Discouraged with solo game dev

[BobbyBurt]

I'm a young hobbyist game dev who works alone. That means that the code, graphics, animations, sfx and music are all on my shoulders to either make or find online. I like to see myself as a jack of all traits who can do all this stuff at least decently.

But the truth is, it's too much for me. I'm not good with audio, nor do I enjoy working on that type of thing. My art skills are limited, and so is my coding. There's often a specific visual or audio thing I want for my game, but I lack the know how to make it myself, and I get frustrated trying. I've had little luck finding good royalty free visuals / audio that's good enough or fits my specific vision. Having to do all this work to get a completed project is overwhelming. What's more, I'm a perfectionist, so I want each aspect of my game to be as good as possible. It's easy to overlook how difficult each profession that goes into gamedev is: sound design, animation, all that stuff takes so much time to become halfway decent at.

I could see myself making games for fun until I'm old, but not if I can't find a different approach to this problem. I'm considering two options:

I could buckle down on my whole “jack of all traits” thing, and take some time to get at least decent with different areas of skill. Visuals, audio design, coding. And get back to making full on projects after a bit of that. I'm not sure if this is worth it, and there's a part of me that would rather focus on getting good at the areas I enjoy.

or

I could really look and try to find other people who I could collaborate with. In that case I can focus on the stuff I like and am already decent at. I just don't really know how to find such people.

You guys have any advice for me? Maybe another approach to this problem that I'm not considering?

Thanks.

[Mineguy155]

Same boat, solo indie and all. The way that I'm gonna go about it is express how much in my program I CAN do, then when it's all up to my ability/finished, that's when I reign in some people. It also might be editor specific, you can do good on one and not the other, so I'd find a good middle ground to actually flourish your ideas upon.

[BobbyBurt]

At 10/11/19 10:18 PM, Mineguy155 wrote: Same boat, solo indie and all. The way that I'm gonna go about it is express how much in my program I CAN do, then when it's all up to my ability/finished, that's when I reign in some people. It also might be editor specific, you can do good on one and not the other, so I'd find a good middle ground to actually flourish your ideas upon.

Yeah, that's a good idea. I might try doing the stuff I can do and then getting help for the other stuff. I'm confused about what you mean by that last sentence, though.

[BobbyBurt]

At 10/13/19 02:45 AM, thepixelizer wrote: There are plenty of artists, developers, and musicians on here that would want to help for free, that's what Tom made the Collabinator for simply put an ad on there wait and eventually some one might respond.
https://www.newgrounds.com/collab

I was hoping to find something like this! Not sure how I missed this, but thank you.

[ninjamuffin99]

solo indie is overrated, collab with people of different talents

[Kwing]

I think the question you should ask yourself is why you're working alone. It could be that you prefer the autonomy of having control of your entire project - I know that's absolutely been my experience, since I have very specific ideas about what I want my games to look and feel like.

You mentioned not knowing where to find some resources. My favorite place for music is Free Music Archive; while their search feature is pretty terrible, the quality of music is far better than any other site I've found. Load up your favorite zone out game and play it for a few hours while listening to a few hundred songs in the genre you want. It's a long process, but chances are you'll find what you're looking for.

Collaborators are a bit hard to find, but this could also depend on what it is you're looking for (programmer, artist, etc.) You can definitely find people through Newgrounds, though I will admit the system isn't as good as everyone wishes it were, especially given how much the site's activity has tanked this past decade.

A completely separate option you have is to overcome that perfectionist streak and just make weird shit. When you're doing literally every aspect of the game, you can end up with a fantastic outcome if you're willing to think outside the box a little. Take Rex Origins, for example. I made this in 41 hours for a Game Jam and could have thrown together some generic electronic loops in FL Studio and ripped some free art assets online, but I made the graphics and sound purposefully goofy, making my own music by beatboxing, rapping, and playing kazoo, and slapping an emoji over the main character. This isn't the best option for large-scale projects, but it's an indicator of how you can work with the limitations of being a solo developer instead of fighting an uphill battle all the way.

[Mineguy155]

What I mean by that last sentence is to find a reasonable game engine for your skill level, as you don’t want to go overboard but also not go too primal. And, yeah, solo indie is HIGHLY overrated. The only fun part about solo indie is that you get to express your ideas how you want to, but even then, if you’re the boss in the project then you can accept and deny works as you see fit, to fit your liking. I’m only going solo indie right now to test my strength on the engine, and once I get a stable demo out and running or I can’t do anymore, that’s when I round up some others. Saves a lot of time explaining the base of your project to others.

[TomFulp]

At 10/11/19 01:40 PM, mayorDump wrote: I'm a young hobbyist game dev who works alone. That means that the code, graphics, animations, sfx and music are all on my shoulders to either make or find online. I like to see myself as a jack of all traits who can do all this stuff at least decently.

A lot of people have said it already here but I agree that collaboration is the way to go. Your best bet could be to start with a demo of a fun game concept, then find some music right here in the Audio Portal that is open for being used in web games - a lot of it is. It's nice to reach out to the musician, too - if they like your concept then you've already got a team-mate in your corner. Next you could find some artists you like around here and show them your demo - see if they'd be interested in doing art to replace the placeholder art. Artists may also bring new ideas that will help you expand on your idea and it will be fun to bounce things back and forth.

In other news, the Collabinator has some updates coming pretty soon when it switches to the new layout!

[pinklul]

I agree with everything, especially big and complicated project literally kill you

what I do to dodge that - I do not make big/long projects that need more then 1 month of time (only last project I did was 3 month project(not worth it), before every demo I made is 1-3 week time max)

At 10/11/19 01:40 PM, mayorDump wrote: I could really look and try to find other people who I could collaborate with. In that case I can focus on the stuff I like and am already decent at. I just don't really know how to find such people.

free work in team is absolutely horrible experience for you and your friends, you may even quit profession after that

look for sponsors or join team that can pay moneys, that better I think

[BobbyBurt]

At 10/15/19 07:20 PM, Kwing wrote: I think the question you should ask yourself is why you're working alone. It could be that you prefer the autonomy of having control of your entire project - I know that's absolutely been my experience, since I have very specific ideas about what I want my games to look and feel like.

Great advice, thanks man. I'm encouraged. I agree, there's a lot you can do on your own if you don't stress on the details, prioritize the different aspects of your game and get crafty with things that might be difficult to make yourself. Oh, and I checked out your Rex Origins game. Good shit.

[BobbyBurt]

At 10/16/19 08:14 AM, TomFulp wrote:

At 10/11/19 01:40 PM, mayorDump wrote: I'm a young hobbyist game dev who works alone. That means that the code, graphics, animations, sfx and music are all on my shoulders to either make or find online. I like to see myself as a jack of all traits who can do all this stuff at least decently.

A lot of people have said it already here but I agree that collaboration is the way to go. Your best bet could be to start with a demo of a fun game concept, then find some music right here in the Audio Portal that is open for being used in web games - a lot of it is. It's nice to reach out to the musician, too - if they like your concept then you've already got a team-mate in your corner. Next you could find some artists you like around here and show them your demo - see if they'd be interested in doing art to replace the placeholder art. Artists may also bring new ideas that will help you expand on your idea and it will be fun to bounce things back and forth.

In other news, the Collabinator has some updates coming pretty soon when it switches to the new layout!

Making a demo is a good idea! I'll see if I can find some collaborators through this community and give collaboration a shot with a small scale game project. Thanks Tom.

(By the way, can't wait for Nightmare Cops.)

[poyoh]

If you need concept art just hit me up man i been waning to work with people on something. Don't know much about making graphics but i'm always down to learn something new!

[BobbyBurt]

At 10/16/19 04:16 PM, nathansuede wrote: If you need concept art just hit me up man i been waning to work with people on something. Don't know much about making graphics but i'm always down to learn something new!

Will do! Just looked at your profile. Your style is really cool.

[Template88]

Keep your team small if you want to keep control, maybe partner with another skilled generalist? I do animations, music, ui elements, illustration and sound design but I dont know how to program. Hit me up if you ever wanna do a ludem dare and see if we mesh well together.

[BobbyBurt]

At 10/16/19 07:21 PM, Template88 wrote: Keep your team small if you want to keep control, maybe partner with another skilled generalist? I do animations, music, ui elements, illustration and sound design but I dont know how to program. Hit me up if you ever wanna do a ludem dare and see if we mesh well together.

Oh, you just gave me the idea that Ludem Dare or a Game Jam event would be a good opportunity to collaborate with and meet creators.

And yeah, I might hit you up sometime.

[BobbyBurt]

At 10/16/19 07:21 PM, Template88 wrote: Keep your team small if you want to keep control, maybe partner with another skilled generalist? I do animations, music, ui elements, illustration and sound design but I dont know how to program. Hit me up if you ever wanna do a ludem dare and see if we mesh well together.

Oh, you just gave me the idea that Ludem Dare or a Game Jam event would be a good opportunity to collaborate with and meet creators.

And yeah, I might hit you up sometime.

[pinklul]

At 10/16/19 07:35 PM, mayorDump wrote: Oh, you just gave me the idea that Ludem Dare or a Game Jam event would be a good opportunity to collaborate with and meet creators.

other people on that "big" jams do not play fair, and when your hard-work for week/month for that game-jam fail to some random Unity copypasta of assets, that will win... many people save some 1-2 years project-work just to "make money by winning game-jam" and act like they made that project for weeks...

it may hit you motivation very hard

[davidpuralocura]

what i did on my unity games is don't care too much about art

some squares circles and triangles does a good job for a start

one thing that helps is recycling concepts if you have a base of a game

you can change that complacently to make a new one

that is what i did at least but i am not an expert

this is just what i learned doing games