Hello fellow devs... Because I'm currently bored to death here creating level after level for my next game I wonder what other developers hate most in the developing process? Beside zero sales? Like written I dislike creating level's. Why? Because it is nothing new, simply no challenge. Pure craft. Nevertheless it is part of the game creation process and someone has to do it. In my one man company this is mostly the same person...me. What I love most is new stuff! Developing a prototype based on a new idea. Or solving a complicated algorithm after days of research. Or seeing all the little parts coming together and forming a real game. These are the milestones that keep me going. Oh, and of course good sales and positive feedback - but this is not part of the game creation process. Ok, lets move on...level #38 finished...62 to go... *sigh*
For me it's the thinking of the themes. And yeah, the level creation too some times. It's just so repetitive! As for the themes, I sometimes just can't think of anything, until I think of it in the bus or something.
LOVE: Like FancyFactory proto-typing is the funniest part. A lot of stuff seems to come together quickly and you think you will finish the game in a week's time HATE: Obscure bugs that seems impossible to solve for hours until you find that it's just some very minor detail that you should have noticed all along. Also: The fact that running a one-man-show means there's no one to share your smaller code-triumphs with...
I love . Designing the look of the game prototype...fun time. I hate. The debugging phase...when you have to play the same levels over and over...hell time.
Wow.. What does that say about your game if you are bored to make the levels.. And what tells us that about the quality of the levels afterwards.. Leveldesign is not Pure craft.. If you think that you are doing it wrong.. In my corporate professional career i've been a leveldesigner for a decade and know hands on that actual ld is one of the most important aspects of a game.. What does it help you to have a clever game mechanic if the levels you employ them sucks... Chanes are that if you play on pc you played some of the games i worked on.. seeing youre from germany.. Leveldesign (if your game has any) is the actual soul of a game because exactly there and no where else comes every tiny part of a game together.. Code, art, sound fused together into levels.. Rant over What i dislike most are tedious dry stuff, like updating tracking tables, writing documentations etc. the burocracy of game developement
Mmhh, first of all you have for sure noticed that this thread is not meant serious. So there is no reason for ranting. Another point is that, even when I dislike repetitive work (who likes this?) like level design, I'm absolutely aware that I have to deliver a quality work. So please dont judge until you have played the game. In fact the level design takes so long because I'm trying to come up with interesting and challenging stuff. You are a level designer? Then I understand your point of view. I'm a developer and I wouldn't understand if someone comes and says coding is boring. But even if someone will do so I wont judge the quality of his code.
well there is a smiley.. get the hint.. and what is a "developer" ... youre a programmer.. a developer is anybody involved in developement and its more than natural if you are a programmer to like programming.. bummer ;D huh.. the artists like to make art and the musician the sounds ;D hehe and yes i can judge the work from people if its a chore to them.. like i said i worked on quite some games in the past and i worked with alot of people and if there is no love and fun involved the results are usualy not good.. thats just knowledge collected over years of chore thats the same with art.. or any other segement.. if a programmer would be "forced" todo the art of the game.. it usualy end up ugly.. reality is a bit different because programmer somehow usualy like to create some of the ugliest dummy assets possible and a are very proud of that hehe... i've seen that a dozen times again look at the smiley.. its not too serious.. if you need some ld help PM me i can forward you to a few colleagues, kein stress axel ---- back on topic.. another annoying work are artist who do not know the platform its restriction and to work with limited ressources.. technical design of assets is something most designer lack completly so you are always running after them to get things done properly.. the thing i actualy love most.. is seeing somebody play your game and having fun with it.. there is nothing more exciting to see sombody enjoy your work hands on.
No offense => you stay true to your board reputation. Ok, then I will alter my statement: I LOVE game development...the entire process...including creating levels. But I simply love creating levels less then programming. But its definitely no chore! Like said by yourself this is no surprise...I'm a programmer in first line.
so whats my board reputation.. that i'm not a sugar coater.. thats ok.. you don't get full fledged high quality rpgs produced in a year if you play balls.. being too long in the corporate either makes you getting a thick skin or drop you out.. i'm glad you now love level design makes me feel better about the quality if your work ;D hehe
Bestrototyping, Watching the sales numbers and using analytics / playing around to see what works well and creating origional/ unique content. Hate: Laying out levels (with a passion) - so much so that Im doing a revshare with a mate thats currently out of a job to do that side of things lol. When I do a prototype and the result is finding out the concept dosent play as well as I hoped/ having to scrap projects...
Love - prototyping, seeing how the project suddenly starts moving. Those early stages of development, when a single day can make a difference and something that looks like shit in the morning turns to a princess by the evening Hate - designing levels, working on the GUI and pesky bugs. Just today I spent some 2 hours going through whole project, GUI, collision detection and so on just to find out everything was perfectly fine and I just placed if(A = B) instead of == Absolutely hate - all the stupid certificates, provisioning profiles, code signing and how annoying the submission process can be
Heh, being the art guy I love suggesting all these cool new additions and features AFTER the game is released that -- little do I know -- most of the time require like millions of lines of new code for the smallest thing The other guys hate me for that, heh... Seriously though, strangely I love balancing games (I'm a number junkie)... Sometimes I spend hours at a time playtesting and adjusting stats to get everything just right... Hate locking down the feature list Its funny... making a game is such a paradox. On one hand its like you almost never want to stop making your game. You want it to have every feature in the world and be the absolute best game ever for everyone who plays it, even if the dev time is 150 years. On the other hand, after a point you just want to release the freaking thing and get it out there in the wild. Its sometimes hard to finally say "stop!"
I would also say prototyping is the most fun part of making a game but you're probably only going to spend 1% of your time developing a prototype. Building a real game around a working prototype involves a ton more work. Anyways, I have to agree with Mr. Ugly on the importance of level design. A great game mechanic is quickly wasted on boring levels. Quality trumps quantity here: I would rather play through 10 well designed scenarios than 100 mediocre ones. Also, making a game's AI is pretty fun for me, especially when it surprises me with unexpected behavior. Balancing a game is fun up to a certain point but then it becomes tedious as you become overwhelmed by the complexity of interactions between your game objects and you need to make some tough decisions on resolving conflicts i.e. what happens when the unstoppable force encounters the immovable object? The least fun part for me is designing non-core game UI i.e. level select screens, user settings, loading/saving game slots, managing a player's equipment, etc. Oh wait, localization can be a pain in the butt too since it can involve more than simple text changes.
The bits where you know what you have to do, but you just have to get it done are the worst parts. For example setting up Game Center Achievements, or realising that you have to change the something similar in 76 parts of the code. The best bits are experimenting, trying new ideas, finding out if things work.
Love - Prototyping new gameplay and learning along the way! Creating the artwork. Watching static character models/environments come to life. Gettting inspired by other game artists/developers like you. Waking up in the morning with a "clear head" and solving issues that have been irritating me for weeks, because usually the problems are simpler than I thought. Improving my programming skills through necessity. Watching people play my game and learning from players. Hate - Throwing out prototyped gameplay because of framerate or device limitations. Throwing out cool game mechanics because of my own limited programming experience (I'm getting better little by little though) Not being able to do everything I can imagine yet, due to limited programming knowledge. Having to spend time and energy researching marketing strategy. Having to extend my deadlines. Having to work full time to earn a living when I could be developing.
I hate the testing part, trying to do every case, tapping everywhere like a spazz to make sure nothing breaks. It seems testing and crushing bugs is equal to the amount of time spent developing the game. In conclusion.. I hate my game.. I love my game.. - Matt
I love when I see sketches turn into real colored final art. I'm always super excited when seeing new artwork come to life in the game. Hate finishing stuff. That last 20% of work doesn't take 20% of the time. It really takes 80% of the time.
I don't like doing UI stuff. Designing it, coding it. It is not my forte and it's obvious in my game. The next one will be so much better. Now that there are retina displays and iPads, it is even more difficult. I love the level designing, at least for Daredevil Dave, because every setting is unique. I am working on a sequel now and am trying to come up with new ideas, and that is difficult. But I love it! I can't really complain about any of it much though. Game design was just a hobby for many years. It has recently become my career...at least until further nnotice. So far so good
I always think the worst part is saving game data mid-play - so the user can pause/quit/answer phone/whatever in the middle of a game, then come back and pick right back up where they left off. Having to save the state and position of every last sprite/piece/etc is so tedious... sometimes it seems there's more code just for saving/restoring than there is for actual game play. I'm not sure what the best part is. Getting nice reviews is always a thrill I also like doing the game art, so it doesn't bother me if that takes a while... but, having to re-do it all for retina displays is annoying.
