

Ask HN: Do I really want to make a game? (or any side project?) - fr0styMatt2

I know the question title sounds weird, but I&#x27;m looking for other developers that might have been in a similar position.<p>I love games, I love games technology and I have these vague ideas for games I want to have made.  Yet I never seem to actually start making one.<p>Even though I think I really want to.  But do I?<p>Having an interesting talk with a friend who pointed out that maybe I really don&#x27;t want to make something, maybe it&#x27;s just the idea of making something that appeals more than actually doing it.  That if I really did have a burning passion, I would have started by now.  I don&#x27;t know.<p>I seem to be at a kind of roadblock.  Every idea seems interesting enough to pursue, yet nothing seems good enough - &quot;there are already games like that out there&quot;, &quot;it&#x27;s not unique enough&quot;, etc.  I just end up procrastinating, or sort of looking to start a million different things because everything is so appealing, but end up doing nothing.<p>I guess this is applicable to more than just games.  I&#x27;d love to hear some stories about how people got through this, no matter what the outcome (even if it is &quot;I tried and decided it isn&#x27;t what I wanted to do after all&quot;).
======
techjuice
Pick three project and complete each one from start to finish, then ask
yourself if you still want to create games. This can be creating a clone of
games to see if you can actually do it since you do need to start somewhere. I
would recommend creating a clone for learning purposes ( in order ) of Flappy
Bird, Super Mario (NES) first level, and Mr Jump Levels 1 to 3. Even at a slow
pace each one should take no longer than 30 days each if you dedicated a few
hours every day to it.

If you can successfully replicate these three games (doesn't have to be
perfect) this should give inspiration or more knowledge to accurately judge
and answer the question since you will have your own practical experience and
know what it takes to accomplish the projects.

~~~
thenomad
Great point.

The question is, really, whether you enjoy the actual process of making the
game. And the best way to figure that out is to make a game.

------
partisan
I spent a good part of my 20's learning about video game development because I
always wanted to write a game. Sadly, the only working thing I produced in all
of that time was a UI system and a Tetris clone.

I am in my 30's now and am grateful for having put the time in because I was
able to apply many of those lessons to business software, which is how I make
my living. That said, I still considering creating a puzzle game using Nim as
a learning exercise and to make sure I "still got it".

I recommend doing something like a Tetris clone because it has challenges, but
is within the realm of the attainable even for someone with a short attention
span such as myself.

------
krapp
Everybody wants to be Notch, but nobody wants to write code for years on end.

If you actually have the free time, and the ability, to pursue at least one of
your ideas then I think the only way you can answer this question is to force
yourself to see one through to the end. I'm kind of the same way - tons of old
Game Maker projects that got abandoned because I wasn't capable of executing
on the ideas I had, things got too complex or I just stopped being interested
in them once I solved what I thought were the interesting problems.

Since i'm taking programming classes now, I've decided to finish one
ridiculously simple game (Space Invaders) just to earn the basic mechanics of
2d game design, in C++. Of course now you have Game Maker, Unity, Unreal and
various other frameworks to choose from, but my personal interests are a bit
lower level. I started in January and haven't finished yet. Just the basics
are turning out to be much more complicated than I would have anticipated, and
I haven't even bothered with art, sound, or gameplay that's anything beyond
the rudamentary. I spent weeks building (from scratch twice) a basic
entity/component system to work with SDL, not because I had to, or because
that was the most efficient way to build the product, or even because there
weren't existing libraries for that, but because that's the problem I was
interested in solving. So something that would probably be a weekend hack for
a better programmer is turning out to take the better part of a year, because
I'm more into the journey right now than the destination.

Having 'vague ideas' doesn't really give you a good sense of the scope of what
those ideas might actually represent. I would second the other comments here
suggesting you find a simple game and try to clone it, but I would also decide
whether what you're interested in is the _coding_ of games, or the authoring
of games. In other words, would you feel more satisfied writing C and C++
code, or working through a framework like Unity or Game Maker? Because the
latter would probably be faster for just prototyping or getting a feel for an
idea, and almost certainly better for making salable games if you're not
already a professional low-level game programmer. But personally, I think the
former is more fun.

Pick a language, pick a framework, pick a game, accept that the results won't
be perfect, and just go for it. That's the only way you'll discover what your
passion actually is, or isn't. If you can't commit to that then, yeah, you're
probably not going to commit to something real. Which is fine. Plenty of
people want to be writers too, who never write. People like that tend to spend
a lot of time taking writing classes or hanging out on writing forums and in
writing groups, because 'being' for them is more interesting (and easier) than
'doing'. It's not an uncommon phenomeneon.

~~~
fr0styMatt2
I think you're right. I've been thinking lots about what exactly it is that
I'm averse to doing.

The coding part - yep that's fine - I've worked with game engines before, I'm
familiar with Unity and have dabbled in UDK. If someone else gives me
something to implement ("go make this character walk") I know where to start
and I can get right into it. When it's someone else's game and things are
plotted out, it's much easier.

I love working with the technology, I love working with artists. I feel that
the scope of challenge in game programming is unmatched. I love how it
requires knowledge from so many different fields, from physics to
storytelling.

Yet when I'm doing it from scratch, when I have to come up with a game from
nothing, that's when I get stuck circling around nothing. Yours and the other
comments are right though - I just need to pick something and stick with it.
Maybe I'm just putting too much emphasis on trying to have a crystal-clear
vision before I start; maybe I should trust the creative process more.

Maybe I'm a fine game programmer, but just not a game designer. Which saddens
me in a little way - I want to be independent. If I can't come up with a game
on my own, like the Notches of the world, does that mean I'll always be stuck
working for someone else? Does that mean I'll never be successful?

Hmmmm....

These are the kinds of things I'm thinking.

~~~
krapp
>Maybe I'm a fine game programmer, but just not a game designer.

Maybe. But you sound like you're in an environment where you can learn how to
develop those skills.

