So for my first game I tried making a FPS multiplayer game. I learned alot from it, but the amount of work that had to be done was huge. Probably bigger than battlefield 4 itself. I wanted to have infantry, vehicles, airplanes,destruction,next gen graphics, and 200 players in a match, because, that would be awesome…
Here is a couple videos of the game I am building. Called Age of Steam.
But I’m going to build a much smaller game out of it that is purely land vehicles. So no infantry, airplanes, destruction, or tons of players (but hopefully 64 in a match). If all goes well, I would like to use the code and models I developed for this one to go into the bigger game.
Meanwhile I started working on a even smaller game called logging empire. I would like to get it finished and released by January. Witch will become the first game I actually published. You can read about it and find a webplayer on this thread. http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/203843-Logging-Empire-resource-gathering-RTS
So am I on the right track? I heard in order to be successful in indie games you have to build very rapid small games with 2 month development cycles and released immediately. But I would really like to build bigger and better games someday and not have to get stuck making smaller games.
Edit: In answer to your question at the end of the OP, yes you can definitely make bigger games. You shouldn’t get stuck making small games forever. The purpose of making a bunch of small games is to rapidly learn. In a 12 week project, if you make a clanger of a mistake that effects your production for the rest of the project you only have to put up with it for a max of 12 weeks. Then you know to do that bit differently and a whole class of mistakes to avoid in the future, and you’ve gained something in 12 weeks that may have cost you way more than 12 weeks in a larger project, plus you’ve completed another game on the way.
Do a bunch of small projects to get started so that you can do that kind of learning. Once you’ve got a few under your belt you’re much better equipped to take on a larger project. You’re building on prior experience rather than stumbling around as a first timer.
Listen to the Penguin. He is steering you right. Hit your Jan target by building the SMALLEST POSSIBLE THING. Finish it, release it, repeat. Do that a few times and then go bigger if you want.
Sage advice from the above replies. Also, in the grand scheme, work on small games that can help you perfect particular game mechanics that can be folded into a larger project. If you can make a limited but FUN vehicle combat game, add FUN vehicle combat elements to your BIG project. OOP wins every time. Build and reuse!
SMALLEST THING POSSIBLE should always be the guiding star for your first project. Do that and then iteratively go bigger, meaning make something 125% larger than the smallest thing possible and not back into your FPS. Learn to walk before you run(off a cliff)
Thanks for the replies. I know people say to start small and go bigger eventually. But really, is it possible to make a game as big as battlefield? Alot of people on here tell guys who are making mmorpg’s to start smaller, but they will have to face the fact that it will never be possible to build a mmorpg anyway.
The only thing that can contradict this is it’s getting easier to make games then it was before. Because now there is alot of premade game engines, assets, and scripts you can buy to use in your game. However, its debatable whether this alone could help one person build a gigantic game.
there’s a game company at a nearby city where I live with about 20-30 people working there. And they are building games much smaller then what I’m building. I’m wondering if this is because of product efficiency or lack of manpower.
I imagine the smaller games they are working on are highly polished. I think this is the lesson you learn trying to release a small project first, not to underestimate how much work goes into making it play and look good as a final product. At least that’s what I learned, it changed my whole perspective and desire as to the types of games I now want to work on. Very different from what I set out to do originally.
I agree and make sure to have a way of saving your scripts externally. It sucks having to rewrite scripts that you’ve done. I personally need better source control.
Also, I found a good way to help with the dev process: Find a demographic. I started making game for my daughter, and not only am I motivated, I already outputted something on my droid device. And I still plan on adding more features to get her to play. (She’s only 5 months right now. )
You should do the Ludum dare game jam in december.
It’s a great way to train. + you have the unity asset store so you dont have to develop your own fps system. You can just buy something like UFPS.
I think you should start drawing how to the game should be and try to modell the drawings in a 3d modelling program like maya or 3ds max.
And Roger you cant just jump into game dev and think that you’re going to be succesfull after your first game.
You need experience to make great games. So just make small ones until you have enough experience to make bigger ones. And the good thing is that you can re-use assets from the smaller games.
Edit:
I see that you’ve already bought the ufps asset.
I completely agree, but I think I’m beyond building super simple games like pong. I would like to build games with some weight to them. The logging game I’m building now could be considered a medium. I believe in order to learn the full aspect of game development, you need to build a game that is simple, but not so much that its missing aspects found in most games.
You say you’ve changed your desire as what type of games you want to build, but you’ve probably just found out making the game you wanted to build is unrealistic and impossible to do. Which is probably what we all stumble upon.
I’m going to be sincer with you, when I read that you wanted a game as big as battlefield 4 , and that it would be awsome, etc… I really thought that you were never going to achive it. After watching your videos, I started thinking that you do have a good chance, the graphics look good, the gameplay looks rich, why not?
Personally I think starting small only sticks to people that are new, like me for example. I can create games, but my projects are not that much of a big deal, and that’s why I’m going after every detail I can learn, but you on the other hand, seem to have a bigger experience. Have you worked as a programmer before? I would say, you should publish your new small game, the wood logging one, and when you finish and publish it, hopefully after gathering a few good bucks, I would re-take the old battlefield-like game.
I’m pretty sure you can achive it, but the one who has to believe in you, isn’t me, it’s only you !
Know what it takes to build AAA games? A triple-A team. Which means LOTS of resources. And the industry is littered with the corpses of dead Indie’s who thought otherwise, especially those of just 1 or 2 part-time developers. My own experiences matches what I’ve read: make short projects, 3 months, maybe 6 months. More than that is buying a lottery ticket and expecting to win.
Rafael : Thanks for the kind words! I appreciate them.
Well, the guys at I-Novae studios are way beyond 6 months. In fact, they’ve been working on their game for about 8 years! Check it out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7eREddMjt4
I think they are still working on the game engine for the game since I’ve mostly seen technical videos and presentations of the technology they are developing. So I dont think they’ve really gotten to the actual game yet.
They must be expecting a huge payout once their game is complete.
8 years? Still working on tech? Expecting a huge payout some day? Sounds like a lottery-ticket strategy to me. At 4-6 months per product, they’d have 16+ products on the market now, with the experience and skills to match. Life needs a ‘Reroll’ option.
I’m going to play devil’s advocate here and say just go for it, stupendously large with the best graphics you can muster and the best physics you can put together… Set yourself a timescale and just go all out, it doesn’t matter if you fail… It doesn’t matter if you scrap it and start again, play with different engines. Get a feel for what dev’s do from every part of the scale, cinematic’s, using blender / max / photoshop / flash to make your own models, animations, mocap, Scalform UI’s, creating advanced shaders, particle physics etc.
Why? Because the insight is invaluable and, you learn strength’s and weaknesses to the tools you have at your disposal, no matter what engine you use there are strength’s and severe weaknesses. You wouldn’t take a butter knife to cut down a tree would you? It’s the right tool for the right job and knowing how to get the best out of them is the key to a happy future IMO. How do you know what’s going to be too much without experiencing it first hand?
All in all the first part of the journey is learning, then what you do from then on is in your hands. If you push your limits from the start then you excel more than playing it safe and never touching the tech that’s available.
It really comes down to how serious someone is about this? There’s already a lot of talented competition out there, especially in the area your exploring. Taking it to the next level can either get you a decent job or at bare minimum stand out from the crowd.
Do set yourself a timescale (Maybe six months / a year?) and I’d recommend not trying to make a AAA game right from the word go, there’s so much to learn and do that it’s almost impossible. All being said, you might be lucky and see it through after your evaluation period.
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