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[Pehesse]

Started studying game development about 1-2 weeks ago and downloaded Construct2. First project is ready, something small and simple. It doesn't really compare to the stuff that gets posted here, but I am quite happy with it as it was my first game.

Only HTML5 right now.
https://www.scirra.com/arcade/action-games/planetpong-5442

Any feedback is welcomed!

Don't sell yourself short, this is quite fun already, especially if you just started out! (and I'm always happy to see some C2 love :-D)

I'm pretty terrible at these games, so I only managed a high score of 12 so far, but I think it's quite responsive, enough to try to go for much higher ones. I rather like the riff on arkanoid, and I thought having two differently colored paddles in play would make for combo opportunities (like bumping off the other repeatedly adding more to the score than using the same one, or something?) - maybe that'd add some layer of strategy, in addition to the twitch reactiveness already present?

In any case, cool work :-D

Using one of my game design classes to finally work on a point n click game I've been planning for a while. Placeholder art so far, but the doors in the background are clickable, and the player auto navigates after a click. Only doing a small scene for the class, but hoping to build out an engine in unity so that I could build out the whole thing with placeholder art.

Looks promising! I've been thinking about how to make those depth effects using sprites for some other point and clicky/adventure projects, and seeing it work in 3D with a fixed camera angle looks so painless in comparison, that might just be the route I'd take too :-D

I´ve been working hard on the level editor and I think it´s turning out very nice:

(snip)

Man, I'm envious of spiffy level editors, as usual. Do you guys start from scratch for those, or do you build them through already existing engines - like would it be feasible/a good idea to make a level editor in C2, or something? (I already know from Absinthe his work on Unity, but I'd love to know if other engines can support that kind of stuff as well)



Interested to try Power Hover, it's downloading right now, so I should be back soon with some impressions, hopefully!

 

[Rocky_Balboa]

Don't sell yourself short, this is quite fun already, especially if you just started out! (and I'm always happy to see some C2 love :-D)

I'm pretty terrible at these games, so I only managed a high score of 12 so far, but I think it's quite responsive, enough to try to go for much higher ones. I rather like the riff on arkanoid, and I thought having two differently colored paddles in play would make for combo opportunities (like bumping off the other repeatedly adding more to the score than using the same one, or something?) - maybe that'd add some layer of strategy, in addition to the twitch reactiveness already present?

In any case, cool work :-D

That is a good idea. I think I will start working on that and also a mini tutorial that will explain some of the stuff. Also at some point if I ever buy the C2 Personal Edition, I will probably try to re-do the art and effects.

Thanks for the feedback.

 

[Ranger X]

Has anyone else noticed a weird anti-unity backlash movement growing over the last few months, or am I imagining it based on Firewatch having some performance issues and people rushing to blame the engine as a current hot topic?

Because comments I've seen along the lines of "if its unity I know its going to be shit" are pretty concerning to me as someone working on unity stuff.

There are people pulling this stupid stuff about any engine. You shouldn't mind their comments because you know they are wrong. When your game runs bad, 99.9% of the time it all on you, not the engine.

 

[Pehesse]

That is a good idea. I think I will start working on that and also a mini tutorial that will explain some of the stuff. Also at some point if I ever buy the C2 Personal Edition, I will probably try to re-do the art and effects.

Thanks for the feedback.

Yeah, at first I was pretty miffed by the absence of a tutorial, but as it is, the game is simple enough to be learned through trial and error, and I think it adds to the experience to kind of discover the rules through experimentation. If you add some more hidden combo opportunities, I think that'd go into that same spirit: looks deceptievely simple, but plenty of hidden flavor!

For C2, watch for some sales, they happen occasionally, and with the upcoming release of C3, there's bound to be even more propping up, so I wouldn't rush to buy a license before it's discounted, you can save quite a few bucks that way and possibly go for a higher tier license if you ever intend to make some money out of it!

 

[correojon]

Man, I'm envious of spiffy level editors, as usual. Do you guys start from scratch for those, or do you build them through already existing engines - like would it be feasible/a good idea to make a level editor in C2, or something? (I already know from Absinthe his work on Unity, but I'd love to know if other engines can support that kind of stuff as well)

I´m building it in GM, in fact I intend it to be a very important part of the game so having a nice integration between both "story mode" and "editor mode" is crucial for me. I don´t know how it´s in Construct, but in GM it´s very straightforward, almost like building a menu screen or a strategy game but with a lot more functionality. I´m using almost no functions that you wouldn´t use in a "standard" game.

 

[Davision]

Tree A, B or C?

I merged some cel shading in the post shader here, basically relatively high fractured lighting with 0.5 blended in. Gives it a kinda marker painted look. Maybe I stick with it.

 

[klaas]

Started studying game development about 1-2 weeks ago and downloaded Construct2. First project is ready, something small and simple. It doesn't really compare to the stuff that gets posted here, but I am quite happy with it as it was my first game.

Only HTML5 right now. It is better if you play in full screen. Easier to control.
https://www.scirra.com/arcade/action-games/planetpong-5442

Any feedback is welcomed!

Yus! This is fun! I can normally get like 12 or so ... but managed to get 23 one time! Hah! I like that it's short (it gets very difficult very quickly) and quick to replay.

If I'm being picky, on mobile it can be a little bit difficult to click on the paddles to control them initially, but I really like that it works on both desktop and mobile!

Ah hah! I just got 24!

 

[Rocky_Balboa]

Yus! This is fun! I can normally get like 12 or so ... but managed to get 23 one time! Hah! I like that it's short (it gets very difficult very quickly) and quick to replay.

If I'm being picky, on mobile it can be a little bit difficult to click on the paddles to control them initially, but I really like that it works on both desktop and mobile!

Ah hah! I just got 24!

Yeah, I am thinking to make some fixes so the paddle could be picked up easier. However some other method might be better for mobile as your finger blocks your view very easily. On a 7"+ screen it is probably fine.

 

[Jacksinthe]

Has anyone else noticed a weird anti-unity backlash movement growing over the last few months, or am I imagining it based on Firewatch having some performance issues and people rushing to blame the engine as a current hot topic?

Because comments I've seen along the lines of "if its unity I know its going to be shit" are pretty concerning to me as someone working on unity stuff.

That whole thread was:

"Here's a handful of games that run poorly using Unity to prove that Firewatch's bad performance and bugs are Unity's fault. I also won't list the hundreds of games that are fine."

I don't think Unity was the right fit for Firewatch, but that's not Unity's fault that the devs chose it. It has its limitations. I don't think it's different from the Unreal posts that bash its pop-in, BUT, there has been a backlash against "Indies" in general lately and since Unity is probably the most popular indie platform, there seems to be a wave of hate against it.

Not to mention the endless array of crap thrown together in an afternoon and slapped up on Greenlight everyone sees. So they correlate what they see with the engine with little thought given to each instance.

 

[V_Arnold]

If your game needs low input latency, 60fps gameplay, and potentially with dynamic asset/object creation and loading (not to mention: sandbox-y with great distances), then yeah, Unity is most likely not a good fit.

I still cringe when I look back at M&M X .

AbsintheGames is right though in that it is the developer's responsibility to judge the limitations of the chosen platform.

 

[Pehesse]

I´m building it in GM, in fact I intend it to be a very important part of the game so having a nice integration between both "story mode" and "editor mode" is crucial for me. I don´t know how it´s in Construct, but in GM it´s very straightforward, almost like building a menu screen or a strategy game but with a lot more functionality. I´m using almost no functions that you wouldn´t use in a "standard" game.

Thanks! I'd have to give it a shot in C2 then, see if it can happen there too :-D

 

[Michael Armbrust]

Tree A, B or C?

I merged some cel shading in the post shader here, basically relatively high fractured lighting with 0.5 blended in. Gives it a kinda marker painted look. Maybe I stick with it.

I like tree C the best. It's dark and full looking. A looks really artificial with how its branches don't droop.

 

[LordRaptor]

BUT, there has been a backlash against "Indies" in general lately and since Unity is probably the most popular indie platform, there seems to be a wave of hate against it.

Yeah, I mean there's like... three or four different backlashes all happening that get lumped together into an "indie games suck" banner, but I haven't seen engine-specific targetted hatred like this since everyone convinced themselves Gamebryo sabotaged Bethesdas otherwise stellar attention to detail, polish and QA.

Its very disconcerting, and although its been put into focus over the last few days re: Firewatch, its been simmering in the background for awhile.

If your game needs low input latency, 60fps gameplay, and potentially with dynamic asset/object creation and loading (not to mention: sandbox-y with great distances), then yeah, Unity is most likely not a good fit.

It's only really the large streaming open world part I would say unity is not a good fit for, mainly because its LODding system is sort of a pain in the arse (and its only very recently added level streaming functionality) - you absolutely can do locked 60fps gameplay, low latency inputs and procedural asset creation in it.
I'm not sure what engine is a good fit for a large streaming open world to be honest.

 

[SplitYourInfinities]

I have a question for the Unity people: do you use a single or multiple scenes in your games? I'm working on a small project and i'm thinking of having just one scene and implementing a state machine in the game manager to define the behaviour. I'm thinking in the downsides but i can't find any other than longer loading times and project clarity (no issues in this case since as i said is a small project).

 

[chris-013]

Multiple. Like you said there is zero benefit to use a single scene. Even with a simple project, I like to have atleast 2 scenes : StartScene and GameScene.
You can also add scenes to do some experiments with the gameplay and/or the game design without breaking everything.

 

[Geminosity]

Started studying game development about 1-2 weeks ago and downloaded Construct2. First project is ready, something small and simple. It doesn't really compare to the stuff that gets posted here, but I am quite happy with it as it was my first game.

Only HTML5 right now. It is better if you play in full screen. Easier to control.
https://www.scirra.com/arcade/action-games/planetpong-5442

Any feedback is welcomed!

This is excellent for your first game :3
My only immediate criticism is that I'd prevent the ball from starting until the player has moved the paddles, as racing to click on them before it begins and game overs you is a bit exasperating XD

Tree A, B or C?

I merged some cel shading in the post shader here, basically relatively high fractured lighting with 0.5 blended in. Gives it a kinda marker painted look. Maybe I stick with it.

I like C. There's not a huge immediately obvious difference between them except size, to me, but for an object you're going to have as part of the background it feels a teeny tiny bit less busy somehow XD

I have a question for the Unity people: do you use a single or multiple scenes in your games? I'm working on a small project and i'm thinking of having just one scene and implementing a state machine in the game manager to define the behaviour. I'm thinking in the downsides but i can't find any other than longer loading times and project clarity (no issues in this case since as i said is a small project).

I'd just split it up into scenes personally. It helps keep things organised. I still use a statemachine though to determine which scene I should be in via a singleton or the like.

 

[Jacksinthe]

Yeah, I mean there's like... three or four different backlashes all happening that get lumped together into an "indie games suck" banner, but I haven't seen engine-specific targetted hatred like this since everyone convinced themselves Gamebryo sabotaged Bethesdas otherwise stellar attention to detail, polish and QA.

Its very disconcerting, and although its been put into focus over the last few days re: Firewatch, its been simmering in the background for awhile.



It's only really the large streaming open world part I would say unity is not a good fit for, mainly because its LODding system is sort of a pain in the arse (and its only very recently added level streaming functionality) - you absolutely can do locked 60fps gameplay, low latency inputs and procedural asset creation in it.
I'm not sure what engine is a good fit for a large streaming open world to be honest.

Yeah. Unity has gotten a lot of unfounded hate lately. People are ignorant, though. They make comments about a lot of tech-related stuff they don't know about. I think ever since Durante mentioned not liking Unity a few times everyone jumped on that bandwagon and just parrot it. Not that Durante doesn't know what he's talking about and people can prefer one engine over another - but the rest of the forum just latches on and rides it because they think he is the final word. Plenty of games using Unity without issue.

As for the 60fps and input latency - that's also just parroting. I know I don't have a visually demanding game but I have thrown a shitload at the engine for our project to see where it buckles under pressure on PS4 and if I keep everything in check and don't fill the screen with thousands of physics objects at a time I maintain a solid 60 and then some. I can easily toss 300 objects on screen with 2D physics (my own) and still float above 100 and a locked 60 with static TTF.

Input latency is also nothing I have had to deal with. That could be due to my script execution order and limited number of post-fx (well, not really limited). I would think latency would be a product of the render pipeline? Don't know much about how Unity handles that stuff as I don't dive in that deep since I don't need to. I roll a few of my own FX and some of Unity's build-in FX without issue. I don't even think i've hit a full ms with all of them combined. My draw is only 0.5 and I think the entire frame is about 3ms - so I have at least 13 more to spare for whatever I need to do that is spent on waiting for the next frame.

Pretty sure it's just repeating what you've heard which came from somewhere. A game of telephone for people who have never played with Unity development. It has its limitations but that's on the dev to make sure they know they can't color outside the lines without the engine pushing back.

I have a question for the Unity people: do you use a single or multiple scenes in your games? I'm working on a small project and i'm thinking of having just one scene and implementing a state machine in the game manager to define the behaviour. I'm thinking in the downsides but i can't find any other than longer loading times and project clarity (no issues in this case since as i said is a small project).

Multiple scenes. A lot less to micromanage, even for small projects.

 

[Rocky_Balboa]

This is excellent for your first game :3
My only immediate criticism is that I'd prevent the ball from starting until the player has moved the paddles, as racing to click on them before it begins and game overs you is a bit exasperating XD

Thanks for the feedback. I fixed the start up based on your suggestion. Also added a bonus system where you get extra points if you use the same paddle continuously.

Update version: https://www.scirra.com/arcade/action-games/planetpong-5442

 

[Blizzard]

Has anyone else noticed a weird anti-unity backlash movement growing over the last few months, or am I imagining it based on Firewatch having some performance issues and people rushing to blame the engine as a current hot topic?

Because comments I've seen along the lines of "if its unity I know its going to be shit" are pretty concerning to me as someone working on unity stuff.

I've seen a backlash, but I'm not sure it's weird. I've always had the impression even as a developer, and even as someone who's used Unity briefly, that it may not be AS suited as UE3 / UE4 / CryEngine3 / whatever for large games. *edit* To be more specific, as others have mentioned, "large" in the sense of open-world, streaming, large-scope.

I have NOT used Unity as part of a large (40+ person) team so I don't know how well that works.

Sadly I read UE4 has an anti-aliasing issue in the latest version(s), so nothing's really perfect.

 

[shaowebb]

Started studying game development about 1-2 weeks ago and downloaded Construct2. First project is ready, something small and simple. It doesn't really compare to the stuff that gets posted here, but I am quite happy with it as it was my first game.

Only HTML5 right now. It is better if you play in full screen. Easier to control.
https://www.scirra.com/arcade/action-games/planetpong-5442

Any feedback is welcomed!

Hell yeah Construct 2 game development! I love that engine so much. Really really excellent tool that allows artists and designers with little to no code knowledge to really dig in and get their feet wet. You can get super deep stuff outta that engine and the premade tutorial templates for different genres provide you with enough examples to really discover a lot of promising avenues to take your own work in without having to figure it out by yourself.

I'll play this later when I get home.
------------------------------------------------------
Edit:
------------------------------------------------------
DESIGN THOUGHTS NOW THAT I"M HOME: Ooh nice. I like the core mechanic a lot. Click and hold mouse>maneuver paddles around the circumference of a circle and they move opposite of each other>try to not let asteroid escape as it speeds up after each hit.

Nice! There's a lot to build on here but the core is actually fun so its got potential.

I'd experiment with your tools...how can you make the paddles influence the asteroid more? How does hitting the asteroid reward the player? Are their other things appearing on screen and if so how can they enhance the experience and fun of sticking around?

Maybe try for every so many hits you fill a meter and if you get it so high you can send out a pulse to decelerate the asteroid so you don't lose so quickly, and balance it with the asteroid's acceleration rate increasing by a small factor every time it logs one of these "resets".
Possibly other things with pulses or waves could work...maybe collect powerups that you can use on the board to influence the trajectory or acceleration of the asteroid? I'd maybe look towards peggle power ups for inspiration there. Things like increasing paddle size or sending out magnetic pulses to help catch the asteroid are pretty obvious ones as well. Might try to experiment with Construct 2 pathfinding and see if you can tether a line between both paddles as a tripline to bounce the asteroid off of or more helpfully act as a "track" the asteroid hits and then travels along to the other paddle.

Like I said....LOADS of potential with this concept. Keep it up! You have a great start.

 

[Jacksinthe]

I've seen a backlash, but I'm not sure it's weird. I've always had the impression even as a developer, and even as someone who's used Unity briefly, that it may not be AS suited as UE3 / UE4 / CryEngine3 / whatever for large games. *edit* To be more specific, as others have mentioned, "large" in the sense of open-world, streaming, large-scope.

I have NOT used Unity as part of a large (40+ person) team so I don't know how well that works.

Sadly I read UE4 has an anti-aliasing issue in the latest version(s), so nothing's really perfect.

I've toyed with 3D stuff in Unity and while it's capable I don't think it's on the same level as UE4. Not that Unity is horrible, no. People make some pretty stuff with it. But as you said I think UE or other engines are better suited for the larger stuff.

Pretty sure if I go 3D ever I'm going UE4. For 2D I think Unity has a better flow to everything, personally.

 

[Jumplion]

I have a question for the Unity people: do you use a single or multiple scenes in your games? I'm working on a small project and i'm thinking of having just one scene and implementing a state machine in the game manager to define the behaviour. I'm thinking in the downsides but i can't find any other than longer loading times and project clarity (no issues in this case since as i said is a small project).

My game just uses one big scene since it's relatively small anyway, but I'm also weird in that I like keeping things super centralized in my projects. If you game involves multiple different levels, then it'd probably be best to have a scene for each (or one scene would contain multiple levels of the same type) for organizational purposes, probably.

 

[beinfilms]

Hello.

I'm a complete and utter newcomer to this thread, and that OP was enormous, and kind of overwhelming, so I'm really sorry if this isn't the kind of thing that's supposed to be posted here. (Please don't hate me.)

Anyway, I'm I guess what you'd call an "aspiring" dev. The only actual experience I have making anything game related is doing some of the Unity tutorials. However, I'd really like to make something myself, but I'm having trouble coming up with a viable concept for it. Almost everything I've thought of is far beyond my level of knowledge, and the one thing I could probably do seems like it would bore me to tears as a game, which kind of defeats the point of even doing it. (It's basically just a glorified flowchart.)

So, what I'm wondering is, do any of you have suggestions of better ways to come up with concepts for a simple game? Thank you for any help you can give!

 

[Jacksinthe]

Hello.

I'm a complete and utter newcomer to this thread, and that OP was enormous, and kind of overwhelming, so I'm really sorry if this isn't the kind of thing that's supposed to be posted here. (Please don't hate me.)

Anyway, I'm I guess what you'd call an "aspiring" dev. The only actual experience I have making anything game related is doing some of the Unity tutorials. However, I'd really like to make something myself, but I'm having trouble coming up with a viable concept for it. Almost everything I've thought of is far beyond my level of knowledge, and the one thing I could probably do seems like it would bore me to tears as a game, which kind of defeats the point of even doing it. (It's basically just a glorified flowchart.)

So, what I'm wondering is, do any of you have suggestions of better ways to come up with concepts for a simple game? Thank you for any help you can give!

Welcome!

Make something simple first, like Pong. Maybe a card match memory game or just boxes shooting boxes to kill other boxes.

Think of your long-term goals and try to place yourself in those shoes. How will you get there?

Most of us started simple. My first attempt was getting a box to move and shoot stuff. Small time. Experiment with simple projects, games that you can play for a minute or two. Then expand.

What is your experience with engines? Code? Etc? What kind of game do you envision making?

 

[DNAbro]

Need some advice about what to do in regards to a game project. I started a game project back in December for Ludum Dare, failed miserably do to inexperience and I've been working on it on and off to help myself get more acclimated with Unity. I was never too attached to my idea, it was a tomagatchi type thing with added functionality and an ending to it.

Now I've been building an idea for the past month or so for a game I actually want to create. Like really really want to create, something that I would put time and effort and once it really starts up marketing, selling, the whole thing. I was thinking of just abandoning the old project and just starting on this one.

So I guess I want advice as to if I should just start working on the thing I want to work on that will take much more time, or I should I continue with my practice project that I am no longer that really interested in?

 

[V_Arnold]

Need some advice about what to do in regards to a game project. I started a game project back in December for Ludum Dare, failed miserably do to inexperience and I've been working on it on and off to help myself get more acclimated with Unity. I was never too attached to my idea, it was a tomagatchi type thing with added functionality and an ending to it.

Now I've been building an idea for the past month or so for a game I actually want to create. Like really really want to create, something that I would put time and effort and once it really starts up marketing, selling, the whole thing. I was thinking of just abandoning the old project and just starting on this one.

So I guess I want advice as to if I should just start working on the thing I want to work on that will take much more time, or I should I continue with my practice project that I am no longer that really interested in?

Well, I would advise you to think about this for a bit.
Because indie developers (and really, most developers) have issues when it comes to finding the steps between:

step a: start a small project, start to learn a language
????*n
step z: finish a big, complicated project

So what is in between? Most likely your big projects will contain things that you do not like doing, but you will have to do it anyway. So if you are in this to learn the ins and outs of developing games, I would say do the thing that I could not do, and finish your smaller scale project first. Chances are, everything you learn with that project will hasten your second project's development time.

 

[beinfilms]

Welcome!

Make something simple first, like Pong. Maybe a card match memory game or just boxes shooting boxes to kill other boxes.

Think of your long-term goals and try to place yourself in those shoes. How will you get there?

Most of us started simple. My first attempt was getting a box to move and shoot stuff. Small time. Experiment with simple projects, games that you can play for a minute or two. Then expand.

What is your experience with engines? Code? Etc? What kind of game do you envision making?

Honestly, my biggest limitation is my lack of experience with coding. I've done a little JavaScript (which I don't see helping me any time soon), I'm taking a class in C++, and the Unity tutorials I've done were in C#, although they kind of just walk you through the coding for the most part.

I've done a little bit of the whole early arcade style stuff through those tutorials, but I kind of want to create something with a bit more substance to it: the kind of thing I can show to people, and the main thing about it is the game itself, not "Oh, cool, you actually made this?" (Realistically, I still need to figure out more of what I'm doing on the coding front before I can do this, but I want to at least do some planning for it.)

My end goals are very long-term, but eventually, I want to be able to make games like the ones that I love, like Metal Gear, the Witcher 3, the Shadowrun Returns games, that kind of stuff.

 

[V_Arnold]

Javascript is a perfectly valid target for game development, btw. You can target mobile apps (with webviews, or Cocoon, or any other webGL solutions), web, desktop applications, and if you write a flawless code, garbage collector wont come to hunt you down. You can offload pathfinding and physics and AI to webworkers (thereby freeing your main thread up, since the workers run on different cores), and modern JS engines like Chakra and V8 are perfectly fine for the usual updates and logic - and there is also the GPU to offload computations in case you fancy that type of solutions.

But of course, it comes down to preferences.

 

[GulAtiCa]

Yep, HTML5 game dev is fine IMO. I created ZaciSa for the Wii U in HTML5. Has done really well for me. My next 2 games are HTML5 as well and even using Physics engine (Box2D Web)

Fun fact: ZaciSa main code (excluding jQuery/Language texts/other libraries) is around 45k lines long.

Site note: I got Nintendo to host a special indie sale group event on behalf of me and a few other Nintendo indies. Very excited about that accomplishment. http://www.nintendo.com/eshop/offers

 

[Ashodin]

Yep, HTML5 game dev is fine IMO. I created ZaciSa for the Wii U in HTML5. Has done really well for me. My next 2 games are HTML5 as well and even using Physics engine (Box2D Web)

Fun fact: ZaciSa main code (excluding jQuery/Language texts/other libraries) is around 45k lines long.

Site note: I got Nintendo to host a special indie sale group event on behalf of me and a few other Nintendo indies. Very excited about that accomplishment. http://www.nintendo.com/eshop/offers

YES OUR SALE IS LIVE

 

[Jacksinthe]

Honestly, my biggest limitation is my lack of experience with coding. I've done a little JavaScript (which I don't see helping me any time soon), I'm taking a class in C++, and the Unity tutorials I've done were in C#, although they kind of just walk you through the coding for the most part.

I've done a little bit of the whole early arcade style stuff through those tutorials, but I kind of want to create something with a bit more substance to it: the kind of thing I can show to people, and the main thing about it is the game itself, not "Oh, cool, you actually made this?" (Realistically, I still need to figure out more of what I'm doing on the coding front before I can do this, but I want to at least do some planning for it.)

My end goals are very long-term, but eventually, I want to be able to make games like the ones that I love, like Metal Gear, the Witcher 3, the Shadowrun Returns games, that kind of stuff.

Play with some engines, see what clicks with you the most and get building anything.

If you want to develop games in the AAA space and large scale projects like you've mentioned you'll need to decide if you want to work for another company in the AAA space and make your best guess on what you feel will be the best space to grow from coding, animating, design, etc. Obviously there are more sought after positions but you need to focus on something and go for it.

If you plan to get there on your own with your own team you'll need to plan a different path. What do you want to do when you get there? Design, code, manage, etc. How do you plan on getting there? What are your strengths? Weaknesses? You'll have to find your footing before all of that becomes clear.

I would say if you're just starting and are asking for ideas that you can practice with you may not be suited to the design aspect. Do you feel more comfortable being given a task or do you like creating problems for yourself to solve? Design and development is pretty much coming up with ideas, identifying the problems and methods to execute the idea and solving those problems and creating methods to do just that.

Read this and see where you stand:
http://www.lizengland.com/blog/2014/04/the-door-problem/

Its an excellent look into what some may consider exceedingly simple systems and just how complex they can be. Reading that, how does it make you feel? Would that be a strong suit or a weak link?

If you're unsure, don't fret. Many of us are overwhelmed at first but the cure is just to simply start with anything small and build on it. Gamedev is as exactly difficult as you make it.

Yep, HTML5 game dev is fine IMO. I created ZaciSa for the Wii U in HTML5. Has done really well for me. My next 2 games are HTML5 as well and even using Physics engine (Box2D Web)

Fun fact: ZaciSa main code (excluding jQuery/Language texts/other libraries) is around 45k lines long.

Site note: I got Nintendo to host a special indie sale group event on behalf of me and a few other Nintendo indies. Very excited about that accomplishment. http://www.nintendo.com/eshop/offers

Yup and grats!

 

[DNAbro]

Well, I would advise you to think about this for a bit.
Because indie developers (and really, most developers) have issues when it comes to finding the steps between:

step a: start a small project, start to learn a language
????*n
step z: finish a big, complicated project

So what is in between? Most likely your big projects will contain things that you do not like doing, but you will have to do it anyway. So if you are in this to learn the ins and outs of developing games, I would say do the thing that I could not do, and finish your smaller scale project first. Chances are, everything you learn with that project will hasten your second project's development time.

I hear you. I just wanted someone to convince me that moving on early was a bad idea lol. Will continue working on the thing and developing ideas for my big project.

 

[anteevy]

Sadly I read UE4 has an anti-aliasing issue in the latest version(s), so nothing's really perfect.

I'm still crying. UE4.7 has me back now. <3

---

Currently integrating Steam into the game. Can already upload and download scores from leaderboards after a few hours of work, so that went better than expected. Still hating that I have to restart the UE4 editor every time I make changes to C++ code, as the "hot reload" feature stopped working for me a few months ago and now just crashes the editor. Stacktrace leads to "UWorld::IsPaused()", great. I guess somewhere in one of my hundreds of Blueprints some node causes this error and it could take me days to find it. Maybe I'm going to invest a few hours anyway and see if I can find the cause....

 

[HandsomeCharles]

Yeah. Unity has gotten a lot of unfounded hate lately. People are ignorant, though. They make comments about a lot of tech-related stuff they don't know about. I think ever since Durante mentioned not liking Unity a few times everyone jumped on that bandwagon and just parrot it. Not that Durante doesn't know what he's talking about and people can prefer one engine over another - but the rest of the forum just latches on and rides it because they think he is the final word. Plenty of games using Unity without issue.

I think that's absolutely true, but I can see where some people are coming from. Unity lowered the barrier to entry in a similar way to Apple with the App store. This means that you see a lot more "lower quality" productions coming through, and people will end up grouping everything together for the purposes of criticism.

It's like when you see people saying "Mobile games are shit". That's just false. There are a lot of good mobile games out there, but they are significantly fewer than the amount of bad games out there. That said, it shouldn't be a reason to disregard the platform as a whole. Nobody is forcing you to play the bad games.

I suppose what also doesn't help is that we're getting a lot of Youtube content based around bad games now ( Whether it be for comedic purposes or for criticisms/rants). Again, because of the lower barrier to entry it means that a lot of these "games" tend to be made with Unity, which doesn't portray it in a very good light.

That said, when you say "Plenty of games using Unity without issue", that's totally true. The problem (I think) is that "When it's working properly, you won't notice it". All (most?) Unreal games have the UE3/4 logo on startup. It's the same with most other engines. Unity, on the other hand, only does this with the personal edition. Chances are if you're releasing a fully-finished product that is actually good, you're going to be paying for a pro licence, and therefore are not going to be visually representing Unity. The only place their logo gets shown off is in the terrible games. (Obvs, not all personal edition games are terrible, but I'm sure you know what I mean)

At work, we don't use Unity for our games (Though one of our Studios does) for various reasons, but for my personal project I am, and I'm very glad of it. It's gone a tonne of great features, and I'm quite confident in my ability to keep the game playable and smooth the whole way through. I think that's largely due to my experience though (It's not that extensive, but It's enough) as I understand what is required to make a game "playable". I know about the impacts of draw calls, garbage collection, memory management etc. Which I think a lot of newer indie-devs will not know so much about, since it's glazed over in a lot of tutorials, or just ignored altogether.

I think what people need to realise is that a game-engine does not make a programmer good, but a good programmer can make a game-engine great!

(Also, I can't wait to hear the backlash for my game when it finally gets to a presentable state. A 2D, Pixel-Art action game with momentum based movement and a high difficulty curve, all built in Unity. Maybe I should rename it to "Flamebait"? )

 

[DNAbro]

Posted an original version awhile back but I disliked it so I just touched it up aka actually adding shading so it doesn't look like pure crap.

Cute or nah?

 

[Jacksinthe]

I think that's absolutely true, but I can see where some people are coming from. Unity lowered the barrier to entry in a similar way to Apple with the App store. This means that you see a lot more "lower quality" productions coming through, and people will end up grouping everything together for the purposes of criticism.

It's like when you see people saying "Mobile games are shit". That's just false. There are a lot of good mobile games out there, but they are significantly fewer than the amount of bad games out there. That said, it shouldn't be a reason to disregard the platform as a whole. Nobody is forcing you to play the bad games.

I suppose what also doesn't help is that we're getting a lot of Youtube content based around bad games now ( Whether it be for comedic purposes or for criticisms/rants). Again, because of the lower barrier to entry it means that a lot of these "games" tend to be made with Unity, which doesn't portray it in a very good light.

That said, when you say "Plenty of games using Unity without issue", that's totally true. The problem (I think) is that "When it's working properly, you won't notice it". All (most?) Unreal games have the UE3/4 logo on startup. It's the same with most other engines. Unity, on the other hand, only does this with the personal edition. Chances are if you're releasing a fully-finished product that is actually good, you're going to be paying for a pro licence, and therefore are not going to be visually representing Unity. The only place their logo gets shown off is in the terrible games. (Obvs, not all personal edition games are terrible, but I'm sure you know what I mean)

At work, we don't use Unity for our games (Though one of our Studios does) for various reasons, but for my personal project I am, and I'm very glad of it. It's gone a tonne of great features, and I'm quite confident in my ability to keep the game playable and smooth the whole way through. I think that's largely due to my experience though (It's not that extensive, but It's enough) as I understand what is required to make a game "playable". I know about the impacts of draw calls, garbage collection, memory management etc. Which I think a lot of newer indie-devs will not know so much about, since it's glazed over in a lot of tutorials, or just ignored altogether.

I think what people need to realise is that a game-engine does not make a programmer good, but a good programmer can make a game-engine great!

(Also, I can't wait to hear the backlash for my game when it finally gets to a presentable state. A 2D, Pixel-Art action game with momentum based movement and a high difficulty curve, all built in Unity. Maybe I should rename it to "Flamebait"? )

Oh for sure. Even I eagerly await the latest Jim Sterling (thank god for him) Steam Greenlight video on his YouTube channel knowing it will more than likely be some crap game thrown together in Unity. There's a lot of negativity the engine gets. There are drawbacks, as with every engine, but when the barrier to entry is literally the time spent downloaidng and installing it and maybe a little bit of coding or an asset store pack for visual scripting, you're going to get a lot of sub-par offerings.

That isn't to say these developers aren't trying, I'm sure many of them are younglings still in school and pushing what is more or less a PoC than an actual game. Nothing wrong with that. But seeing the flow of these games go from a trickle to a deluge can leave a bad taste in anyone's mouth.

I hear the same hate for other engines like GM "you can tell it's a GM game" - how? Its not my bag but fucking a. I'd venture any one of us using any number of engines put our games in a pile and you wouldn't be able to tell where they all came from if performance and production had the same floor.

Anyhow. Yeah. I like using Unity. It has its flaws like anything else but the hate is just craziness. Nothing more than regurgitation from people who don't know any better.

 

[HandsomeCharles]

I hear the same hate for other engines like GM "you can tell it's a GM game" - how? Its not my bag but fucking a. I'd venture any one of us using any number of engines put our games in a pile and you wouldn't be able to tell where they all came from if performance and production had the same floor.

Yea, GM gets a fair pounding too, which is completely unfair. Some very nice games have come out of GM in the past few years. It is definitely one of the simpler engines out there, but I am constantly surprised at what people are able to create with it!

I always hear a lot of people say thing along the lines of "Unity Physics" as a recognition point, or a way to tell that a game was made in the engine. Clearly these people have no idea that Unity just Uses PhysX or Box2D, which are pretty common choices in this industry.

I'm not sure what GM uses, but I assume its Box2D. One of my friends is at YoYo so I'll ask him tomorrow.

 

[Jacksinthe]

Yea, GM gets a fair pounding too, which is completely unfair. Some very nice games have come out of GM in the past few years. It is definitely one of the simpler engines out there, but I am constantly surprised at what people are able to create with it!

I always hear a lot of people say thing along the lines of "Unity Physics" as a recognition point, or a way to tell that a game was made in the engine. Clearly these people have no idea that Unity just Uses PhysX or Box2D, which are pretty common choices in this industry.

I'm not sure what GM uses, but I assume its Box2D. One of my friends is at YoYo so I'll ask him tomorrow.

Yup on the Box2D:
"GameMaker: Studio has extensive, yet easy to use, physics functions based on the Box2D and Liquid Fun open source physics libraries."
http://docs.yoyogames.com/source/dadiospice/002_reference/physics/index.html

 

[TheHollowNight]

Definitely noticed a huge spike in grumbling over Unity in some Firewatch threads. Some qualms with the engine are partially true, and I do miss working in UE4...but like with anything, quality of something is dependent on who's hands the engine is in.

We're trying to get the very best out of Unity 5 for Beacon, strong art goes a long way, but so does really good performance and optimization. Right now the game needs a pretty decent PC to run at max since we've done no work on that end of things yet, but it will no doubt definitely become an important task to address.

It's likely though we'll return to UE4 for our next project with a vastly different kind of game. I think the team generally prefer it, even though I can't stand its BSP tools. It's hilarious old editors like Hammer still have vastly superior BSP level buidling for blockouts. I certainly miss working on environments like this:

 

[Mik2121]

You don't need to use BSPs though? Just place boxes around if the BSP from UE4 bothers you!

 

[SouSouRocket]

Hi indieGAF! I've been lurking this thread for a while now, and I love seeing your projects. I share the concern over Unity grumbling as we are Unity devs as well right now I hope it passes soon.

Question for you fine folks--how do you handle testing your own games? We are a small team, and it's basically me doing 90% of our testing. I've tried to google some procedures but outside of playing extensively and writing down bugs/the conditions they occur under... what can you do? How do you deal with the fear of not creating whatever super specific condition causes a bug and missing it before shipping? People get so hostile about bugs, and while I've been there myself I don't want to put us in that position.

 

[liliththepale]

I could be wrong, but I don't think people are saying you can't make a solid game in Unity. There's just been a lot of times when a game performs less than perfect and Unity is the easy target. Ori sometimes hitches between scenes? Unity doesn't load stuff well enough without a lot of help. Oxenfree chugs during some of the scenes with enormous vistas and lots of parallax and post processing? Probably not something Unity is optimized for straight out of the box. Firewatch can't keep a steady framerate to save its life? Unity!

That doesn't make it a bad engine, nor is it bad that Unity exists. The vast majority of people would rather have these amazing Unity games than not have them. It just seems to have more examples of poorly optimized games than other engines have.

Question for you fine folks--how do you handle testing your own games? We are a small team, and it's basically me doing 90% of our testing. I've tried to google some procedures but outside of playing extensively and writing down bugs/the conditions they occur under... what can you do? How do you deal with the fear of not creating whatever super specific condition causes a bug and missing it before shipping? People get so hostile about bugs, and while I've been there myself I don't want to put us in that position.

Ask for help. Either from people on here/other forums or from friends and family.

 

[Jacksinthe]

Hi indieGAF! I've been lurking this thread for a while now, and I love seeing your projects. I share the concern over Unity grumbling as we are Unity devs as well right now I hope it passes soon.

Question for you fine folks--how do you handle testing your own games? We are a small team, and it's basically me doing 90% of our testing. I've tried to google some procedures but outside of playing extensively and writing down bugs/the conditions they occur under... what can you do? How do you deal with the fear of not creating whatever super specific condition causes a bug and missing it before shipping? People get so hostile about bugs, and while I've been there myself I don't want to put us in that position.

Hey, Sou - welcome!

For our mobile game we held a closed beta and had a bunch of people testing it for us. Recreating bugs is never a certainty and you just have to deal with it kinda. When it comes to player variables, unless it's something insanely obvious its probably really difficult to replicate. If you can't replicate you can always trace the steps of the code the way it was described to you and see if you spot anything.

In the end there's no sure fire way to make sure a game is bulletproof. You just do the best you can.

 

[SouSouRocket]

Thanks guys! I just really feel for the Firewatch folks right now. @_@ Trying to make sure we don't end up in their shoes with the framerate issues on PS4.

Also curious what you guys think of Steam and other PC distribution platforms as far as piracy concerns. I want my stuff to be as widely available as possible but I hear a lot of concern about lost sales due to piracy. :I

 

[Jacksinthe]

I could be wrong, but I don't think people are saying you can't make a solid game in Unity.

Note - the capslock and bold was not done by me - that's the poster's original post:

this is an issue with EVERY Unity game.

Just saiyin'

There's just been a lot of times when a game performs less than perfect and Unity is the easy target. Ori sometimes hitches between scenes? Unity doesn't load stuff well enough without a lot of help. Oxenfree chugs during some of the scenes with enormous vistas and lots of parallax and post processing? Probably not something Unity is optimized for straight out of the box. Firewatch can't keep a steady framerate to save its life? Unity!

That doesn't make it a bad engine, nor is it bad that Unity exists. The vast majority of people would rather have these amazing Unity games than not have them. It just seems to have more examples of poorly optimized games than other engines have.

Unity is going to be the culprit when it's barrier to entry and publishing/selling your game using it is $0. Not saying they need more money - just that when everyone is using your engine and releasing crap, the sheer number of bad titles increases due to user volume.

Unity has it's issues and my knuckles are proof of them but it's far from the piece of trash everyone says it is - by everyone i mean the low-information gamer who acts as an echo chamber for something they read somewhere from some guy who doesn't know

 

[liliththepale]

Oh. Hmm. That's disappointing to see someone actually thinks that, much less thinks it's a reasonable opinion to post. Probably doesn't care about being easily proven wrong, just wants to say something hateful to feel important and right.

I wonder how much it matters though. Like, if you produce a solid game with Unity, are people still going to investigate and be like "oh, it's Unity, so there's going to be perf problems at some point."? I don't think so, a couple outliers notwithstanding.

 

[Candescence]

Unity does have issues that need to be worked around, but good devs can properly optimize. In terms of the garbage collector... Avoiding unnecessary allocations, cache said allocations, and pooling stuff, for example, and using the garbage collector only when it isn't inconvenient to the player.

Large-scale scenes are also a big issue, but let's be frank, it's not like UE4 is much better about that (it's own open-world demo requires a fucking Titan X to run properly). Pretty much any engine that isn't explicitly optimized for open world games will struggle without proper optimization.

It's likely though we'll return to UE4 for our next project with a vastly different kind of game. I think the team generally prefer it, even though I can't stand its BSP tools. It's hilarious old editors like Hammer still have vastly superior BSP level buidling for blockouts. I certainly miss working on environments like this:

There's actually a BSP-esque level construction tool on the Unity asset store, and it's apparently even better and less buggy than Hammer. ProCore is also bringing ProBuilder to UE4, apparently, though that's a more 'modeling package'-esque setup, SabreCSG looks much more intuitive and has tools for certain things that look really appealing, such as making cuts in the geometry and using subtract brushes, though I haven't gotten around to buying it yet.

 

[TheHollowNight]

You don't need to use BSPs though? Just place boxes around if the BSP from UE4 bothers you!

As a level designer, I've always found it far, far faster blocking out in BSP in the method that Hammer/Quake used, much quicker for determining scale and layout than jamming messy box meshes everywhere. It's just a workflow I've preferred and I do miss that functionality.

There's actually a BSP-esque level construction tool on the Unity asset store, and it's apparently even better and less buggy than Hammer. ProCore is also bringing ProBuilder to UE4, apparently, though that's a more 'modeling package'-esque setup, SabreCSG looks much more intuitive and has tools for certain things that look really appealing, such as making cuts in the geometry and using subtract brushes, though I haven't gotten around to buying it yet.

Yeah I've heard of ProBuilder, but this SabreCSG looks great! Almost exactly the kind of thing I'm after! Thanks!

 

[Candescence]

Yeah I've heard of ProBuilder, but this SabreCSG looks great! Almost exactly the kind of thing I'm after! Thanks!

Yeah, SabreCSG also is working on an auto-rebuild feature for the next version. Hell, those two videos even basically demonstrate the sort of features that the asset is capable of, and it's just really appealing stuff.

 

[Jacksinthe]

Oh. Hmm. That's disappointing to see someone actually thinks that, much less thinks it's a reasonable opinion to post. Probably doesn't care about being easily proven wrong, just wants to say something hateful to feel important and right.

I wonder how much it matters though. Like, if you produce a solid game with Unity, are people still going to investigate and be like "oh, it's Unity, so there's going to be perf problems at some point."? I don't think so, a couple outliers notwithstanding.

I'd have to go back in the thread but IIRC some people said they won't buy games made with Unity. I take that with a grain of salt, though. Even the most ardent holdout will look at videos and read reviews from users.