead of actually doing something... Someday!

I'm curious to see what others on the forum have made, please share so I can play it!

[/home/user/]

No one remembers that this forum was created for game development (Thats why there are two games in the top left!!)

I mean, I do, the original battle plan was to spread around the "creating virtual worlds" thingy right? I just thought that generally there was no discussion at all on gamedev here and it's been an alt web forum for the longest time now.

[Gans]

Don't start with your own game. It will entangle you like a web spider and make you crazy. You still can decide! An ordinary life is still open for you!

I'm doomed on the other hand. Addicted to programming... typing commands and logical links will never me leave me, until my eyes stop opening. When I was younger, it even hit me at night, like a flash. Climbed from the bed like a zombie, switching on the machine, the monitor glow summoning me to type nonsense into the keyboard (proper code actually), and falling back into the grave... eh, bed I mean, like a zombie.

My game project started in school times. And now, ten years later, I still enjoy to improve stuff. It's now like 5 games in one big RPG world. It got ridiculously complex. Completly out of control. It's not even I have control over my own game. This cancerous beast got organic and I'm just the medium, that transports the message (and builds all that nonsense, that's required for a game to work, graphics, text boxes, maps, battle system, all the programming code). One month of work goes into a tiny little scene, that the player runs by in a minute! Can you believe that?! Can you believe, how that scales? If you don't want to go completly crazy by that thought, either keep your scale low, try to embrace the imperfect (and become capable of leaving things as they are), don't do an RPG that tells a story, or don't start at all.

That's my advice. Aaah, and if you want to start with game making, maybe try and build something with the programming language "Scratch" (wasn't there a thread about Scratch projects here on the message board?). It's good for logical thinking and has no impeeding dots, commas and brackets to remember.

[WingsOfImagination]

Don't start with your own game. It will entangle you like a web spider and make you crazy. You still can decide! An ordinary life is still open for you!

I'm doomed on the other hand. Addicted to programming... typing commands and logical links will never me leave me, until my eyes stop opening. When I was younger, it even hit me at night, like a flash. Climbed from the bed like a zombie, switching on the machine, the monitor glow summoning me to type nonsense into the keyboard (proper code actually), and falling back into the grave... eh, bed I mean, like a zombie.

My game project started in school times. And now, ten years later, I still enjoy to improve stuff. It's now like 5 games in one big RPG world. It got ridiculously complex. Completly out of control. It's not even I have control over my own game. This cancerous beast got organic and I'm just the medium, that transports the message (and builds all that nonsense, that's required for a game to work, graphics, text boxes, maps, battle system, all the programming code). One month of work goes into a tiny little scene, that the player runs by in a minute! Can you believe that?! Can you believe, how that scales? If you don't want to go completly crazy by that thought, either keep your scale low, try to embrace the imperfect (and become capable of leaving things as they are), don't do an RPG that tells a story, or don't start at all.

That's my advice. Aaah, and if you want to start with game making, maybe try and build something with the programming language "Scratch" (wasn't there a thread about Scratch projects here on the message board?). It's good for logical thinking and has no impeeding dots, commas and brackets to remember.

One advice about game development which I remember reading about somewhere around the web - You don't have to completely give up your cool ideas or ambitious gameplay features, you can do just a little this time around, and save the rest for your next games! Don't think about your current project as the one to end it all.

[Stonehead]

I used to make little games on my family pc when I was in highschool.

I never gave up the hobby and eventually, after about 4 years of development in my free time, I put something out on Steam.

The game development aspect was really fun, and I don't regret any of the time I spent developing the game, or drawing the art, or making music. If you have higher aspirations about your project though, you really need to be good at the self-promoting, social media shilling game. I wasn't, so only a few dozen people ended up playing it. Part of that was that it was a one-man passion project with very obvious programmer art, I can't pretend I made some masterpiece that the masses just don't understand. The reality of the situation though is that making a good game is not the only skill you need in order to release a game.

I really enjoyed making a game, but promoting it was pretty stressful, and I'm not sure it was worth the effort. The problem is though, making something that you know is never going to be played just feels pointless.

[Gans]

@Stonehead: You could put your game onto one of these niche game sites. Glorioustrainwrecks (https://www.glorioustrainwrecks.com/) comes to my mind, as a site for "trashy" games.
A good German site for home-made games would be Pewn (https://pewn.de/).

Because then you will actually never know, how many people will find and download your game. So then you can put that worry away, as the big void may respond... or probably not.

The total freedom of doing whatever you want is the best about being a 1-man-show. And especially if you don't have to please an audience, you can do whatever your crazy imagination can think of!

@WingsOfImagination: You're somewhat right, but if you have all the graphics and characters ready, I must say that it's tempting to use them on side-projects. Also with enough determination, a big project can be realised too with limited ressources, it just needs a lot of time.