/agdg/ - Amateur Game Development General

>Lets talk about going full solo in game development. Why do you think it's good? Why do you think it's bad?

It's retarded. You then have to learn every single aspect of game design by yourself. Dividing work amongst a group of people is much more productive, and will get shit done much faster. Just because there's more than one person working on a game, doesn't mean that they don't enjoy making it.

The reason I'm doing everything on my own is because I'm autistic and don't work well with others. And because I have no marketable traits.

>>25698

>You then have to learn every single aspect of game design by yourself

That's the beauty of it. You learn and you create by yourself for yourself: IF that's the case.

>Dividing work amongst a group of people is much more productive, and will get shit done much faster.

Such games aren't personal. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trashing grouping, I'm just saying that if you create games because of your personal reasons then it's better to do everything yourself.

>Just because there's more than one person working on a game, doesn't mean that they don't enjoy making it.

Of course, teamwork is great, you also get to be with people similar to yourself.

>I'm autistic

Aren't we all autistic here?

True art is more than a walking simulator, usually with a social element like Banksy's. Games can be interesting but they haven't become more interesting than people yet. Solo dev is hell, I realize I could be doing better things but somehow I feel it has worth, to beat the technical challenges alone. I'm great at it.

Interactive is great in theory, Chris Crawford's dragon speech was good. Also his lecture on creativity and game design. He says games could be simulating human interaction. Interesting stuff. But the humanity level stuff, the political stuff, is generally far more important. So not many people play games, it's a heavily commercialized, tiny niche. You had games like Grandia with a sense of potter esque wanderlust and sense of adventure, wonder.. I just preordered a shitty cover shooter, because it promised fun at an easy reach. Creativity is hard, hence why people would rather sigh and pay up or pirate some trashy thing yet again. You know, it's the easier route, it gives you a bit of breathing room.

I tried to make my labour of love, it's so hard. The motivation fizzles out. Well this time I'm back on the horse again, took me just 2 weeks to create a basic engine. Trying to experiment with all kinds of ideas this time, so I don't burn out on the monolithic rpg that stresses me out.

A game definitely has the potential to be the next level of art. But I would say no game so far has come remotely close to being a real work.

The problem is the economy surrounding gaming. Gaming exists as a thing because it distracts millions of retards from all the the glaring problems with their pointless lives. To occupy the bottom of the bottom and as many above them as possible. It's inherently mired in desperation and delusion.

What is art supposed to be? A definite answer is that it is meant to be a symbol that has an original meaning; a device to convey original thought.

What do we have in even the best games? Very, very little original thought. Rehash remixed. Video game writing is universally pure shit. Sometimes some demographic-targeted/formulated story comes along and develops a cult and people outside the cult in turn think that the object of the cult is good some how. But it's not. It's just a bunch of people with nothing better to do worshiping the only thing in their lives that doesn't punish them for their personality/appearance/whatever, and then a bunch of brainless pieces of shit consuming what the media commands them to.

Anyway.

If a person really trained, they could both outperform a team of developers and maintain integrity.

I think going full solo is the only option for integrity besides finding partner(s) who share your vision.

What if a really compatible team really trained?

They could make something really powerful.

No matter what you're making some compromises to build on some one else's work. Language, software, circuit design, etc.

But that's not really a big deal.

But anyway I think for the computer simulacrum to realize its potential as art it will have to be through the connected consciousness of a team. But there will need to be individuals first who can lead the way and share their experience with the next generation, even if they are hundreds of years apart.

Interaction.. look, Until Dawn is a perfect example of how true interactivity from a game is so impossible. The game cannot learn anything about the player, and can't make any detailed conclusions.. ergo.. there is nothing to go on that could drive AI enemies. "Interactive" has always been a marketers' legal lie, probably always will be. AI is hard to develop, especially in the desperate modern economy. Grand Leap creativity just doesn't flourish in corporate profit-counting environments, you need free time and isolation to get creative.

Yeah, I agree about essentially getting a strong grip over the medium, I've been trying it for a while now. Other people are far too slow with this though. The tools we have are so primitive.

>>25708

i hope you realize that the primary reason for this form of economy is to destroy ("grand leap") creativity. It's too hard to compete against. People come up with great ideas all the time. The people in power would not stay in power if there was true competition.

You think on that. You know it's true.

Yeah, I know. But I think the spectacle is inherently worthless with it being a tool of distraction first and self empowerment last. The right people are too rare, I used to think technology alone would springboard amazing things by itself.

In the end you're not making a game by yourself for yourself, you're making a game by yourself for other people, and you expect to be positively judged on that basis. Going solo is an alluring copout, dealing with the fear of someone disagreeing with your "vision" even before the work is done. Another thing is that if you're working solo, you can avoid the stress of comittment. I can completely relate to that, but it's very counter-productive since the range of skills, required by gamedev, is waaay to big, and motivation may just "fizzle out", like other anon said, since you may be progressing not fast enough.

As for interactivity, no, I think it's bullshit. Interactivity has little worth on it's own and you can make any other form of art "interactive". Games are no higher nor lower than visual arts, writing or music.

>>25712

interactivity comes from there being conditional outcomes. Therefore its clear games are interactive.

>>25697

>Why do you think it's good

because im an asperger who cant communicate with other people.

and because i make the games primarily for myself, so i need to be in charge to make it turn out the way i want.

>Why do you think it's bad?

Cause i have to do all assets myself, and i cant into music. Also if im busy irl, development slows to a crawl cause noone else is working on the game.

>>25712

>In the end you're not making a game by yourself for yourself

i totally do. i make (fan)game because there isnt one that has the things i want and to improve my self worth (it's dangerously low). i'll release it to the public to use strangers as bug testers.

>>25713

I think you missed the point anon.

>>25717

Which art besides of games can take input and give different output depending on the input?

That's interaction. Things are happening between you and the game itself.

>>25708

What the hell? So you basically want the computer to have a brain so you can play with it like with another human being. You need to step down son, whenever you press a key on the keyboard you're interacting with the computer.

I think if you pull something off, it's a nice thing to have on your portfolio.

But fuck no I wouldn't do it entirely myself.

I would still commission someone to work on some of the assets, especially music.

There's simply too many people who are good at what they do, for me to validate doing every aspect on my own.

Here's what I think is good to try and make on your own though.

A playable prototype. If you can get your initial idea bundled into something that people can play, I think it's after that stage that you should consider having more than a 1 person team.

Especially if there's core features you still need to add.

What comes to mind here is Soldat.

That was a one person team originally, and then when they wanted the game to scale better for large amounts of players, and with decent anti-cheat, the developer expanded his team size.

The initial concept he made on his own was spot-on though, it was the perfect prototype to lift the game off of the ground.

>>25699

>Such games aren't personal.

But where do you draw the line? I am fairly certain you will call me a retard for suggesting to make your own engine, but hey, your beloved Unity was made by people other than yourself.

What's the difference between making a 3D model yourself and hiring someone else to make a model based on your drawings and sketches? They will surely end up very similarly in case you knew how to model, and in case you didn't and still wanted to make it yourself to make it more "personal", chances are it just looks uglier and nothing like you imagined. So what's more personal, your imagination or your skill?

To put one more counterexample, one of the Hotline Miami devs was primarily a musician, yet he didn't shoehorn his music into the game because he knew his style would clash with the creative intention of the game. They essentially outsourced it to many other artists, and what's better is that they didn't even commission them: they were already made, the devs just knew how to pick the best songs for each level, the songs that were more similar to everything they had in mind, and the result was great.

Although I must agree that role overlapping may end up with both developers eventually having to make compromises to appease to each other (which isn't necessarily bad; in fact, it could be good), having a complementary team based on people that know exactly what they are good at and what not will probably end up producing something much more similar to what the game designer had in mind than what the game designer could actually do if it were to go solo.

I can't work with people, I'm just too smart or they're too dumb. if it's not 100% my vision I will lose all passion for the project.

I made this game solo, but its not the most mind blowing thing ever.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ErnestGames.FallingLeaf&hl=en

I simply dropped everything that requires lot of work but programming.

For example i usually use space settings where almost everything is a sphere.

This time around I went for a galaxy scale game where the smaller selectable unit is a sector of 100 planets. So everything is just a dot.

>>25737

Okay, I've been on both sides.

The benefits of team projects:

- gets 'viral' quicker, since instead of just you, you have multiple people shilling simultaneously.

- you learn to not be perfectionist, since you just accept each team member's contribution, and assuming it doesn't look evidently half-assed, assume that's already a good enough quality for the project

- you finish quicker

The downsides of team projects:

- if the project falls apart, it's done. The only person who legitimately has the 'copyright' to continue would be the project leader IF he put his own money up front. Best forget about it and all the wasted time.

- the project quickly evolves into something which may not feel like your project anymore.

I myself prefer solo now:

- no deadlines, I work at my own pace

- I just troll around for creative commons 0 or royalty free stuff and stockpile them, and easily add them to my projects later on. It's the same as custom commissioning but far cheaper. Even better since the end result is already nice, compared to the directions you still have to instruct to the freelancer who may or may not screw up.

- No need to worry about lost projects unless I failed to back up. Since they're all my projects, I can restart them anytime.

The downsides of course

- time

- no one but you shilling

I wouldn't even mention lack of quality in solo projects, because as mentioned, plenty of CC0 stuff are quality assets now, and if you put them together competently you will feel like a pro.

>Would you agree that games are the highest form of art?

I would say video games have the potential to deliver an incredibly rich experience to an audience by playing on the strengths of its components.

>Text can be used when thinking slowly or thoroughly is needed.

>Sound can set moods/feelings, as well as support interaction or visualization.

>Interaction can either explain dynamics of systems wordlessly, or give the audience a sense of investment through agency.

>Visualizations on their own can give context to abstract concepts, or otherwise immerse someone in a game world.

Unfortunately art often suffers two pitfalls in my eyes. The first is the consumer-producer relationship wherein artists see art as a means to get the audience's cash. The second is the thin veneer of pseudo-intellectual rhetoric(asking a question and never answering it, making an assertion and never supporting it, challenging a position without any argument) that has whitewashed most culture throughout history.

>>25758

>no deadlines

Working at your own pace is great, especially when you have a full time job or other stuff that may be more important, but having no deadlines means that work on unfeasible features can drag on and on while project with deadlines would actually ship, just without those features.

>>25697

Solo is nice because you don't have to worry about coordinating with everyone else (huge save for programming), you don't have to worry about key members flaking out or having a guilty conscience if you flake, being able to pause and pick up where you left off, and having full creative control.

You do get less input though, and it's harder to develop concepts when you don't have anyone else to bounec ideas off of. Also, it's obviously less efficient to have to learn multiple fields instead of specializing in one. Though there's a lot of advantage in having some understanding of other fields when you're working in a team (and having some appreciation for the effort they take).

>Would you agree that games are the highest form of art? They combine all other arts and add something that neither one has: interaction.You can't experience a game without interacting with it.

I wouldn't really rank art, because the only real measure of it is relevance to people (which is why no one gives a shit about abstract blobs or vagina sculptures or whatever). I will say that games are the only art form that really involves people, though. In all others you're always an external observer, judging, thinking yourself objective.

To be honest, I was kind of amazed when playing Sengoku Rance at how much my opinion of characters (and particularly sympathy towards them) shifted depending on whether they were on my side or not (particularly Kenshin, that fucking interloper). I don't think any movie has ever made me question my values when weighing characters who are useful vs. characters who are likeable (and how much those perceptions influence each other), something that games can do well, since you're in them instead of outside looking in.

The thing about going solo for me is that I can't do it any other way. I'm a storyteller, a perfectionist and an autist, and those three facts mean that I have beautiful (or at least what I consider beautiful) stories in my head that I need to share with the world because it is my way of telling people who I am, and in a way determining the kind of man I am in the process.

Working on a team devalues that to the point of worthlessness. If I make a game with a group of people, it's not my vision. It's not my story, it's not my game, it's not me. I don't want to be "one of the guys behind" a game, I want to be "the guy behind" a game. I used to think it was a selfish need for validation of character, but these days I do think it's more pride and the desire for people to see the imagination I have locked away in my head.

But considering I'm literally just an ideaguy at this moment in time, my future looks bleak.

>>25824

this x 1000

I don't have a job so being alone makes me work so slow, for a while I was going to an office just so I could have a place to go. but that got old too.

when I was at the office I felt like going home to work and vice-versa.

I just need a lackey, like those evil geniuses with the retarded assistants. they would just have to sit next to me, clean my apartment and give me their simpleminded input which I will turn into solid gold.

>>25827

I'm exactly like you. but time is ticking, my friend.

Don't let your dreams, be dreams etc.

plenty of games with shit graphics/gameplay ,but a good story, which got moderate success.

fallout 1 and 2 have garbage gameplay, yet they are considered sacred masterpieces.

nothing good, but a lot of bad things come from pride. I learned this from poker, where being angry/prideful turns any pro into a complete retard.

>>25826

I really love the stylization you got going on there. I'd love to play this when its done. you got anything else?

>>25844

>>25826

What engine or technology are you using? Did you make those assets yourself? It has a sharp and uniform look, very polished.

from my own experience, i feel more motivated when working with someone and feel like i have an obligation to just like make a game

>>25758

Any good places to look for CC0 assets?

Making a game solo is good because you don't need to coordinate anything with anyone, so you can apply changes immediately. The downside is that you have to split your attention between several different tasks and if you get vision-tunneled on one specific aspect of a game, then it might be hard to get back into the other parts of the game.

For anything more complicated than a webgame, however, I think you need more than one person. Hell, even some of the DOS mods that I've worked on have had four people contributing resources to them. It's just easier when you have a specialist doing his own thing.

It's also easier to lose motivation when you're a solo dev, especially if you're strapped for cash or no one cares about your stuff. Having another person to motivate you and to talk with is useful.

Anyway, transmission over.

>>25707

Fuken saved

>>28268

>no space to separate () and {

Did you come here just to suffer?

solo devving is alright for me, except for just one thing

>MARKETING

holy fuck there is no amount of words and works to fully describe how much time and lifeforce must be sunk to put in more effective market connections. I already interned for social media marketing, and jumped between [complete boredom] to [just fuck my shit up] levels of time sinking. fuck marketing and fuck the lack of tools to help cover marketing.