I find that if I want to "hit the ground running" in the morning I will starting thinking about my game in bed. (aka loading it into RAM.) This unfortunately results in me staying up all night just getting excited about designs or trying to solve a problem.
This also means that if I don't have time to "free up RAM" after work and say, go for a walk with my wife who reasonably talks about the "real world" I will NOT be able to process it. Often being like... "Uh-huh, I think I solved a programming problem while you were talking. Also, what did you say?"
But I also have a bit of a scatter brain where I'll be working on a trigger volume that does some custom door animation and that makes me suddenly realize that one line of dialogue I wrote 4 months ago should use a different emote than I originally planned. Cool but... hey could we focus brain?
The way I game dev is that I need the ENTIRE game loaded into the RAM of my brain. As the game gets bigger it's really pushes me to my limits. But without it, I end up staring blankly forgetting where a random function exists or what character said what.
Dab to wipe away the tears.
I've had two colds this month. *Dab*
What's the name for this fundamental law of game dev?
Features you dread working on for months end up taking half a day to actually complete, while "little idea I had" features take at least three times as long as you expect to complete and break every time you touch a seemingly unrelated system.
Lately I've been doing a simple thing to hacked my brain into functioning as expected.
I start the day with a small list of 3-5 tasks in a text document.
Having a few tasks in front of me helps me feel like I can choose which I want to work on and overrides my default overload & procrastination.
Screenshot of a cast of characters gasping at the player holding a very large knife.
Hi, I'm Ryan Wiemeyer, a one man Chicago studio currently working on Max Gentlemen Mystery Mansion. Follow me here for updates and indie game dev rants.
I've gotten quite good at making video games. Finishing them you ask? No thank you.
And when you leave they do a little vigil that makes it look like you died. A+ Would die in Sweden again.
Took a weekend trip to Malmö and Copenhagen. Visited a lot of museums and castles. Saw lots of good reference for my Victorian/Edwardian era projects.
I got to try some neat games. Pet lots of dogs. Try 100 Swedish snacks and candies. Did 30 days of yoga. Walked through snowy forests.
I spent all of January in Sweden at a sort of game dev hotel / co-working space and it was a really nice change of pace. Honestly a month felt short. It was great to meet so many new people and I was able to make a big dent in my project. I highly recommend checking it out @spelkollektivet.com ❤️
Screenshot of Unreal Engine blueprint editor with so many tabs open that none of the text on the tabs is visible.
Any other Unreal Engine users go psycho mode and just memorize the location of each tab in blueprint instead of closing tabs?
Just a cheeky little shout-out to @hatsproductions.bsky.social; enjoy some Max Gentlemen and Pip Whipple 🎩
I hit the button ✅😭🐸
🚨BIG HOPS is OUT NOW🚨
Get it on Steam | Switch | PS5 for just $17.99 with our 10% launch discount!
#indiegames #nintendoswitch #ps5
Windows 11 can suck my fat one. 🖕
Dream Design Dev Log 05: Merry Crisis
It's just a PS1 Dino Crisis clone except it's in Santa's workshop and you're hunting evil elves, yule lads, maybe a krampus and some abominable snowmen, etc. Obligatory mission where you escort Rudolph and everyone hates that part.
Though maybe that's what you mean when you clarified? Shrug. Writing. Is hard.
I'd actually like to offer some pushback on this. Sometimes the narrative strain of no one asking (presumably the main character) what they think is more distracting than fake choices. IMO Nintendo does this lazily. But at the least, you can offer 3 flavors of "yes" with some expression of how u yes
Computer, Find All: "horny"
Replace With: "swooning for a gooning."
I struggle a lot with motivation,I think primarily because this is the first time in my life I'm working in near isolation. Previously I had college, a studio job, a co-working space.
But I tell you, watching AI content shit all over the place really gives me pride in my human work and pushes me on
All good games fyi
Many of my ideas would be better off as cartoons tbh and the process of translating that to a game is expensive and rough.
I always need more socks!
Is being excited about storage a sign of old age?
Quite pleased with this Animal Crossing starter home I just built to store extra wood and bodies and junk.
When the duct tape starts coming off your plane, you start looking for places to land.
