Why Game Dev Tutorials Will Poison Your Progress

[@tiembanhbongbot]

Using tutorials is not a bad thing for newbie developers; they can serve as a reference for how to solve a specific problem. If you use an external library for animation, calculating, or even an engine to complete your game, then using a tutorial can also save you time. It's always about how you use it in the progress; there's a fine line between reinventing the wheel and perceiving deep knowledge.

[@douglascounts4634]

I think he is referring to the cut-and-paste form of development that many developers do. You see a lot of cut-and-paste for example in web development.

[@Ghorda9]

@@douglascounts4634 i good middle ground would be to go through the example your self and make it more readable and try to simplify it without it breaking.

[@DanCreaMundos]

The problem is looking for specific tutorials, what you need is tutorials about how to use your engine, not how to make a game.

[@Eroax]

I'd argue the problem is looking for too broad a topic. Ex. a tutorial that walks you from start to finish of a platformer is likely going to get you a working platformer. But you're not going to, to quote a video I watched recently, "see the lines they see". Or understand the underlying reasoning. Whereas learning how to implement specific mechanics, especially dissecting them. Gives you a better understanding of the mechanic by seeing alternative solutions. I think this is more a problem of *how* you follow a tutorial rather than the tutorials themselves. There's the joke of "ooh some github code. Mine now" and that's what people do a LOT with tutorials.

[@bakinto]

I learned a lot with tutorials then this video tbh..

[@Galvatorrix]

I became a blueprint expert by learning how to make one specific thing.. now I can make anything I think of, so i feel that judgment is off.

[@donaldslayer]

This, right now I’m making an actor component for an inventory system using Primary Data Assets as opposed to something like a data table, not sure why but the DT seemed less attractive than assets, either way none of the tutorials I’m looking at are using them, and the inventory logic is usually laughable as well - but watching them is still helpful, I’ve learned a bit about the UMG editor and actually managed to make a partially-functioning inventory UI.

[@lawrence4301]

@@Eroax i think that youd still be better off having built a platformer than having not built one tho (not saying you or anyone would disagree with this), for a lot of people the experience opens the door to let them in. A lot of the best tutorials for things like platformers or simple games will go into depth in justifying why theyre doing things theway they are, and theres still a way to engage with even the most A-B tutorial and learn something from it. Cant speak for others but for me trying to guess what the person is doing next and trying to implement it myself has been really good. Even if Ive had to dramatically rewrite stuff sometimes I've learnt so much in the process of doing so about so many things and thats been extremely helpful to me.

[@checkerbene]

To discourage beginners to start their journey with simple tutorials is just horrible. By learning from examples you can grow and start to understand why the tutorial was made that way. Motivation is also a huge factor as many will be happy to see something work quickly and change it to their designs, and not have to search through comment sections of small games on a game jam. If you start by taking programming courses or doing only theoretical research instead of just starting to build, it might just kill of the motivation and many might stop just there...

[@BonesOfficial_]

I thought how it was weird how they were calling the people who made the tutorials bad. It’s the person not taking the time to practice’s fault.

[@echo_the_developer]

yes, i started by first making a simple game following brackeys how to make a game series, i proabbly watched in about 4 times to fully understand, then i started experimenting,i. made a bunch of random stuff, a small fps and now 5 years later im working on my own game engine

[@ordonineonline]

I never used feature specific tutorial as far as i can remember. If you are genuinely interested in game dev, you should explore the tools available to you (such as learning classes, objects, game engine insight), not what you CAN do. It will benefit you more to learn why and how popular features were made than to copy them. That in turn, will also will also allow you to innovate and make THE game you invisioned. Right now my challenge is actually finishing a game and then publisbing it :)

[@developersbydesign]

Well said! The first game is always the hardest but it's also the best with how much you're able to learn. What type of game are you working on?

[@entername1107]

Same. I am working on a factory game so instead of looking up how to make factory game I figured out how to have a good building system and then figure everything else out from there. I found that you get a lot of creative freedom when you are just using tutorials that are giving you ideas not making a full fledged game. I did follow a step by step to make a fps but the reason was to figure out how movement mechanics can work and little tips and tricks that came along with it.

[@Uchidan]

This video summed up: Here are the tools to create glass. Good luck! What? You want to be taught how? No, that will poison your progress in learning how to make glass. Have fun! What's that? You'll probably give up really quickly because you have no idea what you are doing? Oh, that's too bad. Well, I suggest checking out GlassDev and touch some different types of glass, that will for sure help you know how to create your own glass right? No? Well, I guess you can maybe watch someone online who will show you EXACTLY how to make glass you want to make step by step, and then find other videos that will help you add to your existing glass, thus making the ACTUAL glass you want. BUT ultimately that is a BAD idea because then your glass won't be sturdy enough if you just watch videos. So, really you should just stumble around in the dark for a LONG LONG time until you magically know what you are doing because remember....glass making is hard....

[@NobleAbsinthe]

This is every video criticizing tutorial hell. Here's the secret, you never drop tutorials.

[@bluediskentertainment]

@@NobleAbsinthe Tutorial life forever!

[@lennysmileyface]

This is why I loved ThinMatrix's OpenGL tutorials since he doesn't show you how to make a game but the process and explanation of how and why you do things to build a game engine. This gave me a deeper understanding of how they work in general. I implemented my own systems on top of what I learned so it made me able to more easily use another engine and gave me a good understanding of syntax and logic. The only tutorials I watch are about a specific engine feature use.

[@OHTASISAN]

What people have to remember is that something is better than nothing in most cases. If you're out of shape and want to get fit, anything that gets you moving more than you did before will get you results. Sure you should be aware of certain things as you improve such as proper form and having a routine that you follow, but remember that all of those things are there to support your primary goal. You can get MORE fit with improper form and a haphazard routine but you can't get MORE fit without working out at all. Injury prevents consistency, just as having no routine might. Only insecure people will laugh at another for mistakes. Now extrapolating that over to general game development, sitting there for days and weeks looking for the best way to do things is ultimately worse than starting. People say that adults have a harder time learning than children and while that might be true from a physiological standpoint, the bigger issue at hand is that as people get older, they become burdened by knowledge. Everything becomes a management of resources. "Is this going to be right for me? What's the fastest/best way to do XYZ? Can I make money out of this?" Kids on the other hand just do things because it's fun. If you truly enjoy something you will master it. It's going to be hard to shake habits and fears but trust the process. Whether it's random tutorials or reading documentation or taking formal lessons, all you have to do is start and stick with it. Completing a flawed tutorial is still more valuable than quitting a Masterclass.

[@martinchya2546]

In the other hand, if you are experieced tutorials (I've around 20 years of programming experience), then those "tutorials for newbies" are actually great. Like, I was making some sort of inventory system in my game and I did not know how to implement drag&drop in unity. A 10min tutorial got me enough to make fully featured inventory system by myself. Other example is how to make objects glow in 2D Unity game. Brackeys tutorial was enough for me to get the concept about it being just HDR colors on scene with Bloom post processing effect and I've integrated the tutorial concept as a part of my master shader. Its just a shortcut for documentation and using it this way is great. The weird thing is however, I think they are more helpful to experienced developers that do not know Unity than begginners.

[@timurradman3999]

So this is what people upload when they realize that making informative content doesn't give as many views as making controversial content :) I'm doing Unity full-time thanks to these guys that helped start and made it look doable

[@razkanaz]

That is definitely not what he's doing

[@AwataraGame]

I'm 3 years solo developer without basic programming, I get a lot of information from other developer tutorial, so I agree that they aren't poison if you can modified their code.

[@DylanDev]

I'd argue that tutorials are a crucial step in learning game development without a technical computer science background. Documentation can be incredibly scary. As someone who started in tutorial purgatory but slowly learned how to problem solve for themselves, without tutorials I would not be where I am today, making a multiplayer game completely using documentation and my brain. Tutorials give you the tools you need but the only way to improve is to take what you learn and apply it.

[@xgamesstuff4408]

I won't say Game Dev tutorials will poison your progress. This "tutorial hell" is Level 1 GameDev where surface level knowledge matters and everything seems like copy and paste, they are great at getting a person with 0 experience in game dev or a specific feature off the ground. At that point, the developer should know what he/she wants. If you feel discouraged, then your experience is telling you to go another level. Level 2 GameDev is where design philosophy, code architecture, critical thinking, art style/direction matters. Try to understand what are problems in the project and design solutions around them. Once you mastered them, you are a technically a senior. Everyone has to go through Level 1 GameDev to reach Level 2 GameDev. Don't need to feel bad about it, you are not alone, we all been through there. Just enjoy the process, level up and have fun. :)

[@aktchungrabanio6467]

Exactly

[@jardavaclavik7060]

Just starting learning to game dev, think you got point. Watched one tutorial to get basics about unity, now im finishing tutorial's game(flappy bird) by adding things on my own(read, try till its good style). Next are gonna be some good old simple games(pac-man, arkanoid etc) before trying something complicated

[@princessjoanne4266]

What exactly did Brackeys do to get shit on the thumbnail? I swear this is the third video that uses his image as the "tutorials bad" man

[@manavroy7293]

Started my game development journey at 1 January 2023. Wasted my 3-4 months on reading complicated books, Following tutorials(Which was very annoying to copy paste code everytime..) Now,For the past 2 weeks, I'm working on pong game and this is what the real fun and learning is, Basically creating something with your own logic then copy's someone... Now I'm really enjoying game programing with sfml...

[@areallyboredindividual8766]

The way out of that tutorial trap for me was learning the fundamentals of programming in order to understand enough to attempt to make my own mechanics unassisted. From there, keep trying and failing and eventually you'll know the pitfalls to avoid and good habits to get into early in your project

[@HRforges]

Why try and reinvent the wheel though? Why am sitting here figuring out how to code a 3rd person camera when it's already been solved dozens of times over. Unless I want to do something different with the 3rd person camera that requires me doing it all myself, there is no reason not to follow in others footsteps. We all stand on the backs of giants, take advantage of that. Yes you should learn how to use the tools you are using, but you shouldn't ignore solved issues. You should learn how to take the solution and adapt it to your project, how you can modify it if need be. But like I said, reinventing the wheel is just dumb.

[@grayedsol]

You are not trying to reinvent something, you are trying to solve a problem. Comparing solutions for programming problems to the wheel is just not realistic. You won't know if there's a better solution to your problem unless you have a good understanding of it, which usually comes through at least trying to solve it first. Tutorials will only give you one solution to a problem that may have many. We all stand on the backs of giants, sure, but if you never take a step with your own two feet, you won't even learn how to walk. Since I'm not a fan of using only figurative language in such a circumstance, I'll also put it this way: Modifying a solution that's inherently suboptimal will not give you the optimal solution.

[@HRforges]

​@@grayedsol You are arguing with me but you shouldn't be. We, for the most part, actually agree with each other. I said this in my original post "Yes you should learn how to use the tools you are using, but you shouldn't ignore solved issues.". That is to say, you shouldn't be c/p everything and Frankenstein together a build but instead learn how to use the tools you are using and take advantage of solutions that already exist. If you adequately understand the tools you are using you will know very quickly whether or not you need to engineer a solution yourself. I am 100% an advocate for learning how to solve your own problems. Say you are making a 3rd person game and you've never made a 3rd person camera before. There are many ways you can do this, some more efficient than others and some better optimized than others and some even are better suited for different styles of 3rd person games. Do you lock yourself in a cave and try to figure this out on your own? No that's a colossal waste of time. Instead you should be researching the different methods and then LEARN how to implement that method into your project, NOT c/p it but actually learn it. But what if I research and no existing methods do what I need the 3rd person camera to do? Congrats that's the use case where knowing your tools means you can build that solution yourself. My point wasn't "don't learn how to do it yourself, just copy". My point was you shouldn't lock yourself in a cave and ignore the existence of solved problems. Artists learn other Artists art styles all the time to broaden their skillset and knowledge base, programmers can and should do the same.

[@grayedsol]

@@HRforges If that is your stance, then yeah, I agree. I only objected because it seemed you were advocating for tutorials, which don't actually teach you what your tools do or how to solve your own problems. The majority of "tutorial" videos are completely unnecessary when you can just do what you mentioned: research methods and implement them.

[@raposojogadorgf8761]

@@grayedsol Stfu for a second and think, your methodology doesn't apply to everyone. When will people learn that each person has their own unique learning style? If you don't have formal education in pedagogy, neurology or something similar then just be quiet and stick to your field of expertise instead of pretending you know what's best for every single person in the world.

[@grayedsol]

@raposojogadorgf8761 Who hurt you? If you're going to use that logic, then maybe you should check if the creators of those game tutorials have a formal education in making games and pedagogy (hint: they don't) I'm not saying people shouldn't do what's best for them, but if you rely on tutorial videos, you're inherently limited to whatever information random youtubers decide put in them. You don't need a degree to know that someone who can read docs will have a better understanding than someone who's stuck in tutorial video hell.

[@blackcitadelstudios]

Well said. I started with tutorials but made sure that I understood how it works. Now, 3 months in with my game and I seldom check tutorials now and make my code on my own... ☺️

[@GreenBlueWalkthrough]

I all the creative stuff I do my number 1 rule with tutorials are... Never follow them exactly but listen to them and reference them while making something of your own. Like Pixel art/RPG maker/Synth music/Writing tutorial people are really good with remembering that is their place not to expressly make a step by step guide but to teach the program/methods. So yeah this is a major problem in creative circles thanks for covering it!

[@REDFLECTED]

This is so underrated. Good video! You earned a sub.

[@developersbydesign]

Thanks for the sub!

[@jackproductions4668]

for a little counter argument I learned 3d this way for over 2 years and eventually understood the concepts taught in the tutorials and was able to create most of the 3d content I want 3d character animation environment whatever. I now have a good production pipe line and can problem solve mostly by myself with the occasional tutorial to learn something new.

[@shubham40901]

I have been a guy who never searched for any tutorial for feature but i implemented my own, I watch tutorial of others how they implemented that same features after i have already made solution, this way you learn a lot and you also find out other's approach and what would be the best way to refine your version of feature to work properly.

[@_zurr]

I use tutorials frequently, but I typically don't use them as-is. They generally serve as jumping-off points for learning what Unity features already exist and how they can be manipulated. The basic requirement for any design challenge still exists: breaking down big problems into smaller chunks and connecting those chunks together.

[@Inexpiablee]

Exactly. when I started I used plenty of tutorials to learn the basics. Then at some point of understood all of tools and began making my own tools/levels ect. I think they are great for beginners. The ones that fail are just trying to copy things and have no creativity/ don't want to actually learn themselves and just want to copy and paste.

[@SneakyKittyGameDev]

As one of these tutorial channels (a small one cause C++ master race), your spot on (granted I have a few playlists on optimization XD). Tutorials should be used to get familiar with something, a starting point. The problem ends up being (more often than not) people using those tutorials and basically copy/pasting from them without learning anything or being able to apply that "skill" elsewhere. For example you want to learn UI so you watch a tutorial on how to make a main menu. Anyone with the ability to self learn will use what they learned from that tutorial to make a HUD and other types of UI, but most will only see it as "now I only know how to make a main menu and cant do anything else, let me lookup how to make a HUD even though its the same process". I have this problem specifically with covering the Online Subsystem in Unreal. It's all an interface so the functions, delegates, and other variables are all the same between platforms, yep people still cant figure it out without handholding going between platforms

[@thegamedevcave]

100% wanted to just jump in an say you're doing great putting up C++ tutorials. i've spent the last few months getting into C++ for unreal and damn... we need more decent and good quality C++ learning content on youtube because there is so little of it!

[@shannenmr]

If you do happen to be making a FPS in Unreal Engine though check out Sneaky Kitty's FPS plugin, its the best you will fine and with the recent updates won't lock you into using any of his specific base classes like all the others

[@shannenmr]

I want to put my idea forward again for a tutorial series where you pick common feature(s) (i.e. Line trace) / math function(s) (i.e. Dot product) per video and showing basics around how to write the code and explaining it ofcource but then go into the creative ways you could use it giving examples from games people would know and which you can easily find footage to use behind and potentially pause and draw diagrams over.

[@SneakyKittyGameDev]

@@shannenmr Something kind of like this series I did with the line traces? kzbin.info/aero/PLnHeglBaPYu9ckf7kkAzUOHdmOAtWxg7u

[@shannenmr]

@@SneakyKittyGameDev Yeah I saw those but where my thoughts were going is more show people "cool" / "iconic" mechanics in games that people might think would be hard / custom code but then say they all can be done with the out of the box math formula(s) like this simple example you could build one. Trying to promote people to realise these cool things are usually not that complicated and to think about how they can use these in-built features and your basic example to create their own cool thing.

[@chrono581]

One of the most important things I learned early, and they never tell you this in the tutorials, is how to read your programming language's documentation. That is what will help you the most if you're using Unity, you're using C#, And the Unity documentation. Once you learn how to do that, you can solve problems for yourself.

[@fifthwit1318]

as someone in the process of learning front end work I think the best way to learn, at least for me is to watch some tutorials on how that stuff works then, look thru modern websites and find something cool then try to reverse engineer it and I think it applys knowledge a lot

[@12DAMDO]

i agree... this is why i only watch them rarely when i really feel like i have no other choice... and then afterwards i usually get annoyed by the lack of people actually answering my actual question, i procrastinate for 2 days, go back to my script, figure it out myself, and laugh maniacally like i'm Light Yagami

[@HE360]

I have gane development tutorials on my channel and I simply make tutorials on things that I had to figure out on my own and I make tutorials so that another person wouldn't have to go through what I went through when I was trying to learn a specific thing. Through visuals, explanations and demos, my intention is to save a person time and stress for when they attempt to implement what I showed them or they could take what they learned from my tutorials and expand on it. For example, I might show people how to recycle their enemies in their game instead of deleting them. And they could expand on the recycle method. That same recycle method could be used to recycle the clouds in their games or cars or people walking around in the background, etc. And this isvjust an example on how people could expand on what they learned

[@ProrokLebioda]

Late to the party, but wholeheartedly agree! I have only few small projects under my belt and maybe one was achieved by just following the tutorial... and I've dropped this project as soon as I finished tutorial. Tutorials are great for learning new tools, engine capabilities, and so on, but going through 10h of "let's make a X game" won't get the project done. I agree.

[@mmmmmmmmmmm10]

You have to start somewhere and beginners watch tutorials to start learning. Once the become better they watch less tutorials. This shouldn't even be a video. Edit: seems that I was wrong and this video raises some good points to help some aspiring devs

[@nickbell1198]

Agreed

[@captainfordo1]

No the message of this video is actually very important.

[@costelinha1867]

Not if they never learn to move away form tutorials in the first place. The term "Tutorial Hell" exists for a reason. Which is the same reason that makes this video A LOT more important than you think. Specially for beginners. Yes, beginners start with tutorials. But if they're not careful, as the video explained, these tutorials can become a crutch of which the aspiring dev will depend on to the point they're incapable of making anything by themselves. I say that from my own experience.

[@mmmmmmmmmmm10]

@@costelinha1867 thanks for sharing your experience, appreciate it. I guess I haven't had this problem before and didn't see the possibility of others using tutorials differently. For any skill I only really use tutorials for learning a new skill or way to code a certain functionality, and I spend more time learning by making my own things and experimenting.

[@bengoodell8440]

Honestly people learn however works for them. To dictate and say one is better then the other doesn't help, that said it's still worth thinking about so good on yah for bringing it up. Personally I like both following and experimenting and even complete works (templates) are beneficial to be pulled apart like you would taking a clock appart etc. As well as I believe the goal of UE is to make it easier for anyone to make games...you don't need to know how UE code works to use UE.

[@djrmarketing598]

I wrote my first games typed in from magazines on Commodore and DOS. And it's a huge jump today to go from something then to something now. But I think it's important beyond tutorials to understand the core components of a game - your objects (the NPCs, Player, Items etc), building them with good design patterns (Object becomes Item becomes Weapon, etc Object->Character->Player etc). Then once you've mastered the basics, adding in things like input loops, etc. One of the biggest things I've seen in my journey over the years from making games then, Turbo Pascal, C, later C#, Flash, Unity, Godot, etc is realizing that optimization is HUGE. You could have 250-1000 objects on the level, badly optimized, and your game runs poorly. But by using object inheritance, you could easily have a function added to the most basic object that says "IsVisible" that turns off a bunch of checks and suddenly your game performance is fantastic.. You also have multi-threading, and stuff like that too. It's not as big of an issue today on fast desktop PC's but mobile games, if you want to have compatibility that's not just "the latest 2 flagship phones", you will have optimize EVERYTHING.

[@omle8492]

I feel into the trap when I started game dev. All aspects of my game were tutorials. Later on I tried to do stuff but didn't know how to even edit my own code because I didn't know what it all meant. Now I barley follow them as I realized that I didn't learn much.

[@Private_Duck]

Simply put, You only learn if you face an obstacle that you cant get over with your current knowledge. If you watch a tutorial, it will just teleport you to the top of the obstacle. Instead only resort to tutorials after exhausting every other option. Also only use tutorials just to get an idea a new perspective. This way you actually learn faster and most importantly, youll have confidence in your knowledge. Thats how i learned physics, mathematics, numerical analysis, programming everything

[@Camobiwon]

Great video. I've been doing game dev for a few years now and it is even my fulltime job. I don't think there is any specific route that someone can follow to success, but it is absolutely true that you cannot just only watch tutorials for all of your core features and expect it to work out. I've seen many people struggle with that and it never works out for them.

[@Manas-co8wl]

Dude he's gone let him fucking go. Oh my god why do people never leave Brackeys alone? Tutorials are tutorials they're nothing more nothing less. It's not some panacea and it's not some heinous thing that must be revived once in awhile only to have it banished. Jesus..

[@thegamedevcave]

as someone who both follows and creates tutorial, i can agree wholeheartedly with this! I personally watch tutorials as a source of inspiration, not instruction and when I follow something feature specific, i right away try to change up things so I can make sure I'm understanding what i'm doing, not just copying what I see on screen. at the same time, in my comment sections, I see a lot of people without basic troubleshooting and problem solving skills. that's probably in general not something I can fault them for very much but it does show that people will just step by step copy your instructions and then when it doesn't work, have no understanding of what they're doing and game development is really only a small part creating, and a HUGE part changing, experimenting and irritating... all thing you NEED understanding for.. in the same way, I tend to see a lot of people, when they get stuck only ask for help by saying " it doesn't work" , because of course, the people who see an error code and go figure out what that error means and what could cause it on their own, which I'm sure also happens all the time, dont ever comment for help, because they have learned to help themselves. Above all that is what you should learn as a game dev, not any individual bit of code or technique, but the ability to learn and develop an understanding of your situation and the tools you work with, once you get to that point, literally everything is possible now. (which doesn't mean that you'll flawlessly be able to create anything right away, but once you learn how to learn, it's only a matter of finding the info you need.) as a tutorial creator, I do try my best to explain not only what I'm doing but also WHY i'm doing things, but it's a hard balance to land, you never know who might be watching and if you might be under or over explaining things. But my goal personally is always to deliver at least a bit of understanding on top of a specific list of instructions to use. sorry this comment ended up being a bit long but this is very much something I've been thinking about lately too and I think I can bring a somewhat interesting perspective into the discussion here :)

[@Vivi-xn9iz]

The way I improved in game dev was the same as when I learned English. I only knew basic sentences that school taught me and from there, I started learning by myself with the foundation I had. When you learn a new language, you usually learn by the book, with formal sentences that people don't use every day. When you learn with a tutorial, you're learning about how to do something specific but you don't know why you're doing it and it might as well be bad practice. Thus, I can only recommend looking at documentation just like you'd read a dictionary, read other people's code like you're reading a discord chat

[@L1da77]

As a person who have watched these tutorials quite a bit I'm not sure I agree with all of this. Tutorials are directed towards noobs, for sure but what is a noon anyway? I'm a programmer by trade so why am I watching noob friendly tutorials on how to create games? It's the tools that force me to do it. I'd say that 90+% of the tutorials out there are aimed towards Unity/UE and when you first start those up there's like a million stuff in there. Extremely daunting and near impossible to familiarise yourself with unless you have unlimited free time or do it as a full time job. If you don't know anything about game programming there's also the language barrier, knowing what all of those abbreviations and words mean. That's where tutorials come in to play. Suddenly you have a person guiding you through, showing you where you can change stuff and how it works. The programming part is a very very small part of what, atleast I, take away from the tutorials since that can, mostly, be figured out. And like I said, if you don't have unlimited time then good luck getting into one of these tools. They have a dirty habit of changing the ui in such a way that even tutorials can be misleading... What I think is right about your video is that there needs to be a better understanding of what the next steps are when creating games. Like optimization. Someone should make a tutorial about that 😉

[@benjaminbristow]

I think when starting out for myself using tutorials is great! The problem arises when you're just follow the tutorials and not actually understanding what is happening or why you are doing this to make this happen. I found myself falling into this pattern and started playing around with projects after I had finished a tutorial to turn 1 enemy spawner into multiple enemy spawners or different things. Now im sitting at my desk and coming up with solutions for things I never could have thought of before using logic surrounding the engine but I never could have gotten to this point without a few tutorials here or there.

[@cinneyyy]

This is actually how I started game dev. I watched tutorials for the first few months but as time went on I just remembered how to implement and to certain things more and more, until the questions were just standard programming questions. Then I started to do things without a game engine, in different languages, etc. This can very well only be my experience though, because I can totally see how a new game developer will just continue watching tutorials for way longer and getting discouraged not being able to do what they actually want. Edit: I just rembered that the reason I might have learnt well that way was because I experimented a bit at every step, e.g. with different parameters, formulas, removing/adding some things, etc. to see how they behave / what they do.

[@developersbydesign]

The problem is the dependency on tutorials not so much the tutorials themselves. It sounds like you hit the ground running, not only did you follow tutorials but you experimented and that's what I wanted to push with this video. Tutorials scratch the surface. There's more learning done in doing and testing than just copying which is a trap a lot of people fall down.

[@cinneyyy]

@Developers By Design Thanks, I also very clearly remember starting without any idea what game I wanted to make, I just wanted to know how to make a game in general which is also a bit unusual I think. Also, very good video, I see you're a new channel? If so you already have a good style of making videos.

[@alexthompson8977]

@@developersbydesign I'm working on my first game(a turn based on) and I only used one tutorial. An over 100 part tutotirla by Game Dev experiments. It's just a good tutorial as it teaches you all the concepts and how and why it's implements. I'm relatively new to coding yet still the game in it's current state feels completely different as the tutorial allowed me to use the knowledge to expand it with my own ideas.

[@jeramyiscool]

I started with tutorials until I got the basics from it now I just ask the forums for more advanced stuff... which I will eventually learn to do bit by bit.

[@imthecryptic]

Same I am a beginner and everytime i copy code i always go around changing everything seeing HOW it works, seeing line by line WHY it works, etc then I can build them in my own ways (example the game im making doesnt have any tutorials as its too different from the tutorials... so i kinda dont have a choice lol)

[@hackticdev]

You're completely correct and as someone making game dev tutorials myself it's something I'm keenly aware of. I think as a learner its important to use tutorials more as a tool to learn the general skills required to begin making things by yourself, and as tutorial creators we have a responsibility to create tutorials that give people a jumping off point to learn more general skills, and don't just show them the very specific way to do one particular thing.

[@hackticdev]

I'm also quite surprised to see you've only been making videos for 2 weeks, your stuff is already very high quality and you definitely deserve more views. I wish you all the best in this KZbin journey!

[@xhago605]

a complete video told by both sides of the story, not biased

[@eltipobuho]

The problem i have with tutorials are the amount i need to see in order to solve a single problem, for example some time ago i was looking for a way to create a mute sound button for my game, i looked at tutorials and they had similar solutions but applied for their cases alone, some used one single scene for everything, which i didn't, others used GamePrefs which i used but never worked when starting the game. At the end of things i had to create a Frankstein of a mute button which did the job but for the beginning. It was discouraging how i went from trying one solution, watch it fail, try another, see another thing break and at some point i was about to give up, few to no answers in the comments section either, a few of them were "use GamePrefs and put the button to don't destroy, bye" and there i was asking myself how.

[@levinevara8592]

I hope the algorithm favors your videos

[@Leon-cm4uk]

It is the same like developing enterprise software like apps, websites or whole complex systems for administering a companies assets. Tutorials are good to build a basic understanding but that won't be enough for building a fully functional software. You have to search for small project ideas (e.g. the famous Todo app), try out and use the knowledge and work your way up to bigger projects (like a full website with login, registration, a chat, sending friend requests etc.) If you build something like that from the ground up then you will have enough to do for months! Through failing in each and every project you will learn more than only relying on tutorials. And at some point you developed so much that you know what components are used in each and every software each and every time. At this point you will get faster in development and only very specific problems will be challenging and take a lot of time.

[@nullx2368]

Tutorials don't and shouldn't reflect the skill that you should achieve. While they "suck" in my opinion they teach you the proper path and not poison you. Learning the "bad way" first is not bad, I think it's crucial to understand why the better method is superior. It also makes it easier for new game devs to understand the work required to make a game without going in details. Advanced tutorials don't exist because that is your journey to make.

[@jcd9456]

This video is timely! This week I have been thinking of honing my skill as a game programmer and hopefully make a good release but what's holding me back is that I always forgot what I do. This video struct me and I think it helped me progress in my learning.

[@EstebanGallardo]

That's why the courses/academia exist. To learn how to think and face any kind of project. To create a solid architecture for any software project. Last year I prepared a course to teach students how to start thinking about creating that solid structure for they projects to grow. Tutorials are great when you have a doubt about something specific, but as a foundation to create software is the most horrible think you can do. Eventually you end up with a bunch of spaghetti code that can barely hold itself together.

[@AJ213Probably]

Generally, I will use tutorials as a base and end up refactoring the entire system to fit my needs. I have gone as far as follow an entire minecraft unity tutorial series, that I ended up refactoring to be multiplayer and more what I wanted.

[@SashoSuper]

Man i remember when i watched my first tutorial, i was so focused, trying to understand everything and then 30 minutes tutorial turned into 3 hours, the strange thing is that it happened again a 10 hour tutorial turned into 13 days.

[@InnerEagle]

Then you get so desperated you ask ChatGPT, it helps but then you are stuck talking to him confessing all your problems to him, and he's gonna cry with you

[@Pipubbles]

I really struggle with this, as I feel scared to waste my time on mechanics and different solutions when there could be an easier way. It is the only thing that is reinforced in the community: work smarter, not harder. I feel that if I create something, especially when there is a time limit, that if I can’t complete it in time through experimenting, then I will fail and have nothing to show for it. In the community, lots of people make fun of spaghetti code or say “you should have looked it up,” and it is really hard to find a balance when you are on the clock. Do you try to problem solve a solution for a couple of hours or do you follow a video fully that could be the solution, a dead end (as it can’t be customized) or it just doesn’t work and you haven’t learned. This is why I got stuck on trying to create 2d eyes on a 3d models, that dynamically moved around and worked in unity. Could I have just animated the individual frames and put it on a mesh? Yea. But I want to have a particular vision for the appearance of the character. The last time I tried a similar feature, I completely it my way but ran into a ton of problems, where I had to manual fix every frame. Idk I just don’t feel that it is simple to know when to stop looking for tutorials and when to actually start debugging.

[@mathdantastav2496]

Tutorials are really important, they help u get started, but after u have started and made the first functional project, erase it all and make a new one from scratch, by urself

[@mr.haiwan]

I also started by watching a lot of tutorials and I didnt understand anything and didnt do anything and gave up. But after 2 years of doing nothing I decided to give it another shot but with a different approach. I knew that I wanted to use unity but I didnt knew anything about programming language c# so I decided to learn the programming language first. I started with simple Console Apps with the .NET Framework in Visual Studio. And when I got comfortable with the language and knew the basics I started to learn Unity. It was a challenge, because its a different thing from .NET and learning was slow but I progressed. I watched tutorials but just to get an idea how something gets implemented and I tried to do it by myself or I copy the code and mess around with it. Deleting lines adding more features and so on. This personally helped me to not give up and learn. I also managed to create my first own game and I am still learning it. But it wasnt the only thing that helped me also the documentation was really helpful too!

[@OllieMendes]

I think this is true for any kind of tutorial or thing you're trying to learn. In coding it's called "tutorial hell" where you learn how to complete the tutorial but never take anything away from it. With art there are just so many methods and styles that no one can really teach you how to make art just like how you want to make art.

[@Uchidan]

I guess art classes just shouldn't be a thing huh?

[@hansbansor5170]

I think tutorials are a great starting point to experiment - it should never be the exact solution to your problem but it can be a factor. Id agree with your title if it says "why game dev tutorials can poison your progress".

[@Uchidan]

A MUCH better title for this video

[@zoolanderbestmovie2]

Exactly no one use tutorials for making a game they use tutorials to understand the code knowing the basics for c# is nothing like using c# for make games even knowing the basics of unity will not make you write the code that is needed you must somehow to learn from someone else who have already figured out for example not using tutorials for code is like not using tutorial to learn how to solve advanced mathematics as many hours you spend looking it you will never solve it even if you know the basic of mathematics

[@JokeryEU]

tutorials are good as a way to learn how things work, from there you need to learn on your own, and you will remember everything you learned.

[@orangelimesky]

Only the very basic unity tutorials are the best. In fact when starting out, making the exact game as the tutorial can be useful because seeing code actually work for yourself can encourage you. But once you're done with a couple of tutorial series and want your own game made - stay away from tutorial series. Tutorials are specifically made with speed and simplicity in mind. They don't talk about the very detailed mechanics actual games have. For that , you gotta play games and find inspiration. Learn to code by writing your own code from imagination.

[@bluethan806]

Optimization is the one thing that i worry about the most regarding game development. I'm currently studying it and planning to start my own personal project before next year, but programming is my weak spot, and i definitely want to make sure it's optimized going in

[@developersbydesign]

As a designer, I'm not good at programming but that's okay. We all have our strengths and weakness. It's okay for things to not be perfect

[@Kaycegamez]

I’ve just looked up Tutorials when I can’t figure something out and I end up learning g about other stuff in the videos lol

[@Galvatorrix]

I feel like common sense (if one has any) dictates that doing one or two "how to make a game" tutorials won't make you an expert. But how else do people learn these intensive programs? Tutorials/Teaching/Learning/Doing, The more information you consume and the more you do the work, the more your brain recognizes the program and how to do things. So you're kind of off about telling people not to watch "How to" videos. Thats just discouraging

[@travelOblivion]

You could have made the same point without trying to discredit prominent figures of The Game Dev community I've never met a developer that said let's not look at any documentation asked for help or watch a video and let's brute-force this problem

[@another_day6325]

As a beginner i look up tutorials and understands the concept and try to to do it myself without watching the whole tutorial, this is only possible if you have a good tutorial that explain what we are about to do, if it directly gets into steps then I learn nothing. If I'm completely stuck then only I take up the complete tutorial.

[@JanbluTheDerg]

I only ever look for specific things now if I genuinely can't figure out how to implement something, or if I'm not quite sure that something is going to work. Also this same thing happened in university with my classmates, they ended up too reliant on the programming teacher and Unity tutorials and so they were kinda trapped in a cycle of not knowing what to do when a new problem arose.

[@codernunk]

Great video! I tend to look up tutorials at first to save time, but I’m happy to solve the problem on my own if I can’t find anything. As I start making my own content, I’ll keep in mind how I can show my viewers how to problem solve effectively. Thanks for the insight!

[@okamichamploo]

It's basically the difference between following a recipe to bake a cake vs going to culinary school to learn what the chemistry behind that cake is

[@AndrzejGieraltCreative]

Hey I seem to remember a video concept very similar to this one 😅good stuff, you probably explained it way better than me.

[@rezistsoul1687]

idk if Unreal has any tutorials but Unity provides FANTASTIC tutorials on their site that helped be learn the engine greatly, haven't touched unity since I started learning Blender but I can still do most of the tutorials by memory at this point

[@Bollalillo]

Thank you, im in this situasion. This was an eye opener for me. so thank you very much

[@capucci-kun8151]

Keet it up man! It motivates me!

[@drawer_resp3858]

Not only in game dev, many programs I newly started, I need a tutorial to just get a grip on the UI. Then I use less and less as my game isn't the same game the tutorial making no more. I do look for how to do specific functions but I have to know how to modify those to my use also.

[@odinniereece4096]

Im still learning unity but instead of following tutorials i would instead learn the to implement the system(cinemachine/input system etc) and learn unity built in functions for scripting. I think thats giving me the best results

[@SonOfFurzehatt]

I think this kind of learning is okay if you aren't intending to make a masterpiece - it's fine for a proof-of-concept version to take to a professional developer, for example.

[@shawns4354]

This guy just said what most people should know. If you don't, then that's a whole nother tutorial you need.

[@tmate88-j8y]

Needed this video. The best way to learn is making easy games that already exist and bringing your new skills to the next project. I made rock paper scissors and now I'm making a card game. But I'm getting stuck so I'm gonna make tic tac toe to learn some new things. One day I asked myself, if Rome wasn't built in a day, nor were the current Nintendo games, so why am I trying to make complex games when I haven't learned to get there by making pong or super Mario bros? Start by remaking stuff that already exists to learn the engine, then make the games of your dreams with what you learned.

[@Derrick_Rifkin]

TFW suddenly game development-videos go the full Sir Ken Robinson-route out of nowhere XD

[@DJaycerOfficial]

I’m currently having this problem. While I find game maker videos on specific things and they go a little in depth about certain aspects, they don’t come back with those aspects.

[@VividPastels]

as someone who's had multiple attempts at creating a game, all of which (until now) ended at the "tutorial, open unity then give up" stage, i find that the issue with a lot of tutorials is the fact that, while they do make things as simple as they can, they still don't go over EVERYTHING. yeah, sounds stupid, but what i mean by that is that all code is alien to a beginner. why do you use this statement here? why is there a command made up of 3 words which seemingly make no sense, and what does it do? why do we have to use that? when do i use " ", , () and why? they don't explain these. i found one guy on yt who did explain, and nothing else. he explained the most used commands, what they mean and what they do, and it was the most useful thing ever. it reminded me to go back to the basics (scratch, "programming" on paper), and think of every aspect of a feature, which then leads to an idea on how to make it happen. if all tutorials were like that, treating you as an actual beginner learner rather than a copy machine at school, then they'd lead to more productive things. the issue probably comes from the fact that those who make the videos are expert programmers who forget or just assume things make sense for everyone, when it'd be easier if they stepped down their level a little. still though, i appreciate the people who take time out of their day to educate others, no matter how well, because it's still information. that's my two cents

[@bonbon5000]

Honestly, that's what bugs me about GDevelop tutorials and the forums. Every time I look up a tutorial or ask a question on the forums, the answer I receive is always focused more on CONVENIENCE instead of OPTIMIZATION, which is annoying if you're making a bigger project I don't want to do it the easy way, I want to do it the smart way At this point, I end up learning more by reverse engineering games and picking through the code rather than looking up a tutorial. That way, I can see how a full game is optimized, which is super helpful, and tbh, something that I recommend to every aspiring game developer

[@badratindiedev8328]

Omg, im glad that i didnt fall on this tutorial trap, back in 2021, i started using an engine by watching tutorials, and now i know everything about it 😅

[@Phyllion-]

Optimization aside, I've noticed that many tutorials are filled with full-on bad advices that make you waste time beyond optimization once your prototype is completed by forcing you to completely rebuild multiple systems. Or even has you abandon ideas that turned out to seem like they do not work when the problem really was that something else was breaking it, but you had no way of knowing that as a beginner. Tutorials are nice to give you pointers but if you do go that way, then you should always cross check their pointers with other sources to make sure you're not being told something completely wrong or time wasting. It might seem like a time consuming practice at first but it'll save you so much time down the line by helping you learn and figure out on your own how not to build systems that will be optimization nightmares at the end of the day(or month, or year)

[@robertbloom4424]

The problem is that new folks aim for their "dream game" instead of making simple games with 1 or two basic versions of mechanics/tools that you they don't understand to learn the basics and then move on to more complex development.

[@jmathg]

What you said at 2:20 pretty much covers it: If you don't know why you're using what you are, you'll never be able to learn how to solve more general problems. But that doesn't mean tutorials poison progress - you just have to watch them with that in mind. Every tutorial should be a three part process. 1) Watch them and follow along to get the ideas, syntax, and "muscle memory". 2) Try to recreate the project yourself without referring to the original tutorial/project. 3) Try to improve on it by building your own features using what you learned. As you quickly mentioned, you see the same thing teaching math in schools/universities. People are so used to following a procedure without knowing why. Doing a math major is a great way to learn the instinct to ask why and learn HOW to ask why. Finding ways to answer your question given a set of certain building blocks. As all mathematical theorems are built upon smaller propositions which can be proved straight from the axioms of your logical system. Changing those building blocks (axioms) and you get a different system which might be more/less efficient or allows you to prove different results that might not have been previously possible. This extends well to programming - theoretically all you should need to master a program is its documentation!

[@philsadler6665]

Ouch. Followed an endless runner tutorial as I believed it would serve as a great foundation. Got to the end - working fine. Now to start extending, I wanted to serve a range of 'environments' like industrial, forest etc. Uhoh!!!! Not possible within this design, just the same 'block' over and over - very efficient, but hmm a little limited.... Initially slight disappointment, a little time wasted to see if it was possible to achieve, then classed the week as an investment in techniques learning etc. Quickly decided to now use the 'gained knowledge' and start from scratch with my own structure. So I fully agree, one should use them by all means but not think they'll be extensible/customisable into your own game...great video - and for me at this point comforting!!!

[@mahersabit9265]

this is why i wanted to learn programming first. even tho i knew the basics, but when using that in game engines such as unity and unreal, its like everything ive learned didnt work. or maybe its because i only know the basics in programming. which is why im now tryna learn the programming tutorials instead of the "how to" tutorials. hopefully thatd be better in understanding what im/ill be doing. because like you said majority of time is problem solving, which is true

[@fakesocialdynamics9929]

because I know I want movement function to be shared by both npc and player. I can't build a movement function based on player input I want my collision to be based on is that place traversable based on varibles countained by that object at that location and the comunicate to my movement function to disable it if the attempt was to go there, rather than draw a shape manually in the game engine, that's like building a game using duck tape same thing with dealing with z aixs in a 2D game, I don't want to manually put a texture there and then draw a collision box, rather I want code to handle the displacement of texture and I want texture and tiles seperated so that an object can be in multiple places, I want to use larger one piece texture to cover the mechanically tile based map, I want the game to be able to know that this group of tiles can be seeing as one unit and use one larger texture, useful for ai to know and texture drawing, rather than using a tile set and paint everything in big pixels same thing with path finding I needed my own take where ai think like a human and generalize compounds and entrances, free moving spaces, corridors court yards, roofed, fensed, I don't want my ogre to magically know how to walk out of a maze using copied code or downloaded script, I want him to behave dumb exhuasted, fruastrated and give up same with animation, sound etc, following the norm has zero value, it's something that already exist, and following that same structure won't get you where you want to be otherwise it's just not the game I'm interested in building, not my game, once you know what each function in your game need to be able to do write down what kind of functions need to be in the game, how they work with each other, before writting any code, so that you don't get attached to some code that will cripple you in the long run read documents or manual on the scripting language and program what you need, that's the only way programming gonna be fun,

[@Weird_Quests]

How would you recommend learning to code for developing your own games without getting too far down the tutorial rabbit hole?

[@phancanedoo013]

I figured that would be the case. Most tutorials i've followed just explain how you get to their results, but not how the many steps actually work. The tutorial i went through for Unity may have gone in depth about the components' functionality, some Ui elements and managing the game objects and stuff, but the programming side was never fully explained. When do i use Vector2 or Vector3? How do i get one program to read data that isn't colliders and object transforms? Is there a better form of single line raycasts? How do i make those two otherwise unrelated objects interact? And most importantly for me personally: How do i ACTUALLY create machine learning algorithm in C# beyond just the theory? It's frustrating, especially the AI part, you have no idea how many "tutorials" i've seen to AI, which explain the theory, but never how to actually code that stuff! X(

[@theonewithoutalife8519]

I usually try to find a tutorial for how to make a feature, and than try to impliment that into my game. If I can't find one, than I just have to spend like a week or two figuring it out.

[@TheRealCzechmark]

Tutorials for game development. Model: Default (GPT-3.5)  Below is a comment I want to make on a video that says game development tutorials are bad. I disagree and this is my reply: "I think there is a misunderstanding what tutorials are for. I believe every beginner should do a tutorial, as it gets you used to the process of how to finish a game. Even if it is a small crappy game. But tutorials won't make you a game designer alone. After the 1st tutorial, you need to then practice and create something original to you. Then find the small videos of things that you are have trouble with. Example, how do I put an animation on my character in Unreal Engine? But like everything, you start with a tutorial. Driving, sports, skills, etc. It is up to you to practice on your own to become better at it." Can you create a better reply? I think tutorials are an excellent starting point for any aspiring game developer. They can provide a foundation for understanding the tools and techniques required to create games. However, it's important to understand that tutorials are just that - a starting point. To become a successful game developer, you need to take what you've learned from the tutorials and apply it in a creative and original way. This means using your imagination to come up with unique game concepts and mechanics. Additionally, it's important to recognize that game development is an ongoing learning process. You'll encounter new challenges and obstacles as you progress, and it's essential to continue seeking out resources and information to overcome them. So, while tutorials are a great way to get started, they're just the beginning of a long and exciting journey into the world of game development. With dedication, practice, and a willingness to learn, you can develop the skills needed to create truly amazing games.

[@ed_halley]

I think it's pretty crappy that you use a famous tutorial creator's headshot as the thumbnail AND first shot in your video, just to tear down the whole tutorial concept. No matter how carefully you make your point, it comes off as making it personal against this one guy in particular. Luckily he has quit his widely-lauded series, but maybe it's because of people (ab)using him like this.

[@l2hetoric]

I entirely agree will you. Garbage move alright. Id hope they update the thumbnail to be something more appropriate.

[@RandomShowerThoughts]

Imo watching a single tutorial course, and then know the basics and then look up whatever you need

[@yunggolem4687]

In reality, most people in this field are more "modders" than "developers". Gamedev is time management & triage. Gamedev is choosing a scope of innovation appropriate for your available manhours (usually almost none for solodev). * Solving all but the simplest problems from scratch takes 50x longer than looking up the orthodox method or purchasing an asset to handle it. * 95% of systems required for a game are not ripe for reinvention. Time spent reinventing these methods is time wasted, unless you have a specific plan for how altering a fundamental system will create a novel and attractive experience for the player. * Minimize time cost everywhere innovation/experimentation is irrelevant. * Every hour you save implementing required basic systems is an hour you can spend banging your head against implementation & tweaking the one or two intriguing & novel ideas your game needs. This is the reality of gamedev. It is absolutely NOT about doing everything from scratch or learning how to solve every problem from first principles. It's about becoming extremely efficient at implementing orthodoxy so that you can repurpose that saved time toward deconstructing, remixing, or reinventing one or two areas of orthodoxy. If you try to do everything from scratch, if you try to be unorthodox in more than a few areas at a time... your progress will grind to a crawl, your motivation will shrivel, your project will die, and you will lose heart.

[@MoozeGuy]

I can understand sort of understand your point. However I don't think it's the game dev youtubers job to tell you that you have to optimize or do xyz. I think the bigger problem is that people don't make mistakes that they then can learn from. For example, my first ever game I released was complete dog water but after releasing it and more people were playing it I could learn from the feedback. For anyone wanting to get into game dev, just do whatever works best for you. Follow a tutorial and release the game if you want to. Most likely it wont be a hit, then you can learn and go from there.

[@Malygon]

I have graduated from watching dev tutorials to watching meta videos about tutorials.

[@miebijohnson1678]

It all depends on what the person want does he or she want to learn how to make games or does the person just want to make a game to show off, someone who is passionate about making games will get information from any where be it KZbin tutorials to ads or just playing a video game, not everyone who makes games really want to know how to make games all they want is to make a game they can show to people

[@JianJiaHe]

I would try to find answers in the official documentation before watching tutorials. Tutorials sometimes don’t explain every line of code, how they know these lines of code are necessary, where they got the information from.

[@xyhard8603]

Hello, i saw this video on Homepage, i saw the title and i'm at 0:00 and i want to leave this comment here. Game Dev Tutorials will make you do same thing like they did but your game may be with different systems or there are more easy and nice methods to do what you want. I don't recommend courses at all because they are doing things what even you as started can do it easily and they show you how to do something what you ll never NEED.