Are people in denial about how hard it is to be a game dev?

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Assuming you intend to be a solo dev that is. It seems to me that a ton of devs (many of whom are young, as in younger than 25) don’t seem to have a good understanding of the massively challenges and skills required to be a solo game dev. You have yo learn how to be a coder, an artist, a 3D modeler, a level designer, a writer, an audio designer…the list just goes on and on and on…

I don’t want to destroy anybody’s dreams but I can’t help but feel a lot of solo devs are somewhat delusional in regards to how realistic their ambitions are. Realistically speaking most devs won’t be able to create complex games all on their own unless they are very talented and have tons of time, and will probably have to work in a team instead. And even if you do have all those skills, getting good at all of them could easily take 8-12 years so if you are under 30 then there is a strong chance that you aren’t even ready to start making the games yet anyway…

Do you think devs are a bit deluded when it comes to the harsh reality of being a game dev?

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We need a time sensitive multi-language Unity search engine: Google is not enough, wastes my time
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because there is always exceptions: flappy bird and crossy roads didnt need half the skill you need for an rpg game

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My take on it is that the difficulty is related to the task.

I’m pretty sure I could easily make a box cart. I’m not sure I’d ever finish a real car.

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I know I have. This delusion, however, has kept me going while learning by doing all these years. It might even be a good thing - otherwise a lot of people may never start making games in the first place.

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I did a full civ III conversion mod over a decade ago. I did 90% of the work. Took three years. I thought that was hard. This is hard.
But life without struggle is boring. And life without the rewards of struggle, is pointless.

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Do you think guitarists are a bit deluded when it comes to the harsh reality of being a rock star?

Being at the top of your craft and/or making money from creative work is always hard, because it’s a competitive space.

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Well, I don’t know exactly who you are talking about. I mean, at the basic level I think there are people who have done game development who know what it means, and then there are people who haven’t done it yet, or haven’t really tried. Maybe a disproportionate number of the latter are on the forums? :wink:

I definitely think that if you are taking the tried and true route to content production (modelling and texturing all the assets individually), there tends to be a lot of underestimation of time and effort expenditure to fill out a game world. If each asset takes on average six hours to make, and you need to make hundreds or thousands, that an insane amount of work - really that amounts to solid years of one’s life. And more can be added as a result of changes to the design throughout development.

It would be great if procedural generation could simply create everything instantly. But you don’t even have to get there to reap the benefits of a good workflow. For example if you use a master material in Substance Designer for all of your assets of the same style, where all you do is plug in the baked maps, you can get a very solid result for a lot of assets for almost the cost of texturing just one.

If you create kitbashing sets, or even better really get to know how to design a modular set of building blocks, you can shave tons of time off production (though maybe not on your first game).

If you add editor tools (inside your favourite 3D modelling program and the Unity editor itself) that can help you cut time down a lot more, depending on how much of your game you can parametrize for a semi-procedural or procedural toolset.

I guess my point is that yes, probably there are a lot of people in denial about how long it takes to make a game, but those who consider themselves enlightened about how long it really does take are probably just as wrong. Especially if one is a solo developer, there is no room for ignorance about workflow considerations and development practices if one would like to finish the game in a reasonable amount of time without undue suffering.

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From my point of view, game dev is specially difficult, if average dev Joe, does approach game dev matter with similar thoughts as OP describes (no pun intended). What I mean is, that probably most of us, if not all, had, or have some big aspiration for big game dev at some point in our life. We do learn over the time, that most of us need cut these aspiration down to bear fraction, to be able to achieve actually something.

So my point is, most of us as startup dev, probably fails, at least at begging, taking scope too big. See for example, lets take these initial requirements, derived by aspirations / thoughts:

For many games, you can probably cut these requirement, to very handful, starting small.

But that is often our dev issue. We want to start big. Leading us to imminent failure, because of lack of intermediate skills and resources. Here, probably not realizing, how much time it requires, to gain required skills. Not to mention, to develop required content itself, on top.

This really can be scoped down, to make small games or even prototypes, with fraction of time. This way any dev can drive their further motivations, by experiencing sense of progress. Hence getting step closer to desired goal.

Unfortunately, many of us, don’t have comfort of having much time to develop what we dream about. And even, if some of us have, not everyone has much of commitment and self propelling motivation to do, what we would like to be done.

It is like being running own business, where not everyone has predispositions, to be own boss. But thing is, we don’t know it, until we don’t try. And even fail, try again and try again. And maybe, we eventually find this something, which will leads us to desired success. Sometimes we just need be at the right time …

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Divide and conquer. And be prepared for putting in some serious time.

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yup

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Well, I’ve got hobby making almost A-title FP Shooter. Which development already lasts more than a year, and I haven’t abandoned it yet. Which I may not ever finish solo, but it’s fun to do.

Way more fun that making complete brainless games for mobile that I do at the day job.

So here’s that.

And yeah, shit I know it is hard, no denying that.

Each dev has their own reason to do what they like. Like making crappy outsource games for survival and living. And making impossible dream projects because it’s how you thrive as a dev.

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You have a WIP page? Always fun looking at devs that make quality stuff

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I’d rather finish that vertical slice first before posting anything. (That would be a free demo to play)
I’ll surely post some info in the future, but it’s way far from that.

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Dont forget to start devlogging, its a solid way of building a community

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I don’t think gamedev is necessarily “hard”, per se. But I’d say that releasing a polished, professional-quality game, especially for commercial release, is hard. The beginners that want to make a shipping product will understand what that last “90%” of work means, because a lot of the tools, supporting code, and time and effort to getting the software as bulletproof as possible can easily take up far more time than the game itself. And all of that stuff is not glamorous at all, but necessary if your next plate of food depends on it.

EDIT:
Gamedev is definitely time-consuming. I’d go with that.

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Game dev is super easy. All you have to do is buy this:

Change the the title screen and then build for windows.

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Anything worth doing is usually difficult.

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Having enough sleep is usually easy. Keyword - usually.

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Well said. Only if my sleep was so easy, as typing this line :slight_smile:

Of course it (again) depends. But lets say, some part requires from you so much thinkering. In fact so much, that can not get head round. Is like asking some sportsman (as example), to derive complex algorithm, chances are, they will never will be accomplish it. Or with huge amount of study and effort. Which leads to topic header word (hard). This is more than just a time. But if you familiar with a subject, asking sportsman to run marathon, that then become feasible.

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I get what you’re saying, but at that point, is it the complex algorithm (i.e. mathematics, computer science) the hard part or game development?