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July 23rd, 2018, 22:29
Originally Posted by duerer View Post
Sorry for my bluntness, but you won't like what I'm gonna say.

Do NOT, repeat, do NOT go this route. Give it up NOW.
You will be crushed for life, and frankly, the indie scene does not need yet another idealist casualty.

It is like sex: you'll either do it or don't do it at all. There is no such thing that "oh, it's just fellatio, so it's not sex".

Again, please give up, or seriously reconsider your stand.
If you feel burned out, go out on a long vacation, find a decent, non-taxing job and fulfill your ambition strictly as a hobby. You'll thank me later.
BTW - what games have you developed? I'm curious

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July 23rd, 2018, 23:26
Originally Posted by Darth Tagnan View Post
Thankfully, I've set my sights quite low in terms of potential sales and popularity. I do hope that I will eventually do well enough to make a humble living - but the ultimate test is more about being able to actually finish a game

As I've talked about before in this thread, it will not be anything like "the ultimate pet project" - because that would be absolutely unfeasible.

So, I'm going to attempt something that I might actually finish - and which might actually sell a few copies. But it's not going to be the quest for a quick buck - because I refuse to create something I wouldn't want to play myself - and I'm one picky asshole

I will be working from home, but I don't foresee that being a problem in itself - because I have few distractions here that I wouldn't have at an office - as a one-man team.

I'm going to try and establish a "work-day" schedule where I MUST work at least, say, 4-6 hours each and every day - and I'm pretty sure the thought of going back to an average job is going to be motivation enough.

Well, if not - then nothing will ever be motivation enough unless someone is holding a gun to my head
I'm kind of envious of you, if you're at a point in life where you can afford to do this. And that is, in my opinion, the only way to do this: If you can afford to waste a couple of years to work on your passion. Meaning, you have the money reserves to hold you over for the time you want to offer to this project. And if, after those years, in the highly probable chance that it won't succeed, you can easily transition back to a 9-5 job, until you consider your next plan.

As I said, I'd love to be able to do this. Unfortunately, in my field of work, if I take off a couple of years, I'd better have some strong reasons for it, that can be placed in my CV, and that will not cause the usual HR employee to filter mine out upon applying to a job. This is usually because most people in my field do this sort of thing in their spare time, outside regular work. Which sucks, but when enough people do it, it kind of becomes the norm.
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July 23rd, 2018, 23:38
When I took some time to work on a project, I found that working from home was not a good experience. Not problematic in itself, but lacking the delineation of a working day, and the changing of environments. Hard to get started, and once going, hard to stop at a healthy time.

So, I looked for another environment to work in. I found that one of the museums had a membership program (for like 80 pounds a year), with the benefit of access to a members' room. I would go in there for a working day, have my lunch in there, and if I had to meet someone, we'd do it walking around the galleries. Perfect sort of environment, not too noisy, but much nicer than staring at a blank page in my own four walls. If you can find something like that, I'd highly recommend it.
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July 24th, 2018, 09:16
Originally Posted by danutz_plusplus View Post
I'm kind of envious of you, if you're at a point in life where you can afford to do this. And that is, in my opinion, the only way to do this: If you can afford to waste a couple of years to work on your passion. Meaning, you have the money reserves to hold you over for the time you want to offer to this project. And if, after those years, in the highly probable chance that it won't succeed, you can easily transition back to a 9-5 job, until you consider your next plan.

As I said, I'd love to be able to do this. Unfortunately, in my field of work, if I take off a couple of years, I'd better have some strong reasons for it, that can be placed in my CV, and that will not cause the usual HR employee to filter mine out upon applying to a job. This is usually because most people in my field do this sort of thing in their spare time, outside regular work. Which sucks, but when enough people do it, it kind of becomes the norm.
Yeah, I'm in a very unique situation that I didn't even plan for.

It sort of all came together - against my own wishes, because the plan was to meet a new girl and get another relationship going. I also wanted to buy a house and invest some money, and so on.

But something has changed - and I no longer feel the urge or desire to go through all that again. Not that I don't want "love" or companionship - I just no longer feel the overt need for it. I'm strangely comfortable by myself.

But I suddenly realised that I have the perfect opportunity to pursue a dream that's been the "number one" thing I always wanted to do, but which was never convenient enough for my lazy ass.

I always had one excuse or another - and it's really about the fear of taking the leap.

So, I'm going to give it this one shot. I know I have to - and I can feel my future regret if I don't.

I have no notion of how realistic it is - but I'm going to try my best to create… something that I can say I actually finished and I'm sort of happy with, given the limitation of being alone.

According to my calculations, I should have about two years to pull this off. If I fail, then I don't know what will happen - but at least I've tried

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July 24th, 2018, 09:20
Originally Posted by Ripper View Post
When I took some time to work on a project, I found that working from home was not a good experience. Not problematic in itself, but lacking the delineation of a working day, and the changing of environments. Hard to get started, and once going, hard to stop at a healthy time.

So, I looked for another environment to work in. I found that one of the museums had a membership program (for like 80 pounds a year), with the benefit of access to a members' room. I would go in there for a working day, have my lunch in there, and if I had to meet someone, we'd do it walking around the galleries. Perfect sort of environment, not too noisy, but much nicer than staring at a blank page in my own four walls. If you can find something like that, I'd highly recommend it.
That's actually a pretty good idea. Unfortunately, I sort of live on the outskirts in Denmark at this point in time (my parents' summerhouse) - and there's not a lot of options available in that way. It was the only way to save up the kind of money I wanted to.

But I think a museum would have been a nice place to do some work.

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July 24th, 2018, 10:17
Among myself and my co-workers it was a mix bag. About 1/3 of the team could work very effectively at home including the 'lead programmer' who pretty much works full time at home and maintains a high degree of effectiveness (biggest distraction for him are the kids not the internet). I could never work at home and at least two others on the team felt the same way. So it depends a lot on the individual. Also in a lot of the cities (usa) you can rent shared offices fairly cheap but cheap is relative to ones budget. Anyway have fun and good luck on your project.
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July 24th, 2018, 10:41
Originally Posted by Darth Tagnan View Post
BTW - what games have you developed? I'm curious
When you are over 200, there are too many to mention.
In the past 5 or so years I'm doing contracted consultancy / analyst work for various big or small companies. Since "chaotic development" is my forte, I contributed to projects as diverse as Ori or MFX:Andromeda. Aside some cool successes now and then, I had participated recently in a spectacular indie failure (no names, the main creator still in tears and hates me for telling this will happen).
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July 24th, 2018, 10:43
Originally Posted by duerer View Post
When you are over 200, there are too many to mention.
In the past 5 or so years I'm doing contracted consultancy / analyst work for various big or small companies. Since "chaotic development" is my forte, I contributed to projects as diverse as Ori or MFX:Andromeda. Aside some cool successes now and then, I had participated recently in a spectacular indie failure (no names, the main creator still in tears and hates me for telling this will happen).
Ok, cool. I was just wondering if you'd created any games yourself that I could take a look at

That said, I don't plan on investing my ego in the public response. That would seem extremely unwise, based on my experience with human beings.

I will look at the copies sold - assuming there's at least one - and make a judgment call on whether or not I could possibly succeed by making more games - or expanding the first one - in some way.

I'm not the sort of person who finds it useful or comfortable to rely on the approval of strangers - beyond the "cold" fact of them buying the game or not

I wouldn't be able to function if I did that.

Of course it would be very nice to have people say good things about something you create - but even if 90% of the audience likes it, there's still going to be that last 10% that probably hates it - and if a game is sufficiently popular, those 10% will tend to be extremely vocal and I'm just the kind of guy who would dwell on the 10% - rather than the 90%.

That's one advantage of getting into it at this late stage. I've sort of grown beyond the need to satisfy my ego in that kind of fickle and pointless way.

No, I think you have to do this for yourself - not validation from strangers.

If I can actually make a living off of it, which I'm sceptical about - that would be all the praise I could ever need.

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July 24th, 2018, 11:00
In other news, I've gotten closer to the nature of the game I'm going to try and make - and it's starting to come together in my head. I've watched a few tutorials, and I've started work on the very first basic things.

Unity has a great feature for just this kind of game, so here's hoping it will make it a little easier.

Another advantage of my plan is that it's a game that should be relatively trivial to convert to Android and iOS - which is definitely my plan, if the game is at all sellable.

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July 24th, 2018, 11:22
Originally Posted by Darth Tagnan View Post
I will look at the copies sold - assuming there's at least one - and make a judgment call on whether or not I could possibly succeed by making more games - or expanding the first one - in some way.
This one is easy.
No marketing, no IP, no community, no production values = ZERO copies sold.

Originally Posted by Darth Tagnan View Post
I'm not the sort of person who finds it useful or comfortable to rely on the approval of strangers - beyond the "cold" fact of them buying the game or not
Again, an easy one.
The secret art of being an indie dev is how to fulfill your dream while listening to others. Obviously, you do not need to obey them like a dumb yes man, but you should at least consider what they say, WHY they say that, and draw your conclusions for yourself.

Originally Posted by Darth Tagnan View Post
That's one advantage of getting into it at this late stage. I've sort of grown beyond the need to satisfy my ego in that kind of fickle and pointless way.
Think the other way of it.
Assume you have finished your game. You have worked 1 year on it, burning, say, $100K of your cash in the process. You are exhausted, maybe your relationship with your SO got fractured as well. So you release your game…
… and all you've got is 1 purchase (your best friend), earning you a modest $4.99 (~$3).

Is it worth?
  • If you say: NO - then you are a sane person and you should do something else.
  • If your answer is YES, ABSOLUTELY - then you are an idealist masochist and you should seek help. No one will cry for you, because you did DAMAGE. I don't care for your personal damages, but I do care for the damage you did for the industry.
  • If you say WELL, I THINK I HAVE AN IDEA… - then you are worthy. Welcome to the wonderful world of indie dev!

Now why I'm saying these?
Do I like to hurt you? No.
Do I want to help you? Maybe. It's your call.
Do I care for the industry? Hell yeah.

No hard feelings
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July 24th, 2018, 12:08
Originally Posted by duerer View Post
This one is easy.
No marketing, no IP, no community, no production values = ZERO copies sold.



Again, an easy one.
The secret art of being an indie dev is how to fulfill your dream while listening to others. Obviously, you do not need to obey them like a dumb yes man, but you should at least consider what they say, WHY they say that, and draw your conclusions for yourself.



Think the other way of it.
Assume you have finished your game. You have worked 1 year on it, burning, say, $100K of your cash in the process. You are exhausted, maybe your relationship with your SO got fractured as well. So you release your game…
… and all you've got is 1 purchase (your best friend), earning you a modest $4.99 (~$3).

Is it worth?
  • If you say: NO - then you are a sane person and you should do something else.
  • If your answer is YES, ABSOLUTELY - then you are an idealist masochist and you should seek help. No one will cry for you, because you did DAMAGE. I don't care for your personal damages, but I do care for the damage you did for the industry.
  • If you say WELL, I THINK I HAVE AN IDEA… - then you are worthy. Welcome to the wonderful world of indie dev!

Now why I'm saying these?
Do I like to hurt you? No.
Do I want to help you? Maybe. It's your call.
Do I care for the industry? Hell yeah.

No hard feelings
No, I don't assume people like to just hurt me like that

Why would you?

I think you've had some very bad experiences with indie development - and you seem to believe that your perception of what happened is the only possible outcome of being an indie developer.

I can respect that, and we all have to rely on our personal experiences.

Of course, we know with absolute certainly that SOME indie developers are making games and earning som money doing it. Heck, some even seem relatively pleased at the same time - though it's hard to be sure of such things.

We also know for a fact that tons of games with zero marketing, IP and extremely limited production values have managed to sell thousands of copies. Just look at something like Underrail - or even something like Dark Quest (something like 20K copies - though many of those have been from sales, I'm sure).

So, rationally - it's possible - and I believe there's a variety of ways such a thing can happen, and I have no doubt that a certain measure of luck is involved regardless of your strategy and whatever "expert" advice you follow before going about creating something.

I hope it doesn't come as a shock to you - or that I'm just dismissing your experience out of hand. That's not at all the case - and you're far from the only person I've heard say similar things about the indie scene.

Even some of the relatively successful indie developers, like Wardell and Vogel have some very harsh words to say about the scene.

You seem to have this base assumption that I'm thinking this will work - or that I will definitely succeed. Almost as if you haven't read my words about absoutely NOT expecting anything of the kind.

But I've made up my mind that I'm going to do this - and I've never lived my life based on the experience of other people, so I'm not likely to start now.

Also, you sound excessively jaded and as if you're still hurting bad from whatever you've experienced - and I don't think that's a great source from which to draw advice.

Even so, I thank you very much for your attempt at "rescuing" me from the nightmare of being an indie developer.

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July 24th, 2018, 13:27
Well, I can understand being alarmed when someone with no professional experience says they're going to quit their job and become an indie game developer, otherwise they'll kill themselves! But, at this stage we must assume that the risks have been considered, the decision made, and only suggestions on how to proceed down the chosen path are worthwhile.
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July 24th, 2018, 13:47
All input is welcome, though I would definitely prefer something a little more supportive of the idea - as I have no plans to give up before I start

As for killing myself, that might have been a slight exaggeration. I live in a country where you can fail doing things like this, and yet not be in any kind of danger of not having basic needs met.

Also, I start from a position of already considering myself a complete failure in terms of meeting my potential. There's really no way that would lead to a particularly worse perception of myself that's related to this endeavor

Trying and utterly failing would STILL be better than not trying.

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July 24th, 2018, 14:31
Originally Posted by Darth Tagnan View Post
All input is welcome, though I would definitely prefer something a little more supportive of the idea - as I have no plans to give up before I start

As for killing myself, that might have been a slight exaggeration. I live in a country where you can fail doing things like this, and yet not be in any kind of danger of not having basic needs met.

Also, I start from a position of already considering myself a complete failure in terms of meeting my potential. There's really no way that would lead to a particularly worse perception of myself that's related to this endeavor

Trying and utterly failing would STILL be better than not trying.
Regarding your last remark, that hit quite close to home for me. For 1-2 years now I've been half-on/half-off, basically procrastinating, starting work on a serious career change. And I think a serious reason for my procrastinating is because of fear of failure. It's a bit hard to admit, but I think that's my main issue.

And I seem to keep on doing that. I can't seem to buckle down. Or just admit that I won't be doing it, and just get it out my mind of it. But I can't, because that would be admitting I've already failed. And I keep on dragging this out, hoping to be able to master my procrastinating.
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July 25th, 2018, 09:33
Originally Posted by danutz_plusplus View Post
Regarding your last remark, that hit quite close to home for me. For 1-2 years now I've been half-on/half-off, basically procrastinating, starting work on a serious career change. And I think a serious reason for my procrastinating is because of fear of failure. It's a bit hard to admit, but I think that's my main issue.

And I seem to keep on doing that. I can't seem to buckle down. Or just admit that I won't be doing it, and just get it out my mind of it. But I can't, because that would be admitting I've already failed. And I keep on dragging this out, hoping to be able to master my procrastinating.
Well, it's never too late - as they say

But it's not the end of the world either way. I would have preferred "true love" and a life without having to actually do any work - so if that's an alternative…..

Then again, I've always wanted to be creative. Rather, more creative.

The strange thing is that every single time I get going and stay focused on something creative - it's the most satisfying thing I can think of doing.

I have absolutely no idea why I've wasted so many years of my life doing trivial "normal" work - but that's what being human is like.

We're stupid and weak.

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July 26th, 2018, 09:25
I registered my company

I dug up my old Crux RPG system - and I will be adapting it for this game. I designed the system to be adaptable to sci-fi from the beginning, so it doesn't take a lot of work.

I've started a mock-up character generator - and I'm struggling with keeping it to strict functionality.

This is one of my weaknesses - in that I absolutely HATE not doing at least SOME art and adjustments so the thing actually looks like it might be respectable at some point, but I've reconciled that I won't waste time doing that.

There's a massive heat wave going on around here - and we've had almost three months of dry and extremely hot weather. My entire lawn is yellow, bascially. I can't function very well as a human being under those circumstances - so it's a bit of a struggle.

But, I'm slowly getting into the zone. I need to be there when I quit my job - or else I won't be comfortable living without the security of a regular paycheck.

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July 26th, 2018, 09:35
A heat wave in Denmark? I'm guessing that's not a common occurrence there. Do most houses have central air conditioning?
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July 26th, 2018, 09:40
Originally Posted by JDR13 View Post
A heat wave in Denmark? I'm guessing that's not a common occurrence there. Do most houses have central air conditioning?
I can't remember any other summer even remotely this hot for such a long time.

That said, we're used to a very varied climate (some would call it shitty weather - but I like it) - and above 30 degrees celsius is something that only happens on the very hottest days at the peak of summer. We've had 3 months of close to that temperature - or more.

Air conditioning is much rarer in Denmark than I gather it is in the US. Some houses have it - but I don't think it's the norm.

In any case, I live in a summerhouse at the moment - with nothing but windows that love to swallow the heat and bake my home

At least my car has air conditioning - and since I have 2.5 hours in that thing every day, I'm thankful for that - at least.

However, it should be said that the majority of Danes tend to love summers like this. But that's because they prefer to be outside among other people.

I don't

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July 26th, 2018, 09:54
Yeah, the UK has been scorched, too. Here is the satellite picture from May to today.



I've had to buy my first air conditioner. Noisy bastard, but necessary

With regard to the game dev, I'd suggest using placeholder art until the end. When it comes to tinkering with how things look, it's easy to fall into what I call semi-working - doing tasks that are sort of legitimately connected to the project, but not really the difficult work that needs to get done. I'd suggest focusing on getting the systems scripted/coded, and only worry about the nice art and interfaces when that's solid.
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July 26th, 2018, 09:57
Originally Posted by JDR13 View Post
A heat wave in Denmark?
Check it out
loading…


Looks like Australia now!
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