How to combine gamedev with working full time

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When you're getting into gamedev, you're probably not immediately quitting your job and going all-in. Instead, you work some hours here and there on your game, until eventually you get something shippable. However, this combination of gamedev and another job can be extremely tough, so we go over some of the strategies that allowed us to release our own game, Forge Industry.
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Timestamps:
00:00 Quirky intro
00:53 Don't go fulltime
02:41 No deadliness
05:44 Brainwash yourself
08:59 Scarcity mindset
11:40 Time blocking
14:18 Closing thoughts
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[@orczan8533]

Out of all the gamedev KZbinrs that make this type short form content, you're my favorite by far. Your answers and suggestions feel like genuine advice and not just some cookie cutter answer.

[@tov8714]

I work on my game part time while working fulltime in software. (1) I manage my sleep so I'm not too tired after work to focus on gamedev, (2) I carefully break down features into specific, manageable chunks of work so I can add a few to my todo list each day, (3) I try not to be too hard on myself when I can't get what I wanted done, or if I end up being too tired to get meaningful work done, and (4) I video record weekly personal devlogs, just for myself, which I stick in a private playlist on youtube. I find that helps keep me motivated each week because I don't want to make a video with nothing to show! Great video, thank you!

[@ytmiva2]

Great advice, thanks!

[@dinokknd]

Hey kerels, Nederlander hier. Leuk om te horen van onze zuiderburen. Ben een solo developer die een zelfde route bewandeld als jullie gedaan hebben en doen. Werk nu full time als software developer met zo'n 10 jaar ervaring, en ben nu twee maanden in Godot bezig. Deze videos brengen een goed perspectief - dankje.

[@KuzmaProDev]

I've started to arrange "weekly meetings" with myself each Monday to set week goals and analyze what is done or not previous week. Copied the practice from agile, helps me to stay on track in long run.

[@stygianarcstudios]

Great video! As a Indie dev with a full time job I've found success in time blocking and developing discipline. Something I like to do is, work on my game everyday, no matter what. It can be simple stuff like cleaning up the project, or texturing one small asset. Then I plan a "game jam" with myself every month. One weekend every month I give myself 30 hours to make as much progress as possible. Knowing this is coming every month allows me to build my work around it, so during that 30 yours I'm as productive as possible. I also give myself 1 month break from my game every 6 months, just to keep burn out at bay. This process has worked wonders for me!

[@CoDEmanX47]

Read the title, clicked the video, and saw Marnix' rings under the eyes. Question answered 😅

[@HE360]

I drive a bus and during my big 5 hour break, I do game development and I do game development when I come home at night (after I've eaten at my favorite restaurant). My life i beautiful!!

[@michaelgriffis6450]

You can’t tell me not to watch your videos! Imma watch all of them now!!

[@sloppyy]

i work remotely as the only dev in my organization so no one knows what i do except that i give them what they ask for on time little do they know i just half-ass my real job and work on my game during work hours. hopefully it doesn't get awkward when i inevitably brag about this game project to future interviewers and have to explain why i made a new repo without any of the commit history that shows how much i did during work hours

[@anonimowelwiatko9811]

Don't self snitch. You can always do interactive rebase and change commit times :D

[@NorthFactory]

I think the most important that helps me with working outside work is being able to divide everything into small tasks and chunks of work, if I have only 2 or 3 hours in a day that I can work on a game or have breaks of multiple days it always messed with my motivation and ability to work on my projects because it was just so hard to continue from where I was previously. Now I can "finish" work I started on the day no matter if it's a 2 hour work day or 12 hour work day on my projects. The two biggest things that help me with this approach are 1. Version Control and 2. Code quality and compartmentalisation/modularity The first one give me the ability to see what I worked on the day or week before, and the second one allows me to complete chunks of work easily and not worry about touching "old code". Keeping classes small always leads me to not treating them as a manuscript but as modules all independent from each other and limited in scope.

[@bruceburnett5372]

Depending on this as a living seems pretty hard being so speculative in nature.I'm back to work PDQ because I don't want to live on cheese sandwiches. Cheese, the tie that binds us...get it? lol. I need to know that I have stability to make it work. I've done both. Suffering for your art is a tough road. Be kind to yourself. You'll be healthier, happier and make better product. Game dev is for badasses.. you guys rock!

[@notteaart]

I have always had a game design mindset, i have done a lot of writing for tabletop games and designed my own board games, cards games, and the like. I've been studying art, music, and writing for a very long time, but only just now getting into coding and learning how to use game engines. I work two jobs to make ends meet, and most of my free time is taken up trying to keep my head on straight, but I really want to learn to develop games. I appreciate the advice you gave in this video it does help and, while I wish I could be the guy to drop everything and run into game design, I greatly appreciate the encouragement that it is possible to work full time and still find the time to learn and grow and create.

[@chrisfortin4933]

I appreciate this channel so much because you don't just tell us what we want to hear, you're real about it and make us realize that it's a lot of hard work and dedication and quitting your job to work on a game because you're excited is the worst decision a person could make

[@View619]

Giving the people advice they need to hear, instead of just selling a dream. Quitting your job to make an indie game is probably the dumbest choice one can make, so finding time to do it while continuing to earn a paycheck is an important lesson. Keep up the good work.

[@mandisaw]

14yrs as a published solo-dev, last 9yrs while also working FT in software. Time mgmt and being efficient are critical, as mentioned. I'd add that you need to be straight with yourself - what are your goals, your skills & constraints, and what are you willing to give up or change? For me, I want to make extra savings money, and learn interesting skills, while making the kinds of games I would like, but that aren't made / don't exist. Cut back on hanging out, watching anime/TV, and other hobbies, and now try to make family/friend time more impactful & intentional. Hardest aspect was *not* when family or work duties ramped up [no choices there, you do it], but realizing that I needed to invest in more school & networking, b/c some doors you just can't open on your own. Like the movie, "a man's got to know his limitations" 😅

[@Mel-mu8ox]

7:55 Weirdly, change happens before an act, not after. Its only through thinking about something, perhaps due to hearing the subject repeatedly, that you change your mindset. After the change happens, its then that you start to act. For example, people who talk about learning programming, but never actually believed they could succeed, so never tried. compared to someone who considered the possibility of becoming stronger, and thought they might be able to achieve it starting to go to the gym... Sure the work still needs to be put in, but the change happens in the mind first

[@rottdude1985]

No deadlines - you’re preaching to the choir here. I’m already 9 years into my project.

[@anonimowelwiatko9811]

Definitely agree that you can learn A LOT of things you will not use instantly but you will find extremally valuable and will give you good grasp on topic, understanding of base concept for things like art, music theory, story writing, game development. You can use this knowledge later. If something will click, will make impression on you, you will remember it. It's not wasted time. You need to properly arrange information, abstract concepts, priorities in your head anyway before becoming effective.

[@ytmiva2]

Good advice! I agree with the starting point and getting serious point. I started using unity around 10 years ago and join one or two gamejams a year. Late last year is when I got serious. In the 3 months I worked almost full time I learned so much! I think now I'm ready to work on games seriously in spare time. (or full-time if I find someone crazy enough to pay for me)

[@tymondabrowski12]

I'm more of a "how to find time for my full time job around the gamedev hours" person for now. I had a time when my motivation dwindled but I realised that if I won't do it, no one will do it, and I need it for future work, so better to clench my teeth and do it now. Also time is running out, I wanna participate in Next Fest in June.

[@42ultra]

Thanks for being so candid always. Good luck to your team!

[@augustolara9057]

Great video! I was "forced" into full time gamedev after losing my prior job as an animator in a video studio. Even though I loved it, it was BRUTAL. I had a deadline for when my cash was going to end, and it was clearly not enough. The game flopped hard I was lost about what to do with my life. Fortunately, the time spent making my game was enough to get some experience and portfolio up, and got my first job in the actual game industry. Now it's really hard to find the ENERGY to create games on the side. It's not just about time. i already spend all the focus my brain can spend on the full-time job. But still hope to be able to come back to it soon!

[@kingcole_thered]

really, really good insight!

[@Dailyfiver]

This is the exact video I needed today. Thank you.

[@whilefree]

Time-management is indeed a MUST-HAVE. My system is quite simple. I don't define which period of which day what I do. I just calculate the amount of free time I have in a week, list all I should do at start of the week, and I assign the free hours to them. For example: KZbin Video: 7 hours Godot: 6 hours Exercise: 2 hours etc. Every time I have the free time, I look at the list and see which one I can handle most efficient right now. I assign more priority to the ones which have less hours done. Then I start working. My mission is to spend the hours. I don't look at what the outcome is. You may get into a bug which takes HOURS to solve. You can never predict. I have control on how much time I spent. I don't have control on what I get in those hours. So let's stick to what I have control! Spend as many hours as you can doing your thing. Of course I have side-notes telling me exactly what I should do for each task. So the KZbin thing may look like this: Make a thumbnail which looks like this and this. Add sound effects to the video. etc. Or, add that feature (defined in details) to that specific mechanic in Godot. etc. You can't know how much can be done in 3 hours, except if you record how much you've spend on each task. That's why I save all my weekly plans. After 6 months a look at the old weekly plans and the hours spend on each task gives you a clear idea on how much time each task takes. For example I know very well that making an average KZbin video takes about 7-10 hours from me. All the aspects of it I mean. Deciding on the idea, writing the text, recording it, etc. etc. I hope you find value in my comment and it helps you improve your time-management system. Thanks for reading. And thanks for sharing your experience! :D

[@jakedelmastro]

Ngl, its rough to juggle the two, that's me rn

[@smokyHR]

Thanks for this video. I'm just in the phase of entering game dev, listening to videos and similar while juggling it with college and job in software. This was inspiring to watch.

[@_Kolcki]

Waiting for that one tutorial that tells me how to do this with full time job and two kids... gonna be a long wait lol

[@marnixwyns]

I'll need the 2 kids first, so please be patient!

[@johan_hansson]

It's possible. I got 2 kids (4 and 7 years old) and manage to work ~2 hours almost every night. Build a routine and stick with it and hopefully you can get the ball rolling.

[@flamart9703]

Yes, it may take time, but just train your kids to be game developers and they will make games for you. After work you will supervise them like a real project manager. :)

[@mandisaw]

Join a game-dev group, ideally one for ppl over college-age. For one, you get folks to bounce dev ideas off of, compare notes with, and maybe team up with for jams or side projects. For another, you get that social support and in-the-trenches exp from other ppl who are making games while balancing family life (incl spouse, caretaking, travel, etc).

[@View619]

Make game dev one of your main hobbies, basically. So the time you would spend on something else (watching TV for example) gets out towards game dev instead. And probably take your time with it, when you start getting burned out switch things up.

[@xangamerzone3716]

Hi, great video! For me, I tend to make a list of all the mechanics, UI, sound, etc. that I want to add, then rank them according to what's most important for the next play test build and try to get those done first. I also include a 'nice to have' list incase I finish the important stuff early or if I REALLY REALLY don't feel like working on the game I have a list of things I can pick from that may be a bit more fun to implement so that that I can make that progress and regain motivation.

[@tjspeirs75]

for me the hardest thing is how lonely it is. i really gotta find more community. i'm in the biteme discord, and a bunch of others of course, so I gotta just get more active in them

[@anonimowelwiatko9811]

Same. I started contributing to Godot's discord. Gotta start somewhere.

[@LimbaZero]

I currently have few hobby projects that are for my own fun. If I plan to release something new then I think I need to have quick prototype if it's even fun to play and develop before continuing to end. Because if you don't have fun playing those prototypes then who would would like to play end product. I have lots of "dead projects" that after prototyping I decided this isn't enough fun to continue. I may visit them after wards if I have new ideas related to them. Also keep some notebook of ideas and maybe discuss with your friends what they think about those. Edit: That small task list would be nice for each week. Maybe something that can be done with trello. Jira is too overkill for hobby projects. Also thunderbird seems to support tasks. Maybe I need to use trello and mindmap more for hobby projects.

[@brunotorrao]

doing that rn.. Its the hardest thing I've ever did on my life.

[@Sargonius]

Working fulltime + working on my second indie game. For now it's insanely hard because of the overall heavy workload. But we're trying to scope our next indie game smaller and work on the systems and ideas that we already know how to implement. So it should be okay :D

[@juyas6381]

Most importantly, just start. Doesn't matter how or when, just start. You don't get experience from just "looking into stuff" or watching videos. Search for easy opportunities and go for it. Especially to those at a young age, you got the time and the energy - learning things you are actually interested in is by far the best investment for your future.

[@anonimowelwiatko9811]

If you will start without proper research, you will get overwhelmed and quit. Speaking from experience with like three different engines in past. You need a guidance, you need direction, you need plan. Learn from others, observe, try it yourself, see what works for you.

[@mandisaw]

​@@anonimowelwiatko9811Both are true. Doing serious research - into development, on your genre/market, or your own skills-assessment - all counts as "getting started". A lot of folks assume that writing code = project start, but that can lead to either "Tutorial Hell" with no motivation/target, or the sort of half-assed code-spiral that you're describing.

[@Lacotemale]

Also worth saying that having a job can fund buying assets or hiring people to help make your game.

[@twiddles]

Just a minor nitpick, the lethal company developer had multiple years of gamedev experiences under his belt and has released several games before, even though he was just 21. To hit the point home: not an overnight success either.

[@DannyDeer]

Very good video.

[@genetix5004]

Touche - been walking this line for awhile as well.

[@mandisaw]

Didn't know the DICE Summit ppl had a podcast - thanks for that! Maybe do a video on good resources around the world, or from less well-known platforms/sources? I've hit upon some great "hidden gems" from finding conference talks outside the US/W. Europe, or useful discussions that just weren't listed with a PC/indie focus.

[@nicholasjackson8709]

Now we need the video of how to balanace a full time job, kids, wife, game dev, and living life 😂

[@tomazznidarko8700]

For me Gamedev is hobby. A big obstacle for me is time, since I work 5 days a week and having more time available only on sunday. But even then my wife give me a lot od headaches when I want to seat in front of my computer and delve into Unity which is a beast of itself, since it take a lot of time to learn it. I buy all my assets (grafics, music and utilities) on Unity Assets store and this is a tremendous help (but this you should buy before you start full indie). My advice would be (if you want to start full time indie game development), you must have savings for at least 3-4 years in your bank account before getting serius. And even this is not a guarantee that you will succeed. If you are a beginner in programming, don't start full time. At least you should be on the intermediate level and having at least one full completed game posted on Steam. Just my 2 cents.

[@galotta8475]

Game Designer + 3D Artist ☝🏻

[@TESkyrimizer]

When I was working as a jr software dev WFH just meant that people could message me even after work hours. Work load was fair in the sense that my bandwidth was almost fully occupied by work and every ping from Slack would give me PTSD lowkey. I was stressed and tired and had no energy for gamedev at all after looking at code all day. Now that I've been laid off I'm not sure I'd even want to go back to that life. Also here in Canada us jr devs are being hammered to death by the awful job market of the last 3 years of tech layoffs. Doing gamedev fulltime is all I can do rn. That and waiting for my vocational school application to get approved so I can reskill from my common-as-fuck CS degree, or get a part time job making 15k a year at some understaffed service job. It's a pipe dream. Whatever. Life is short. Who cares. FTE would be nice but not fucking minimum wage with a STEM degree, bruh.

[@RealCoachMustafa]

I had the opposite journey as Marnix when it comes to self development. I was into game dev content first, then I got into self development. I was listening to Tim Ruswick's Game Dev Underground (which eventually merged with GDU) and he had this guy on his podcast, talking about Bulldog Mindset. So I checked out Bulldog Mindset, and I was really into it until I realized how crazy he is, then I got into better self development material. I was really deep into self development for maybe a year or two, but after a certain point, they keep repeating the same things so I eased off of self development podcasts and books.

[@gameworkerty]

Yeah like 95% of the point of that stuff is to make you feel bad enough to give them more money lol

[@RealCoachMustafa]

@@gameworkerty 95% is a bit of an exaggeration but I would definitely agree that Bulldog Mindset was setup to grift money from naive people.

[@marnixwyns]

I think there isn't a "perfect" guru out there, they all have something polarizing to them. For me it was mainly Hamza in recent years, although now I don't like his content anymore, back when I was starting BiteMe, I was constantly listening to it and what he talked about. -M

[@anonimowelwiatko9811]

@@marnixwyns you write from personal profile, no need for shortcuts :D

[@abdoulgadiroubah-ip5sb]

Thank you very much for this adviced , And please how do developers receive money from Google play store ?

[@FreakinfreakInfreaki]

It's simple. Embrace the fact that you will be exhausted all the freaking time lol

[@LorneDev]

Algo boost :)

[@markguyton2868]

Still tying to find the fun in game dev and my inability to understand code is probably causing it, so consistency isn't a thing for me unfortunately. Trying to figure stuff out still, but until then idk...

[@skippyzk]

I'm married. But if you can do it, I can do it

[@lew.bow.studios]

How to combine gamedev with working full time? Quit your job xD

[@anonimowelwiatko9811]

Marnix, eye bags are out of control, get some sleep man 😭

[@bitemegames]

He has been sick this week, so he doesn't look his best. He insists on uploading for the community though. Please cut him some slack this week. -T

[@ladyvipaka]

I work full time and do gamedev in my free time, and have for several years. Some of the advice in this video I strongly disagree with... Time-blocking to try and boost your efficiency and productivity to the max is mentally and emotionally unhealthy (if not exhausting) and will almost inevitably lead to burnout, because you'll be treating your gamedev like a full time job on top of already having a full time job. Using an amalgamation of purchased premade assets is a fast path to producing shovelware. In the end, one size doesn't fit all, and personally I think some of the advice in this video is both unsustainable and counter-productive to the goal of releasing a successful game.

[@celsladroma8048]

men dont talk just how to creat a game talk about how to create ART or story building.. im so jealous with a as a game dev also a youtube vlogg.

[@HansFriedrich532]

6:40 And yet all your games have been flops lol :')