Good day, I'm an indie game dev. I'm literally making more money as a Janitor, than as an Indie Game Developer. If the game is successful, then you can make some money, but keep you job.
@danielronhovde83232 ай бұрын
I loved hearing you talk about your motivation. I have a similar experience with motivation in my work, even though it's not game dev specifically, so it was encouraging to hear
@mugileaguegaming17692 ай бұрын
Here are some hard-to-swallow pills you didn't ask for -- slow down, it's not the destination, but the journey. Often a lot of these YT gamedevs make it look easy to crank something out, and that "a year" is realistic. Common advice is "scope small, halve that, and halve it again," but the truth is, if you're goal is to FINISH a game, then yes, by all means, ship a Pacman clone and call it a day. If you want to make something meaningful, artistic, and is a bespoke product only you can make, then you need to work on it. And I don't mean chipping away at the same piece over and over. There is seldom an example of someone being considered a master of their craft based on their first piece. You need to learn to be comfortable with failure, but you also need to try. No one sets out to lift weights saying "I want to be in a shape where I can regularly lift 15lbs every day without sweating." Motivation comes from challenge, and you need to give yourself that achievable challenge to make this feel meaningful. Yes, you won't make your "dream game" anytime soon, but the attitude of "well if you can't ship something this year, when will you ship anything, let alone your magnum opus?" -- cut yourself some slack and relax, you literally spent the last year learning coding, graphics, game design, etc., etc., in a single year. At some point, you'll release your first, then your second, then things will move faster and you'll get more support and recognition, things will iteratively get better over time. Don't do what some other YTers do and just stake everything on one project getting out the door before fiscal year. People can tell if something is not made out of passion. The development cycles of those "indie one-hit-wonders" may have been a year or two, but you're not counting all of the years they've spent playing with the engine, learning new skills, building their brand, and developing their work ethic. Things take time, and it's really toxic how the internet nowadays just makes it easier to feel bad about your progress because everyone's business is just out there in the open to be judged. When solo-developing, your game is like a committed relationship. If you can't see yourself with that person after 6 months, then you'll never see yourself with that person for a lifetime. Sure, you can be "done" and ship the game in 6 months, but you'll still need to market and support it, it will become one of your children. Be realistic with yourself, work through the challenges, not because you have to, but because you care. If you can't convince yourself the game is interesting, what makes you think you can convince others? Do some self reflecting, find a reason why you're not motivated, and then give yourself the reason to work on it every day. You'll find that secret sauce that'll get you there, but that will take time.
@WyrmyrGames2 ай бұрын
All good reminders on how to stay balanced. I do have to remind myself that I can't accomplish every gamedev goal that I have with one game. My main goal was making a game in a year. But the time limit definitely works against other goals, like making a good game and hitting marketing beats. I'm sure I'll do more reflecting, but making the game fun to play and as good as it can be have become more important than simply finishing it. Thanks for the words of wisdom!
@jabean26682 ай бұрын
Thomas Brush has really good advice when it comes to marketing and setting expectations for game development. For your next project i think it would be beneficial to find an intersection between what you're interested in and what games are popular. That way you can make something you're interested in as well as something that's more easily marketable. You're doing awesome!
@WyrmyrGames2 ай бұрын
Thanks a lot! I’ve been watching Thomas Brush for a long time but I probably haven’t completely internalized what he teaches. I haven’t taken his course so I’m sure there are some deeper things I’m missing. This game IS my attempt at making something that seems popular/marketable. 😂 But I could be out of touch.
@kaylasuemedia2 ай бұрын
Keep plugging along, Jared! It's normal to go through ups and downs when it comes to motivation with projects like this. You def have the right mindset. You got this!
@realmcafee2 ай бұрын
restart with me and my wife. get viral or gtfo. gameplay over everything. ecosystem are also on our focus (edit: currently doing a fishing game, we have time, im a programmer and we have a budget). if you dont want to, then dont invest time or effort in your yt videos - dont allow your time to get stolen. i havent seen any yt dev that made it because of his dev vlog.
@WyrmyrGames2 ай бұрын
The only one I know of is ThinMatrix, where he seems to live more off the devlog/Patreon income than game sales. But he is definitely a special case and his model is not what I'm aiming for. My devlogs are just about getting some eyes on the game while I make it and learn a bit about marketing. You say "get viral" but I believe that's a skill I have yet to learn and YT is teaching me.
@holacabeza2 ай бұрын
follow da market ma man. japanese fountain girls dating sim is what's popping LEGOOOOOO
@WyrmyrGames2 ай бұрын
😂
@holacabeza2 ай бұрын
@@jamad-y7m they just fall in love with you and eventually turn into fountains like full steam all day ⛲️
@master112132 ай бұрын
my advice is to do dev logs for those interested in your game and show your progress to the target audience. even if it doesnt look amazing to you others will enjoy it
@WyrmyrGames2 ай бұрын
The hard part is finding or reaching the target audience. I don’t think they’re watching yet so I’ll have to try something else.
@ŕíćéAvarice2 ай бұрын
@@WyrmyrGamesJust upload content, you don't need to create anything other than a slideshow for each thing you do or want, video thumbnails are also important.
@Tetravalence12 ай бұрын
13:43 I don't know about that... I can't 3D model. 😂
@WyrmyrGames2 ай бұрын
I barely can. I made one fish and just changed it a little bit for each evolutionary change. And a few plants. Then turned on shade smooth. 😂 Whatever you know, your feedback has been helpful.
@ŕíćéAvarice2 ай бұрын
Fish game dev, greetings from Uruguay 🇺🇾✌️
@WyrmyrGames2 ай бұрын
Hello there!
@ŕíćéAvarice2 ай бұрын
@@WyrmyrGames awesome video
@alefet.88612 ай бұрын
how did you spread your video? any paid advertisement?
@WyrmyrGames2 ай бұрын
For my first video? I didn’t do anything. I think it just caught the algorithm. There was a day the impressions went to about 100k then flatlined. From what I’ve seen, the first devlog tends to do better than the following ones and I’ve seen many others that did way better than mine.
@CheeseVr-px4gv3 ай бұрын
Cool game!!!
@kaylasuemedia4 ай бұрын
Update your discord link and select the option "never expire", otherwise, the link defaults to expiring after 7 days.
@WyrmyrGames4 ай бұрын
Oops, meant to do that. Thanks!
@kaylasuemedia4 ай бұрын
Nice! love the idea of a different camera angle when you click on an individual fish.
@ChimeratAlpha4 ай бұрын
8:32: From the basic outline you've given of the intro, I wouldn't be surprised to face an unexpected mutation, or a strange interaction between species. A poisonous fish or a super carnivore. Something that you might need to somehow offset.
@jeremykhoo51274 ай бұрын
Man. A lot of progress in 3 months
@beegman274 ай бұрын
i think it would be cool if the camera was fixed in space but had a small range angles it can pitch and yaw through
@WyrmyrGames4 ай бұрын
Thanks for the suggestion! I'll have to play around with that idea.
@BucketmanAnimations4 ай бұрын
The discord sounds so sweet!
@kaylasuemedia4 ай бұрын
AWESOME WORK JARED!
@WyrmyrGames4 ай бұрын
Thanks Kayla!
@CaudiciformStudios-ik5dj4 ай бұрын
Given the narrative of the tutorial it would be kind of cute for it to start in a more sterile fish farm environment and then move to the full pond at the end of the tutorial segment when the player has built up several fish to release.
@WyrmyrGames4 ай бұрын
That's an interesting idea. That fits in well with an idea I had to have a sort of experimental area outside of the natural environment where the player could do whatever they want. Your idea would definitely lend well to telling more story.
@JasonStorey4 ай бұрын
Nice! looking good. I'm interested to see where it goes. One small thing I recommend is, you have the fish moving in a great flowing languid manner, but the camera is very rigid in its movement, Instead of setting camera targets directly, I recommend having a target position for the camera that is constantly moved to with Vector3.SmoothDamp or something and you assign a value to the target position and it will smoothly move to its destination, but with smooth damp it will move faster when far away to cover ground, but move less when already close to the target. Would make the camera feel like it too is "swimming" and feel more cohesive.
@the_yashe4 ай бұрын
You'vs said people doesn't need to be patreons to join the discord but the invite link is under the patreon post. Can you link it to your yt socials or into description of videos?
@WyrmyrGames4 ай бұрын
Yes, absolutely. I just meant you don't have to spend money to get the links, but I'll put links to Discord and Itch in the video description so they're easier to get find.
@yoouussef4 ай бұрын
Nice video as always wyrmyr! keep up the good work!
@xantishayde-walker45935 ай бұрын
Nice video. Also seeing some great addendums to the process in the comments. I got this saved into my Game Dev 2024 list. Also, saw your first vid of Game Dev or Janitor? Im right there with ya, man. Here's to both of us succeeding!
@Seb00lean5 ай бұрын
Really like your style and calmness. Excited to see your game come to life. Which tutorials / books would you say are the ones that got you where you are now?
@WyrmyrGames5 ай бұрын
Thank you! I haven’t read a single book on making games. 😅 Probably should. My learning strategy so far has been consuming as much Gamedev content as possible and hoping it assimilates. I’ll look up targeted tutorials as needed. The first series I ever watched was on Udemy by @awesometuts. I learned most of the basics from him and the official Unity tutorials. As for the business side, I’ve been watching @thomasbrush for a long time. I haven’t gone through his course but I think I’ve watched 90% of his videos on KZbin. More recently @howtomarketagame videos have filled in a lot of gaps for what type of game to make and how to get it to the finish line with specific marketing strategies.
@ryanorionwotanson45685 ай бұрын
I could test it if it works on steam deck...great advice too!
@boomxhartshotxchannel31116 ай бұрын
Fellow new-ish Unity dev here. Interested in testing if you still have that need.
@theimperialkerbalunion75686 ай бұрын
Hey I recommend reading Tynan Sylvester's "Designing Games". Its a must read. It will help with learning game design. Also marketing isnt advertising. It starts withh the conception of the game. Make sure your game actually has a market, and an audience. And work on making a prototype first. If you can make your prototype fun, then all you have to do is scale it up to the full game. But you have that anchor of good game design. It would be better to spend a whol year making a prototype that is perfect, than a full game that is flawed. Also please scale down your first game. You can go so far with so little. If this is your first game, you WILL fail if its too large scope (especially since you only have a year, and you dont have a technical background.) PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE, make a small but innovative game. Look at "Baba is you" that game is so simple, and super innovative. And widely successful. Please dont start woth a large scale simulation game. Games largely fail because of 2 things: Noone wants to play it. The game design was bad. By making a small game you can improve your game design skill with games that are easier to design. You should honestly spend your time making 1 small innovative prototype a month. Then pitch to publishers. If you get a deal from a prototype, youd be able to work fulltime and not return to janitor work. And doing repeated games will hone ur skills
@vast6346 ай бұрын
Have several prototypes in parallel. One for gameplay, one for visuals like animation or post processing, one for the menu element and inventory mechanics for example. Its much easier to test and iterate on those if the project does not depend on all the other elements of the game. Other elements could be mocked if needed. Once all main "modules" are sufficiently usable, you can assemble them into a combined project, implementing them in a clean way. That then is the basis of the game.
@BuggyGameDev6 ай бұрын
Is that really working ? I would tend to make all element acts in synergy and respond one to the others to make a great game. Of course it can be interesting to have those draft elements and iterate on code and visuals independently, but at some point you must merge. So divergences (like having a gameplay loop with gamepad but you fast travel map is using mouse) could you make loose time, kind of exagerated but that's the idea.
@vast6346 ай бұрын
@@BuggyGameDev Its mostly technical and mechanics that I develop in their own sandbox project. For example NPC animation system is developed separate to an inventory system. Or having a specific project that contained the preliminary art-assets, materials and post processing setup, where everything is just staged, and im mostly interested in tuning the visuals and the lighting. I intentionally use simple prototype materials and assets in the other projects, so I can separate gameplay mechanics from visuals. The projects get merged at some point in a Main project, where I reimplement the stuff, but now in a much cleaner way, without all the temporary stuff that was just for some tests. (A big challenge of larger games is handling complexity - many assets, big codebase, not so much how to do something.) For a larger team that would be the point where productions starts, and there is a solid architecture and references on mechanics and assets and workflows.
@jameshughes30146 ай бұрын
This was really helpful. How could this be done for a first person role playing game like fallout? It's not exactly a first person shooter, since fighting is only one portion of the game play. I'm thinking since it would involve crafting, building, fighting and quests, i should make a prototype for each mechanic, but also one that involves all of them to make sure they're balanced?
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
Glad it helped! Yeah, I think you’re on the right track. I’m sure Bethesda had a prototype, of sorts, with just the player character being able to do some of things you can do in the game, before they really built out the world and all of the quests and items. I haven’t used them myself, but there are downloadable FPS frameworks that could get you started really quickly so you can focus on the unique mechanics to your game. I’d be interested to see what you come up with! (I just started playing Fallout 4 after the show came out. I should be making game but the world sucked me in 😄)
@DIPPYDO6 ай бұрын
I disagree.. i think that if you want to learn how to code games, making prototypes could be a good way to do that.. but games are more than the code.. if you want to be a solo dev, you'll news code, art, sound, level design, story, character design,ect.. the only way to build those muscles are to work them.. i think beginners should do as many game jams as possible to practice every aspect of game dev..
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
I agree that’s another great way to learn! It’s kind of the same concept as a prototype, just more involved as you said. I didn’t mean to say coding is the ONLY thing beginners have to learn. But in my case it was the first thing I had to learn to actually make any sort of working game.
@RandomNewb6 ай бұрын
good reminder about implementing, failing fast/receiving feedback, and iterating. back to development!!
@maxkopfraum6 ай бұрын
imo: simulation games - gamified slices of life with traditional game mechanics simulations - deep and representative software emulating non-game mechanics
@maxkopfraum6 ай бұрын
oh wow! do you find the broad but basic skills required for janitorial work match well with your work style? i've been thinking about this approach to life and pay-the-bills-work myself.
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
Yeah, I'd day that's a fair assessment. I get to do a lot of different types of cleaning work so I'm not often overly bored. It's active but not strenuous. I don't really have to deal with people very often and it's relatively stress-free. I do a fair amount of driving and the work can get repetitive but I get to listen to KZbin or audiobooks for almost the entire time I'm out working. Everyone I've met that does cleaning enjoys it and says it's a great line of work to be in. I've done it on and off for nearly 20 years. There's always work in this field and its not too hard to find. All that being said, it's also a great stepping stone for whatever you'd like to do for work. The schedule is often flexible which allows you to pursue learning or a hobby in your off-time. It's not often difficult or stressful work so you still have mental energy at the end of the day. And being a relatively relaxed work, you have time to think or listen to something while you work which makes the time doubly valuable. Most of my learning on game development and some of my best creative ideas have come while working. I recommend it and I'm planning on continuing in this work alongside my pursuit of game development because they really do work well together. Obviously, the goal is to shift away from cleaning, but for now it's working well to do both and I'll keep doing it as long as I need to.
@maxkopfraum6 ай бұрын
@@WyrmyrGames appreciate the answer, thanks!
@mattrobb35666 ай бұрын
Hi, good open and honest ideas, thanks. But not too sure about this; as you say most genres have a set of core mechanics and it may be fairly easy to program them and test them without them being much fun or the sign of a good game to come. But isn't the key the differentiator, what really makes your game fun and what is the perceived progress process that will keep it fun? Share too much too early and a good tester will see a way forward to make a better version more quickly and this could undermine your game. Be careful out there, this is a 'dog eat dog' world. Now I must get back to my new unshared prototype: 'Hungry fish!'. Good luck.
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
😂 Go for it man! I’m making this game because I want to play it. I’d love to see more games like it or even better. I do understand what you’re saying though and I think it’s a common worry of game developers. If it’s a novel idea and happens to be really fun, why risk putting it out there for someone to steal? I can’t say that I haven’t asked that question myself. But I keep hearing from other game devs not to worry about it and I’m trying not to. They always say “no one cares about your game” which I think is mostly true. No one sees the full potential or vision of your game as well as you do. I think it’s important to have some balance. Find only a few trusted sources for testing at first and keep the testing on a small scale during development. Testing is too important to skip out of fear. But maybe try to avoid game developers as testers 😂
@mattrobb35666 ай бұрын
As you fully appreciated I was just teasing. In all sincerity I wish you all the best and will probably 'wishlist' your game after a few more progress posts. I'm intrigued to see where the fun is, but good on you for identifying a fun way ahead with feeding fish. I would still be very careful about sharing the details of your novel ideas. So please use trusted Testers.
@Digital_Squirrel6 ай бұрын
Thank you for the clear and concise guide to prototyping. If you're still looking for testers feel free to reach out.
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
Thanks for the interest! I'll keep you in mind and let you know more about it in my next devlog.
@isaachepp34816 ай бұрын
Thanks for the helpful video, I look forward to seeing your work and wish you good luck on your journey!
@JamesArndt6 ай бұрын
You said you were a beginner in game dev, but you are clearly articulating wisdom that not many beginners compartmentalize early on.
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
I only know what I’ve been taught! Been learning from the best on KZbin and reading articles for at least five years now. But thank you 😊
@BestHakase6 ай бұрын
thank you, helps a lot
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
Glad to hear that!
@CosplayZine6 ай бұрын
Great stuff. The game art is looking great so far.
@everythingcouldbesimplify8186 ай бұрын
I agree that prototype is good to start but the best is having a deadline, the game will have to be finished no matter what
@maxkopfraum6 ай бұрын
in practice i see many devs linger for a while on aspects they care about. i don't think it is necessarily bad, if it keeps the spirits up. it's also possible to have multiple projects at the same time.
@maxkopfraum6 ай бұрын
most important: protoypes are vertical, not horizontal. a slice of every layer, not a finished layer
@baitposter6 ай бұрын
This is one of the simplest and best bites of information for a prototype The proof-of-concept prototype isn't your alpha and doesn't need to be; just a vertical slice and taste of what you want your game to be
@Choco7946 ай бұрын
What about a strategy game, wouldn’t it have plenty of game mechanics so how do I isolate the core of it for a prototype, It will either take too long to make the prototype then I will have to scrap it so high wasted effort or I will burnout due to the amount of game mechanics I need to build and then if by some miracle if I finish the prototype and it is validated, I have to refine and fix my code which will be almost the same amount of effort as in making the prototype. Likely, I will give up either way so what should I do?
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
I’m not really a huge fan of the throw-away prototype. I understand the arguments but like you it’s rather demotivating for me to have to do the same work twice. So I don’t see why you couldn’t consolidate that development into one stretch and when the prototype is completed and tested, build on from there. I’d have to do some research, but there may be kits out there for strategy games that help you build a basic game quickly without having to build all of the core mechanics yourself. (If there isn’t, maybe you could sell your prototype as a starter strategy kit 😂)
@maxkopfraum6 ай бұрын
@@WyrmyrGames in my opinion prototypes should be used to build up the underlying core libraries for your final game. the prototypes can still use the same libraries, but present them differently, use more or less features, combine them differently, etc that way you may lose one throwaway protoype configuration, but the core mechanics keep evolving.
@Uhfgood6 ай бұрын
It depends on the type of game. If it's a narrative game, then a basic prototype is not quite as feasible (you can still do it, but you have to provide a little more content than an action/arcade/etc game). I am going to do something similar, starting with a text adventure progressing in stages until a fully graphical, animated point-and-click adventure game.
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
Agreed, the genre can determine how complex your prototype needs to be. It sounds like you have a good idea of how to make it work with your game. I’d be interested to see your progress.
@Uhfgood6 ай бұрын
@@WyrmyrGames - Maybe i'll link ya when I've started making videos. (vlogging my progress here soon)
@BuggyGameDev6 ай бұрын
A outline of the choices and dialogs would not be in this case the prototype ? It's not from a synopsis indeed you will make a narrative game appealing, but a concept art of the settings, characters, and the detailed plot would assure the game is good at least I would think. The hidden cost is more on the tools you will use to integrate, like the localisation, the UI (hello text too long in german), staging and narrative engagement. So if you begin directly for a short game executable... Well maybe later because of you want a unusual way of making choices (timer etc), all can fall appart.
@amraouza49376 ай бұрын
way to gooo Brother !!!
@chaosordeal2946 ай бұрын
You don't need to prototype something that you have seen work in a zillion games. Characters can jump onto platforms in video games -- no prototype necessary. If you make a platformer, a significant effort will go into perfecting the jump mechanisms, and a prototype really won't help -- you may as well start on the first iterations of the final product. Camera-tracking always needs refinement as a project progresses. Again, don't even bother with a prototype -- it's just one of those things that needs fussing with until it's right, and you won't know if it's right until you see it at the tail end of the project.
@Choco7946 ай бұрын
The main reason for a prototype is to test the innovative features or features not commonly seen in this genre, the USP so to say and see if it gels well with other prominent game features that are commonly found or even define the genre.
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
Good points. In that case a prototype, or first iteration, could have a framework of solid game mechanics from your genre layered with some more experimental mechanics of your own. There are plenty of starter kits out there for certain genres where you would only have to tweak those solid mechanics and really focus on testing mechanics of your own.
@Choco7946 ай бұрын
@@WyrmyrGames thanks, you answered my other questions/comment as well. Also how much new learning do you think a project one wants to sell potentially should have (approximately)?
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
@@Choco794 Hard to say. In my case, it’s close to 100% because I didn’t have any experience when I started. But I think if you’ve learned enough to make something like a polished vertical slice of your game, you can run with that and maybe only have to learn a few more things along the way. I probably won’t dive much deeper into 3D modeling, for instance, because I think what I know now is enough for me to be able to finish the project at the level that I want it to be. But I have a lot to learn about coding still because there are a lot of things I haven’t started on. If it’s your first game, I would say focus your learning on building what you want to make, whatever is most interesting to you. And when you’ve learned enough to make a good portion of a full game at whatever level you’d like it to be, go for it! I hope this helps. I’m learning too! 😄
@ChiliTurtle6 ай бұрын
That looks nice, reminds me of My Aquarium, I am also a solo developer and know how hard gamedev can be.That deserves a sub and a like. Will you check out my prototype?
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
Thanks! Definitely. Should I check out a particular video of yours or is your prototype playable somewhere?
@ChiliTurtle6 ай бұрын
@@WyrmyrGames Yes it is. (I should probably put the link into the description) its on itch, I updated it today, and rewrote the physics, so currently just round courses are available (the battle royale is disabled until I am completely done with the physics rewrite) I pinned it on my video, because I am not sure if you are allowed to post links on other peoples comments section.
@jefferyknudson98946 ай бұрын
Hey! I would love to test this game! It looks awesome! Also, I've really enjoyed following your growth and story. Reminds me a bit of myself.
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
Hey thanks! I'll let you know more in my next Devlog about testing. Thanks for the interest.
@PandemoniumGameDev6 ай бұрын
Good stuff! It's really logical to create prototype in order to separate good concepts from bad ones, unfortunately we're emotional creatures and a lot of times we ignore this in order to create our "dream game" 🤣. This a good reminder to stay grounded and trust the players more than your own fantasies.
@WyrmyrGames6 ай бұрын
Thanks! I completely agree. It's all too easy to trust your own instinct or your vision for the game and move on without testing. Instinct and vision ARE important and you should listen to them, but a healthy balance of listening to testers will only make your game better.
@ChimeratAlpha6 ай бұрын
I would be interested in testing, but I don't use Discord. Any program that "requires" the ability to comb your computer's programs to collect data is not welcome on my PC.
@FH-ff9jj6 ай бұрын
thats how most apps work though?
@ChimeratAlpha6 ай бұрын
@@FH-ff9jj I never once used Discord for gaming, it was intended to chat with people I knew. Then it suddenly had a list of all the games I owned. I promptly deleted it and it is no longer welcome on my systems. If you're okay with them digging into your date, that's your choice.
@FH-ff9jj6 ай бұрын
@@ChimeratAlpha thanks for the odd paragraph bud
@revimfadli46666 ай бұрын
What about slack? It's like discord for work
@revimfadli46666 ай бұрын
@@ChimeratAlphaisn't slack like discord, but for work instead of gaming?