And where's the motivation?

[Yue]

Reading a book, on how to make idies games, mentions that the biggest failure is that motivation fades, and it is due to several factors.

A very big project: At this time most people come from playing AAA games, this implies that the project covers a lot and instead of creating things this is in a learning process so the project ends up stopped, in the garbage. 

Then it says that people who have grown up with games from the 50's, 60's, have greater ease in creating a game, and that's where I get to understand why I'm not passionate about 2D games. I didn't grow up at that time.

So he says, make a very small game, simple, unless you have enough money to invest, not only in powerful engine, but in human talent.

This is where I get stuck, I've been through a great learning process, but there's always something new to learn, the problem is that this has no end, so doing something simple is the key.

Do you have any suggestions, they are welcome. 

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator

[Rick]

Motivation usually fades when you have to start doing to "boring" stuff (whatever is boring to you). I found it also faded when you had to really nail down some mechanic that wasn't well defined. I often felt like if I made the wrong choice it would ruin the game so you make no choice at all, which doesn't even give the chance for the game to be ruined because it never gets made.

I think the fear with making simple games is that even a simple game will have aspects that are difficult and you put all that effort into a game that in the end isn't that fun. There used to be a good and simple game here like Furious Frank or something. It was well done and simple. When you played it you were like oh cool...for about 5 mins. Then you never played it again. That person I'm sure did put a fair amount of effort into but the question is what did they get in return?

A game like that Furious Frank is something I've thought about creating again. I tried to recreate something like that before Pissed off Pete, but scope creep kept coming into play because I knew Furious Frank was fairly boring after a very short amount and though, why make a boring game? If I only added this and this and this it'll be fun, but then you never finish it because all of those things were harder to do and added time and weren't really fleshed out well.

[cassius]

IAs a hobbyist I find motivation from solving a gameplay problem and getting it right. This encourages me to go on.I have always planned to have a test project where I can experiment,. One thing I would like to do is have an oildrum that explodes and bursts into flame. I think I know how to do it but so far I have been too lazy to try.

[aiaf]

When i loose motivation i start to do smaller tasks or bug fixes, after some time looking back i can see i made progress even by doing those little things.Try see if it works for you.

Other thing is switching to some other small project or different part of game for some time or really take a few weeks break from it.

 

I have a game im working on for over 2 years now, as i do this in my free time i feel no pressure to finish this game.

It's something unique that i crafted.

But I know it will be done at some point.

 

 

[gamecreator]

Motivation is definitely helped by choosing the right size project.  I've found that during weekend competitions I'm really motivated because I get to work with the beginning, middle and end of a project, even if it's ridiculously small.  1- or 2-month projects are similar.  Seeing the end of a project clearly in the final hours or days is very rewarding.  I guess I'm also a bit more motivated by pressure, which is not a good thing for long-term projects.

7 hours ago, Rick said:

fairly boring after a very short amount and though, why make a boring game? If I only added this and this and this it'll be fun, but then you never finish it because all of those things were harder to do and added time and weren't really fleshed out well

This was the main incentive for starting up with creating dungeon room generators (but Leadwerks navmesh generation was bugged so that had to end) and now, as I've reduced my project scope further, generating random hills a la Worms.  I'm heavily inspired in this by games like Spelunky (which creates new rooms every time you play) and Binding of Isaac (new dungeons).  By their nature they introduce replayability and so extend the life of the game.  Of course, this model doesn't fit many game styles so you have to decide how important it is to you.

[GorzenDev]

whenevver i loose my motivation i actually force myself to do at least 4 hours of coding each week.
which in turn motivates me because i progress. (even if its just small progress)
this brings me in a vicious circle that keeps me going.
 

[Yue]

Thank you all for your comments, I've chosen to blog the things I've learned with Leadwerks.  I thought to find more people interested in developing video games that speak my native language.

:)

http://www.iris3dgames.ga/materiales-en-leadwerks/

 

 

[Josh]

I think it is difficult to keep going if you don't have a design document. The process of committing your ideas to paper forces you to make decisions. Without that, I feel like I am just wandering around aimlessly.

[Yue]

5 minutes ago, Josh said:

I think it is difficult to keep going if you don't have a design document. The process of committing your ideas to paper forces you to make decisions. Without that, I feel like I am just wandering around aimlessly.

You are absolutely right, they are very varied factors in that this gets stuck, however I think I need more organization, invest some money in this if I want to do something really fun, like activate my steam account, but the main point that is, lack of organization, precisely the book I'm reading talks about it, says that every game starts in the mind but passes to a paper and tells the story of which Pacman invented, his game wrote it on a napkin. 

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator

[catch22]

Scope and the mundane are probably the biggest killers.  IE: don't set out to make an MMO for your first game.

Do some jams first, or weekend warrior projects.  An artist once told me to put down a project and move onto another one when you get too close to it.  Worrying about the little details to the point you don't make progress for a few days.  Just switch to another part of it, or something different.  If you stop making headway and progress, motivation plummets.

Always move forward, if something is blocking you, work on something else that gives progress to re-ignite your motivation.  When you go back to the thing blocking you earlier, you will probably push right through it.