How I quit my 9-5 and became a full time indie game dev

WISHLIST UNWORDING ON STEAM - store.steampow...
New gamedev life video! • Indie game dev - Motiv...
In 2016 I was stuck in a job and life I hated. With no knowledge of coding, I decided to quit my job and transition to full time game development. Here's how I managed to do it without going broke!
Rainswept on Steam - store.steampow...
Links:
Website: www.frostwoodin...
Twitter: / frostwood_int
Email: [e-mail]

[@robsdroid6856]

I am about to quit my job to become an indie developer. I'm nervous, but seeing videos like yours gives me hope. I'm gonna buy your game tonight.

[@shreyas908]

Don’t stop keep going this is amazing. I love detective games I will give it a try

[@TylerHaddad]

Incredibly moving. Congratulations on the release and everything that has gone well for you. You are a true inspiration.

[@maanster5339]

So happy things went well for you in the End! I was a backer of Ranswept and Will definetely back your upcoming peoject as well. I can tell that you put a lot of heart into your games and that you really Care about what you are creating. Good luck in the future!

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you! I'm really glad my projects are able to communicate that. Thanks for backing Rainswept as well :)

[@pixel.stories]

Hey Armaan, Kartheek here, thank you for this video. I keep watching this in difficult times to stay motivated. This shows the light at the end of the tunnel.

[@Waltah14]

Think you for inspiring me, I was honestly so so lost for what career I’ll choose and your video motivated me. For context I am a 14 year old who started stressing over careers and I also love video games. You honestly moved me to also follow my dreams. I hope I can be experienced like you one day!

[@KosmasMJpec]

I'm glad Ive played and competed Rainswept! It's brilliant! I hope someday I will do something like this and I hope your new game will release on the Nintendo Switch to play it! Your work is great! Continue your hard work and don't stop it for anyone!

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thanks for the encouraging words! :) Excited to make and share more games with everyone. And best wishes for your game dev dreams as well!

[@rondelrosario9375]

Inspiring man! hope you're going strong in your chosen career

[@IndieProgressPlaysDiablo]

Awesome video and story. Really gives hope and inspiration for myself and other Indie Game Devs to follow their passion. I worked for 8.5 years as a business analyst when all I really wanted to do was make my dream game. This has definitely pushed me towards the idea of going full time. Thanks and best of luck on your second game!

[@isto_inc]

Awesome video! Congrats on taking the plunge and going for your dreams!

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you!

[@bonehelm]

We think so much a like! I'm glad your game release went well enough for you to keep going independent, congrats. I too attempted full time indie, with similar feelings to you, back in 2018. Sadly for me it failed (probably because I'm a programmer so my weakness is art/music/story) and had to go back to a "real" job. I'm still learning though and hope to attempt full time indie again in the near future with everything I've learned since then.

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Good luck - hope it works out for you! And if possible, you could also try moving to a place with a low cost of living to make it happen and take some of the financial pressure off early on :)

[@superjustin5000]

Working toward the same goal right now. I make good money, but it truly is soul shredding work. So happy for you, going to check out Rainswept now. Good job man!

[@josh_swanson]

Fascinating. What I admire is that you picked vision and stuck to it, and it paid off. That's been my sticking point in the first few years of game dev. Thanks for sharing your story

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thanks! Fortunately, it was enjoyable all the way through so that made it easier. Good luck with your own games!

[@NamidaSai]

I’m currently at the 2017 step of your journey: did an irrelevant degree, went to filmmaking, got burned out and switched to an office job. Haven’t dropped the 9-5 yet, but been picking up gamedev skills for the last 9 months along with starting a YT. Hearing about what you managed to achieve moving from that point onwards is truly inspiring and really motivating. Thank you for sharing your story and keep up making awesome games! 👌

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Keep at it and don't give up (as long as it does make you happy ;) ) you'll definitely get there! :)

[@faus585]

This is so inspiring! I'm so happy for you :)

[@jagzhere]

I loved watching this. In the situation you were in at the start right now, this was a great watch! cant wait to try out your game.Thanks for making this

[@dannydeen7764]

Really inspirational. Thanks for sharing

[@mkaram4893]

"work that I don't understand or care about"..... exactly what I tell myself every morning when starting my laptop to work for my tech job...

[@murthy562]

Bro this is the most meaningful video I have seen, really close to heart. Happy you are sucessful

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you!

[@jutekpixel]

Big Respect! Me as well I have started two years ago to learn programing and unity as a hobby. Recently I am thinking about making the same move. learning

[@MattKander]

This is so awesome to see! Congratulations and loved the video

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you! :)

[@frolics2dio]

Brother, your story is very inspiring and I can feel your long journey pain. I hope you get more progress in the future....

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you :)

[@TeaManDev]

Awesome video, man :) I was really hoping that you will start to make videos like this one day.

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thanks for the motivation ;D

[@foreducation408]

Yoo dude it's so good to see a fellow game developer from India telling his story about game development and his struggle with it, loved your video man, it gives me soo much motivation for game dev, all the best for your future brother.

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thanks for the kind words, and I'm glad it motivated you!

[@Technique1995]

Hey Arman. I am from Dimapur, India. You inspired me as hell. In College I developed my own word game, now I going back to my roots trying to build chrome extensions

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Happy to hear this inspired you - good luck with your projects!

[@omeysalvi]

Amazing! Very inspirational!

[@gamitor6499]

subscribed. keep creating, you are legend in making.

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you

[@leeoiou7295]

Just watched this. Very inspiring.

[@anaykharade]

This is a video I have been waiting for!

[@frostwoodinteractive]

I'm glad I finally got it done then, been planning this for a while!

[@egretfx]

Wow...you are the one who's making forgotten fields?...you got yourself a new fan and a sub:).... Good video ...much appreciated all the good you put on....Love you;)

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you so much for the encouragement :) Means a lot!

[@SpecialGeek40]

This was incredible!! 💗💗💗

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you!

[@XanderwoodGameDev]

very inspiring story. I am so happy for you and the success you had with it. Your game looks great too!

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you!

[@JoyceGreens]

Inspiring is an understatement, I'm currently starting my Dev journey also. I'm a firm believer that with all these AAA studios putting out copycat and mundane games with little effort or story, that there is a massive need for beautiful stories that capture our imagination like they used to. I've got Rainswept downloading now and am looking forward to experiencing it tonight. I relate a lot to your emotions and journey, thanks for sharing! looking forward to Forgotten Fields in the future, best of luck

[@JoyceGreens]

Just saw on steam that it's already out, add to cart! haha

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you very much for the kind comment! I really hope you enjoy playing it!

[@JamesKelly89]

I'm here because I'm so sick of working an office job and getting laid off. Making video games has been a huge dream of mine that has always seemed out of reach.

[@darrylwolfe7359]

7:09 Memories of Murder was featured in this video. NICE.. For everyone reading this, please watch that movie, it will become your favorite korean movie of all time. I guarantee it.

[@harshitchoudhary3731]

A whole lot of inspiration & hardwork.

[@Squidmoto3]

The new game is looking really good.

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you :)

[@gavinreis91]

Truely inspirational.

[@SourishBasu]

This was very inspirational, great job

[@rb76768]

I am 19 and publish game apps on the play store, I hope to reach the same goal one day 🙏

[@gamerspalace]

Awesome video and very inspirational. Also, love your work! Thumbs up :)

[@josekarnikowski1711]

Dude, amazing!

[@TYNEPUNK]

great video man, glad indie dev is working for you..

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you!

[@AaryanGamer]

I clicked as soon as I got the notification! I'm left speechless after seeing this video. You followed your dreams and successfully managed to accomplish them. I'm so glad that you didn't let the pressures of life affect you and you continued to pursue your goals. I've been trying to learn Unity myself as well, and this is a huge motivation for me. You are bound to be successful and popular, just keep going after that dream and I guarantee you that you'll make it there!

[@frostwoodinteractive]

I'm glad you found this motivating, it's exactly why I wanted to make this video. We hear a lot on the internet about how it's impossible to switch to full time indie dev and I wanted to offer a different view to that :) Thanks for the kind words, and good luck with your journey as well!

[@arslanbashir7804]

Nice Man...keep motivated...you can do wonders...

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you for the support :)

[@gmlaster]

Dude, thank you!!! I've always wanted to develop games, but I had the opposite problem you had. I had a career I truly loved as an independent contractor and an Adobe certified instructor. But I had to let it all go when my son was diagnosed with autism. He was so messed up! He didn't speak until he was 10. I couldn't put in the hours and do all the traveling I needed to do and help him too. He needed a full-time caregiver, so I became an at-home mom. You'd think I'd have all the time time in the world to learn game development being at home. But he needed doctors visits, therapies and constant care, all day, every day. He's now off to college majoring in engineering so it was well worth the sacrifice, but it cost me literally everything. I committed career suicide. I lost my marriage and had to leave the excitement of Chicago to move back home with my mom. So I'm living in a small town I truly hate, and now I'm older and stuck in a market that doesn't value me. I'm teaching Blender and Photoshop to kids at a local computer camp. But the games I've always wanted to develop are still stuck in my soul, waiting to be born. I didn't know about the Unity plugin you mentioned. I'm not a programmer, but I dream of developing games for VR and AR. Congratulations on your success, and thank you for lighting a fire in me to take a leap of faith. I've got nothing to lose. I've already lost everything. Maybe my dead end is a blessing in disguise!

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Wow, that's quite a story, and I'm sorry to hear about your struggles - but it is truly incredible what you did and achieved for your son. I hope you're finally able to get back on track with your own dreams and do something cool for yourself now that you have the chance. Cliched, but we only have one life! Go for it - the indie community is a really fun and supportive scene to be a part of. For more inspiration, I'd suggest watching some game development documentaries - the ones by Double Fine (called "Double Fine Adventure" and the newly released "Double Fine PsychOdyssey" are great for getting an inside look at the game dev life. GVMERS is also a good KZbin channel for docs. There's so much more to get inspired by. But for sure, go ahead and give it a shot! :) It'll be totally worth it.

[@gmlaster]

@@frostwoodinteractive Thank you so much for telling your wonderful story. You never know how sharing your own journey will affect others. You're reaching the masses with this video. I can't speak to the effect it's had on them, but you really lit a fire under me to bite the bullet and do this. Thank you for the lead on all the great dev resources. I can hardly wait to explore them all. But I sincerely wish you all the luck in the world with your impressive enterprise. Your game looks so stylized and immersive. Your unique illustrative style is what really sells it, in my humble opinion. It really draws you into the story. I'd love to see you do a video series as to how you moved from prototyping and development to getting your game sold. That had to be quite a journey. Did you just go the Kickstarter and Patreon route, or was there an easier way to get your company noticed? What did it take to fund your project? You should blog your marketing journey. I'd love to hear what you learned from the experience. The dev part is only one piece of the puzzle. Selling your product and getting yourself noticed…that's the real secret I'd love to know. Thanks again for being so generous with your experience!

[@frostwoodinteractive]

@@gmlaster Thanks! And to answer your question in short right here, I did a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo. A big help in getting noticed was launching a demo on itch.io and gamejolt, and a lot of people wishlisted the game because of the success of that demo. A lot of press attention came from that, which was amplified by the indiegogo campaign. To be honest, it's not a flawless method as I tried to do the same for my next 2 games, but it wasn't as successful. So of course, a lot depends on the game itself! Here are 3 posts I wrote detailing all this, hope you find them useful: www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/7nrdod/6_months_ago_i_quit_my_job_to_make_a_game_solo/ www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/am48n5/2_years_after_quitting_my_job_as_an_architect_my/ www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/blfjg9/3_months_ago_i_released_my_first_game_was_it/

[@Filchencko]

Highly motivating video man, thank you for it! I’’m also about to start the developing my own story driven game, and I’m working on its story by evenings after work for the last year. The biggest concern I have, is how to define that I’m ready to quit my well-paid job to start working on the game full-time. How would you define this “ready to start” moment?

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Sorry didn't see this comment earlier! I think the point was when I researched the practicality of it all - will I be able to survive on a game with a small, realistic amount of sales? Once all that was figured out it was easy to deduce the timeline, figure out how much savings I needed before starting etc. Once it's practical and the risk is manageable, go for it!

[@vivek-raman]

I love it. Keep it up, my partner! I hope to meet you with my own story to tell. :D

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Looking forward to hearing it! :) Best of luck!

[@anshgala4020]

I think i have watched this video more than 50 times. This video is damn good

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you so much!

[@harneetsingh9420]

Hi Arman, nice journey. I was following your games but I have noticed its been a while you haven't posted any updates about your new game on this channel. If I remember correctly last time I read somewhere that you were making a horror game or something. Also I am wondering if you are still working as gamedev or did you switch career ? :)

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Hi! Yes, very much still a gamedev :) I'm currently looking for funding for that horror project, and haven't officially announced it yet. As for this channel, I should post more but dev takes up most of my time. But I do have plans for more videos (like getting funded) so stay tuned!

[@harneetsingh9420]

​@@frostwoodinteractivethanks for the reply and good to know that you are still doing ok. Totally understand about less videos on channel due to dev time. Looking forward to your next project, keep going and don't spend too much time on it, keep it under 2 years 🙂👍 good luck.

[@rahuldasrd7780]

It feels good that in India there are also Indie game developer, hey do I need a comany to create steam direct account .

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thanks! No, you can do it as an individual also.

[@fj12n3]

Congrats man, this is my dream

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you! :) And go for it! It's totally worth it.

[@coderonix4501]

I'm just saying Assassin's Creed Black Flag still look gorgeous today as it was years ago. Damn. But I admire your tenacity to chase your dream.

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Haha I love Black Flag. And thanks!

[@faithdrawnstudios]

"How I quit my job and became a game dev"..."2017... I quit my job... moving right along". No mention of specifics? That's why I came to the video!

[@thorminator]

Very inspiring! Did u you use Photoshop for graphics?

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thanks, and yep! Photoshop.

[@vishnuprasathkv]

Hi this video its awesome but How did you even learn unity out of blue....I wanna learn too,can you please guide me

[@frostwoodinteractive]

I just followed online tutorials and experimented with my project :) Give the official Unity tutorials a shot for a few weeks, they're pretty good!

[@roman-vv5xz]

I would love to do what you did... unfortunately, I'm primarily a developer who sucks at art, most of the selfmade indie devs I see here started the other way round. I feel lack in Art Skills is harder (though not imposiible) to compensate with the new tools like unity. And also good gameplay with bad art is harder to sell than rudimentary gameplay with beautiful art.

[@frostwoodinteractive]

There are a lot of games with very simple art - find a similar game that has done well and see if you can get inspired or emulate their formula! And then for the next game you can always work with an artist with funds from the first game.

[@darrylwolfe7359]

Ive been learning C# and Unity for almost 3 years and still I have no game that I have finished. Im really disappointed with myself and thinking about quitting.

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Don't quit! I would say skip the thorough learning and just make something - 3 years of learning without seeing any tangible product can definitely be very demotivating, and you can definitely just learn on the job by making stuff!

[@darrylwolfe7359]

@@frostwoodinteractive Im a slow learner and thats one of my problems. Im 37 and im a slow learner and I dont have a game that Im proud of. I'm afraid that I'll never achieve my dream.

[@frostwoodinteractive]

@@darrylwolfe7359 Small steps daily add up to huge things over big periods of time. Maybe start with something tiny with an interesting mechanic/ style for motivation?

[@darrylwolfe7359]

@@frostwoodinteractive thank you for not giving up on me. Its going to be hard cuz I can only spend little time on my gamedev dream each day plus im a slow learner. I Dont have a job but my responsibilities at home are so many. And did I mention I still live with my parents? Its not looking good for me to be honest. I cant help myself from losing hope. But you are right, I should not give up.

[@_capu]

would be interesting to have a story set in your home country :o

[@frostwoodinteractive]

My 2nd game Forgotten Fields is set in Goa, India!

[@_capu]

@@frostwoodinteractive oh! I thought it was also set in USA Nice thanks

[@lawrenceorolobo]

How did you market the game?

[@Driptech.studio]

My story is very similar. Wow.

[@Tick89]

Givin me hope Thanks

[@id2450]

Hey Armam please read my comment, I can relate to your story.😢😊 Hey armaan, I am also Indian, I've spent almost 4 years, good amount of money and most imp time on Game Dev.. Still no success.. I made games from my heart but still.... Now after 4 years I have dropped game Dev about a month ago.. My story is exactly like yours, step by step your story is very much same, except the end result.. Please guide me.. ❤❤❤

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Are you coming to IGDC Hyderabad? That might be a good experience. Come say hi if you do.

[@id2450]

@@frostwoodinteractive I can't sadly. Can i get like your discord or something by any chance?? Do u have any public discord server ??

[@frostwoodinteractive]

@@id2450 Sure, server is pretty inactive discord.gg/Nwe5ePT or armaan_frostwood for my discord

[@trulyharsh]

Jai Bharatam!

[@DonJuanDM]

I just want to say how much I appreciate your game Rainswept. I always love adventure games with mature theme subject but there is hardly any. When I saw the trailer, I knew this is what I've been waiting for. Playing Rainswept really resonates me. This is a pure masterclass adventure game. The story is so plausible, gripping, tragic, emotional, cinematic and packed with moments that makes me taking a step back in my head. I really love how the story being told, the dialogues are beautiful, surreal & moving. I hope one day Rainswept will become a movie or TV drama.

[@frostwoodinteractive]

Thank you so much for the kind comment! I'm sorry I didn't see this earlier. It makes me really really happy to read that the game resonated with you - this is the main reason I made it in the first place, and so it makes it all worth it. And I dream about turning the game into a movie too one day ;) Fingers crossed for that!

[@Filchencko]

Highly motivating video man, thank you for it! I’m also about to start the developing my own story driven game, and I’m working on its story by evenings after work for the last year. The biggest concern I have, is how to define that I’m ready to quit my well-paid job to start working on the game full-time. How would you define this “ready to start” moment?