How to finish the creation of a game

The network wanders full of articles on where to start developing video games. But it doesn’t matter what the young developer read there before diving in the abyss of tiring work – the first days, and maybe the week, he will last in inspiration and delight from the selected activity. He will absorb any information and enjoy the “party” into which he fell. Work will be in joy.
After almost 2 years of development, my Reflection of Mine game was released today, which I created alone, and now I can talk about what is happening a year later, and a half or two after the start of development – there are no instructions about the same. And what to do when the delight disappears, and the phrase “I make video games” already begin to pronounce with despair, and not with enthusiasm? Beginning developers will not believe that closer to the end the creation of the game for most turns into torture a hot poker. I will describe by my example why I cursed everything and everything at the moment of preparation for the exit.

I do not write about the work of a large casinosnogamstop.co.uk studio. I was alone, and I describe everything by my example. My project is not a global strategy or MMORPG that requires the work of the Army of Game Designers. Game design in small independent projects is not a science, as is commonly believed. There is no need for education, no super-talent is needed. Game design is a fantasy and a little game experience. And fantasize is easy and pleasant, I am ready at least now to write the stories of the creation, formation and destruction of bunch of marvelous game worlds. The strength and value of ideas is greatly overestimated. This thought is perceived extremely painfully, but it will come to everyone who sat down to make the game. At the very beginning, you have to fantasize a lot, and it is damn easy and pleasant – to invent mechanics, locations, character design, write dialogs. Only sooner or later the moment will come when absolutely everything that is needed is already invented for the game. But the ideas continue to climb into the head and spit that there is neither the strength nor the time to realize them all.
This is most prevented from finishing development – I always want to fasten new characters, redo levels, thoughts about how to make the already created mechanics even better. If you value your ideas, write them down and strive to realize each – development will take a decade. From there and so many long-line games-the developers value the invented too much and do not catch the moment when fantasies act on the project destructively. The creation of Reflection of Mine has gone smoothly from the day when I swore to myself – I will not screw anything into the game that was invented after this oath. I still will not shove everything that I will fantasize. From the day of the oath, my ideas have become cheaper than air.

When working alone, to realize brilliant plans, a lack of time will interfere, and something from the game will clearly have to be thrown away. All plans to create a game must be built based on the available resources, cutting off ideas, which you do not have enough for the embodiment of which you do not have enough years. I have more than one pair of sketches for MMORPG, but I understand wonderful that while I work alone and I can’t keep an entire staff of employees – I will not take on these games. I have to do something easier. And you, too, lonely renovations are doomed to this fate.

If you are familiar with working with large projects – dissertations, cartoons, books, drawings – then you are familiar with a wonderful feeling when the case is completed and the heavy burden of duties and responsibility falls off the shoulders. The last point in scientific research, the long -awaited signature on a complex contract – these small events marked the beginning of a new era, with them comes the end of old troubles and life is divided into “before” and “after”. Feeling of completion amazing thing! But if you make games in the 21st century, then forget about these emotional miracles.
You did not record the game on the cartridge or disk, did not send it to production and did not send it to the shops. You posted the game on Steam, where now you will support it indefinitely. There will never come a clear moment when you say “everything, I will not touch this project again and generally delete the source”. A long time after the release in the game, bugs will pop up, because of which patches will have to be released, and thirst for more copies will force you to pile up DLC. The path you got up to have no end. Release is only the beginning of your work, all that was before is only a warm -up.

The last weeks before the release I have not fantasized; did not draw anything new; was engaged only in the editing of bugs, which seemed to have no end; He stopped at all to see the ultimate goal and therefore acquired a persistent and unpleasant feeling that I was moving into the void. I wanted to abandon the development of the development of more than ever. And I know that many have done so, having all the opportunity to release the game. So what helped to bring everything to the end?
First, I reviewed my expectations. I realized that I would not experience a sense of completeness, and if at first it was demoralized, then after a couple of days I acquired something more than the joy of the oily point in the final of the project. The game is not completed. But she came to life. And he will live, it will become even better. I seemed to have created a living creature who, after the release, entered into a dialogue with the players, and will lead it for a very, very long time, spreading in patches, additions, continuously telling them the story that I came up with. It is much cooler than just putting an end and make a project with your past.
Secondly, despite the fact that it is impossible to create a game of your dreams at this stage-I look at Reflection of Mine with love and admiration. Like a son. He may not be the most gifted of the children, but this will not affect love for him. And, moreover, the devil knows what cockroaches are behind the “giftedness” of others. I don’t know how painful it was to create them and what sacrifices made.
Thirdly, I really buried a bunch of ideas due to a lack of resources for their implementation. I invented something very cool and was forced to forget this thought, because I just don’t have enough strength to revive it. But if I start Reflection of Mine, as I see that the mechanic once recorded on paper is implemented. The characters that I invented and for whom I drew a hundred sketches move, communicate and really live. Realized ideas that appeared from emptiness is real magic. And it is the embodiment of ideas that is true gold. If, in order to create something real, you need to abandon a pair of three ideas-I will do it with joy many times.
I described three illusions: the illusion that ideas are a delightful good; The illusion that the game will look exactly the way the developer wants; The illusion that the release day is the end of the development. I received the main share of emotional discomfort during the collapse of these wrong performances. If you are not fascinated by this deception, then I congratulate you, you have every chance to finish your game and get a sincere joy from the matter you are engaged in! And if fascinated, then do not be discouraged when everything collapses. Believe me, you will get much more in return.