How to complete the game

Original author: Derek Yu
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On the blog of one of the creators of Aquaria and Spelunky, there is a curious post with tips for those who are having problems completing their game projects. This list of tips turned out to be a kind of “mirror” for me, which reflected many of the problems that I myself had to deal with, and I was surprised at how well the author was able to grasp the essence of these problems and propose solutions, often uncompromising.
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Approaching the final stage of development of my game, I thought a lot about how to complete the implementation of projects in general. I noticed that there are a lot of really talented developers around who have problems with bringing game projects to the end. In truth, I myself left behind a number of unfinished games ... I think many have the same situation. Not every project succeeds, for various reasons. However, if you began to notice that you constantly abandon projects that have good potential, it is probably worth looking back and studying the reasons for this.

When a new game, book, film, etc. was released, everyone would ever think “Hey! I would do it much better! This is clearly overrated. ” It is important to stop and understand that the creators invested their time in the project and completed it, but I did not. This is at least one reason why they are better than me, why they received recognition, and I did not. If you regard the completion of the case as a skill rather than a stage of a process, then you will confirm that this is something that you can improve on, and you probably know what habits and thought processes accompany the developer during the completion of the project.

I do not believe that there is only one sure way to make a game. This is a creative enterprise, so there are no strict rules that could not be violated at a certain point. However, as a game developer who discussed this issue with other game developers, I think there are mental traps that we often fall into at some stage or another, especially if we are just starting to develop games. Knowing these traps in and of themselves is a very important step towards completing your project.

So, the following are 15 tips for those who want to successfully complete their game project:

1. Choose an idea that has potential


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There are three types of games that interest me: the games that I want to make, the games that I would like to be made, and the games that I do well.

The games I want to make are games in which the creation process itself is interesting. This may be a game mechanic with which you want to experiment, or, for example, a character who is interesting to animate.

The games that I would like to be made are games in which I am interested in the result, not the process of achieving it. It can be a game with an incredible concept ("OMG, GTA + Final Fantasy + Starcraft + ..."), or just with a cool idea, which can be far from fun to bring to life.

Games that I can do- games that, according to my personal feelings, suit me, and I have experience in creating them. Perhaps this is some kind of genre to which you gravitate and feel the rhythm and trends in such games.

In my opinion, the games with the greatest potential (at least enough to bring the matter to the end) belong to all three categories at the same time and satisfy the requirement “I have time and resources to really do this”.

2. Start finally making this damn game


Designing and writing out the idea of ​​a game does not mean starting to make a game. Describing a game design in a document does not mean starting to make a game. Gathering a team does not mean starting to make a game. Even making music and the visual component does not mean making a game. It is very easy to confuse “getting ready to start making a game” and “starting to make a game”. Just remember: the game can be played, and if you haven’t done anything you can play, then this is not a game yet!

Finally, even creating a game engine does not necessarily mean starting to make a game. And that leads us to the next piece of advice ...

3. Do not roll your engine unnecessarily


There are pros and cons of creating your own engine. Ask yourself if you really need it. Is it possible to realize what you want using the available tools, or will you reinvent the wheel again? Of course, if you write your own engine, you can make it ideal in the sense that you imagine. But to be honest, how often did you overcome the stage of creating the engine and go directly to the development of the game itself? Or can you say that you make game engines more often than games?

I made the original version of my Spelunky game in Game Maker., and this truly completed game allowed me to continue working on the version already under XBOX360. Therefore, do not take the software for creating games and other tools that simplify the work, as something illegal. The main thing is the game.

4. Make prototypes


Tip after # 2: prototype everything you have. Sometimes bad ideas come to light right there. Sometimes ideas develop and get even better. One way or another, I usually with great difficulty can figure out where to invest my efforts until I finally start to do something. So do something!

5. Make sure game mechanics are interesting


Find a basic mechanic that would be fun to play with. Most in-game interactions should be interesting, because this is what your players will do most of the time. Ultimately, this “core" should guide the entire subsequent development process. In the future, if you have to cut out some parts of the game, the core should always remain the foundation to which you can return without loss.

In the process of prototyping, it may happen that a new mechanic opens up, more interesting than originally conceived - consider using this new mechanic instead of the old one!

6. Choose good partners (or work alone for as long as you can)


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Finding a good game development partner is a lot like courtship. You might think that skill is all that is needed: “Oh cool, I'm a programmer, and this guy is an artist ... let's do it!” But no, there are other things that need to be taken into account, such as personal qualities, experience, free time and degree of interest. As in a romantic relationship, it is unlikely that you want to find yourself in a situation where the partner is much less interested than you. Take a closer look and check each other on several small projects, since it can be really devastating to have a key person leave the development after several months or even years from the moment it started.

Another advantage of having completed projects is that partners will know what you are capable of and it will be more convenient for them to work with you. It is very difficult to convince someone experienced to work with you, having one single idea, given how few such ideas survive (and how hard it is to see the significance of an idea until it is implemented). Good partners will want to see your completed projects. So finish them!

On the other hand, you can find free music and graphics on the Internet, at least for a while (at The Independent Gaming Source we competedon which a lot of free music and graphic content for games were created). Use ASCII if necessary. As an artist, I know that I will contribute more to a project that is almost complete and needs only a graphic component. And if you need a programmer ... try to learn how to program yourself (if I could, you can too!), Or find the appropriate software (see # 3).

7. Hard work is normal, include in your plan


Creating games is in many ways tedious and completely unhappy. This is not a game, this is work (so shut up everyone who jokes that you “play games all day”). At some point, you realize that there is all this garbage that you did not think about when you planned the project and made prototypes - game menus, transition screens, loading and saving, etc. "Wow! I imagined an amazing world that I would create, and this cool gameplay with which I would experiment ... I did not think that I would spend weeks making functional menus that would not look like shit! ” Or, for example, there are things, such as animation of characters, that are interesting in certain doses and become a nightmare when you realize that there are 100 of these characters.

As soon as you go through all this several times, an understanding will come of how important it is to scale the project so as not to spend too much time in this inevitable quagmire (“too much” means the amount of time until you abandon development). You also realize that all these details actually give the game a complete look! Even a pretty start-up screen can do wonders.

8. Use competitions and other events as real deadlines


When Alec and I were working on Aquaria , the deadline for applying for the Independent Games Festival forced us to make difficult and radical decisions about our line of business and revise our schedule. If not for this deadline, I don’t think that we would have finished at all! Participation in competitions is very useful, because there are real deadlines and real rewards (recognition, possibly money). It is also a way to meet like-minded people.

9. Go ahead


Feel like you're stuck? Move on. Start work on a new level, a new enemy, a new anything. This is useful not only to increase motivation, but also helps to feel how the game will look in general. It's like composing - no one writes sentence by sentence, giving everyone the perfect look before moving on. First make up a plan.

10. Monitor your mental and physical condition


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It may be surprisingly difficult to monitor your condition when you are so focused on completing the game. In truth, giving up sleep, exercise, and proper nutrition means doing yourself a disservice. In the best case, you reduce your ability to work at full capacity and increase your chances of scoring on a project. It is natural to doubt and worry about your project, but to fall into depression or get sick because of this - no. It's amazing how much you can not want to work on the game of your dreams when you feel like a rag.

11. Stop justifying starting from scratch


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“My code is sheer chaos. And I have already learned a lot. If I start again, I will do everything much better and faster, and further development will also go faster!

Stop. Not. At some stage, this happens in all game projects. There will always be confusion in your code. You will learn a lot. It will never be perfect. And if you start all over again, then you will come to the same state from which you left. To think this way is a terrible trap.

There’s even a joke: a guy works all his life on a game engine so perfect that all that guy needs to do is press one button, and the perfect game will be done by itself. Actually, this is not quite a joke, because a guy will never make such an engine anyway! Such engines and games do not exist.

If poor architecture slows down the development process, go back a bit and have surgery to make it easier. If it worked, but looks like a hack, then take courage and hurry on!

12. Leave it for the next game.


So, in the midst of development, you had an idea that would excite the minds of everyone, but to implement which you have to redo the whole game? Leave it for the next game! Right? Presumably, not the last game you do. Leave a new idea for the next game ... and complete the current one!

13. Cut. It. Completely.


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That damn tight deadline. In my head are all these ideas that have time to colonize Mars before they succeed in realizing at least half of them. That's the trouble ... But wait!

Well, actually it's great! Now you have to decide what is really important for the game and what can be cut. The fact is that if we all had unlimited resources and endless time, we would have made the same stupid mess game out of everything that is possible, which would not make sense to play. It is our limited resources and time that force us to make compact games in which some goal is felt.

If you build your game on top of a few basic concepts that seem cool, just keep filming all that is superfluous, leaving only a small part of the add-ons on top of these concepts. Everything else is probably unnecessary trash that can be dispensed with. Or even worse - the trash that prevents players from seeing those very interesting basic ideas and concepts.

14. In case of failure, scale down


Well, sometimes there are failures. Maybe there is no way at all to ever complete the project, or at your disposal is too much chaos of developments to sift something. Maybe the rest of the team has already scored. I am compiling this list in the hope of helping people avoid such opportunities, but hey, maybe you have come from a collapsed project. And sometimes ... shit just happens.

If there is no way to save something, at least reduce the scale of the next project. It is very simple to want more and more, even if projects become less and less complete. “My skills are improving! I learn from my mistakes “- a typical excuse. That is why I believe that the ability to bring the project to the end should also be interpreted as a skill.

Therefore, go back, lower and lower in level, maybe even to a level slightly lower than your current one. For example, instead of rushing from developing a space strategy to developing the same strategy in 3D, try to make a quality game, focusing only on a small part of space simulators. And if you can’t complete it, try something like Asteroids. It is very possible that this will be much more labor-intensive than originally thought (and / or even more fun than expected).

15. The last 10 percent


They say the last 10 percent is actually 90, and there is some truth to this. These are parts that take a lot of time ... Indeed, maybe you put together a powerful combat system in a week ... but to make it really high-quality and debugged ... it can take months. It also happens that this final round will be repeated time after time, before the real final round comes.

It may sound depressing, but it shouldn't. Although the last 10 percent is excruciating, I have found that this development time is most satisfying. Because more and more often different fragments are well joined together in the long run, if the time was spent reasonably. And to turn the confusion of ideas and content into a sweet game mana is a magical sensation.

That's all for the details.

And finally ... release!


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Incredible, you released the game! Congratulations, you have increased your level, this is success. Among the prizes: increased self-confidence, reputation for the skill of bringing projects to the end, as well as an understanding of the entire game development process! Although the best point is that now you have a little fun game that I can play and enjoy. And I like to play games, almost as much as I like to make them.

No more idle on the sidelines, friend: now you are a game developer.

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