Ramble ramble/finishing stuff

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Socoder -> On Topic -> Ramble ramble/finishing stuff
Thu, 17 Apr 2014, 11:56
caligula	I first joined BlitzCoder in 2004, when I was eleven. I still remember struggling with understanding variables. Time flies! Now I'm coding for money. Also funny how many of the people here have followed the trail of BC all the way here, and are still here. I spent some time yesterday looking through an old folder I still have with stuff I made in 2008-2009, some really cool ideas in there, even though only a handful of the things were reasonable enough to materialize. It's slightly sad looking through this history of ambitious and interesting projects and ideas I had and seeing how few ever got anywhere. To be sure, I had a lot of fun when I was making this stuff. And I learned a ton. It did wonders for my English. But my finish rate is horrifying. I finish more things these days, mostly when I have to, but still give up: socoder.net/index.php?topic=3617. Still have the code for that, would love continuing but I'm so short on time these days How are you guys doing with finishing these days? I can force myself to finish for small projects, but for bigger stuff it's harder. For me, I see this long history of dumping perfectly valid projects and I think: what if I'd kept going with that thing? I know this bothered me five years ago, but what bothers me now is that in five years I've still not managed to get over it. I'm thinking that I have to make serious investments. Spend significant amounts of money on something, to make quitting really painful. I don't know if this works. How do you finish?
Fri, 18 Apr 2014, 03:41
rockford	I pretty much finish everything I start, although I do do a lot of R&D with stuff that will never be a proper game in itself, but has elements that I want in other games. My time nowadays is more limited and I'm spreading stuff across even more formats now, which adds extra pressure, but on the whole my track-record for completed games is good. I don't write hundreds, like Jay, but usually do at least 3 full games a year. This year alone I've done 13 or 14 (although to be fair 12 of them were deliberately crap mini-games, but all are playable)
Fri, 18 Apr 2014, 07:13
caligula	Good to hear! Do you have any tips or does it come naturally to you? I think at this point I've become more discerning in what I attempt. I don't start stuff as easily as I used to do, and maybe that's why I finish more than I used to. Still, I'd like to the point where "I pretty much finish everything I start."
Fri, 18 Apr 2014, 08:09
spinal	I never finish a damned thing... ever... My old DS homebrew folder has something like 90 projects but I only released about 4, even then, they weren't really finished. -=-=- Check out my excellent homepage!
Fri, 18 Apr 2014, 10:00
rockford	Do you have any tips or does it come naturally to you? Erm... Pick something manageable The way I do it is work on only one part at a time. Once that's working move onto the next bit. Concentrate only on what you are doing and what come's next. Focus on the current game, not on the one you'd like to do next. Don't rush each segment, but don't take too long worrying about individual parts either. You can spend hours tweaking a bit of maths or a single pixel, when messy maths or a stray pixel isn't going to be seen/noticed by anyone but you. Imagine the game as it will be, as you want it, not how it is right now. Don't start with block placeholder sprite graphics - create graphics that will show you how effective your game is with images, not blocks. Coloured Blocks are not at all inspiring or motivating. The sprites don't have to be complete or the best thing ever, but even a basic animated man can motivate development over a static block. The landscapes can still be blocks though. Unless, of course, you want your graphics to resemble blocks.
Fri, 18 Apr 2014, 14:23
caligula	Spinal, can totally relate to that feeling I suppose the golden idea is picking something that's reasonable in terms of what time you have available. My issue has probably always been aiming for the stars. By the way, I'm talking about any non-trivial commitment you undertake, not just games. Everyone has a hard time seeing things to the end. New Year's resolutions are a joke. Seeing real progress is definitely rewarding. Sometimes, when I do something interesting, I'll just sit and admire it like a fool. It's a great feeling.
Fri, 18 Apr 2014, 14:26
rockford	Sometimes, when I do something interesting, I'll just sit and admire it like a fool. It's a great feeling. It is. I'm working on something now that I've never done before and I'm just enjoying playing with it. It's not a game (but could be used in one), but it's just interesting (to me).
Fri, 18 Apr 2014, 14:42
cyangames	It's worth mentioning that abandoning projects can be a good thing also. if you get so far into a game but just aren't feeling it, even after tweaking. It may be worth giving up on for the moment and trying something else. Try entering some game jams with an aim to start and finish a game in a short timeframe. It's a lot of fun and there's less time to lose with a project. -=-=- Web / Game Dev, occasionally finishes off coding games also!
Fri, 18 Apr 2014, 14:47
rockford	Even abandoned products can be beneficial later on. There's usually some code that can be salvaged and re-used.
Fri, 18 Apr 2014, 20:41
therevillsgames	It is hard to finish a proper game. I normally have the main engine/gameplay done in a couple of weeks, which is the bit I enjoy and is a challenge... But then its creating hundreds of levels, profiles, options, story, sound effect, music, mid-screens etc which makes the whole process really long and boring... and there's testing and more testing.