How NOT to make an indie game
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- Опубликовано: 4 сен 2020
- Patch Quest is now available on Steam! (for PC)
▶ store.steampowered.com/app/13...
For daily dev news, check out the Discord server:
▶ / discord
And you can follow development on Twitter, too:
▶ / patchquest
Music used in this video:
▶ Overworld - Super Mario Bros 2 (Qumu Remix)
▶ Jungle Theme - Patch Quest
▶ Overworld - Super Mario World
▶ Desert Theme - Patch Quest
▶ Bowser's Road - Super Mario 64
▶ Moth Mounting - Patch Quest
▶ Forest of Hope - Pikmin
▶ Ghetto Libretto - Streets of Rogue
▶ Green Hill Zone - Sonic the Hedgehod (Qumu Remix)
▶ Coastal Theme - Patch Quest
▶ Fish Mounting - Patch Quest
5 years ago, I started work on my first unity project with very little experience. I’d made some smaller hobbyist games in Game Maker Studio, but this was the first time working on something professional. And progress… was really slow. Beyond art and programming, I had to worry about a whole range of skills I hadn’t really considered - like music, sound design, user experience, marketing, and game design itself.
It’s no secret that game development takes a long time. But fast forward 5 years, and I now have a relatively complete game that I’m really happy with! It’s simple, juicy and fun. However, the path from there to here was very shaky, with a lot of setbacks and tough lessons. And halfway through, I even had to scrap development and start over from scratch!
But you know, these kinds of problems seem to happen to a lot of new developers - to varying degrees. And that’s why I’ve made this video, so that you can learn something from my mistakes. 
Игры
Got it, Prototypes are key
You're darn tootin
Just keep making prototypes until you realize that prototype is actually just a game.
You bet you're fucking ass
I tought it was memory
2 prototype games are out already. who wants to make another game about Аlex Mercer? unoriginal
Tbh, this was actually really inspiring
super inspiring, guess I gotta try and get back in game dev (again)
Let's all develop!
@@LycheeGameLabs what did you do to the npcs? did you... MYYYYYURDER THEM!!?
@@LycheeGameLabs also, will the game be on switch?
@@catonmars9852 I hope so, someday
“I have not failed, I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work” - Edison
Iteration is how everything gets made
He literally says that at the end, Floyd.
edison was a charlatan though
"I have not failed, I just stole the credit for other, better inventor's work!" - Edison
@@idontwantahandlethough yes
So basically: "Core game loop needs to be fun, everything else is icing on the cake and comes from iteration". Difficulty in mastering will keep dedicated players coming back for more, and the core mechanics need to be easy to learn to make people stick around for at least one full iteration of the core game loop, so they get the best experience out of it.
Awesome thanks for this simple explanation 👍
Saved me 22 mins thx❤
Also important to have a unique twist on game loop to ensure your game does not blend with the sea of others
You saved 22 minutes of my life mate. Think about it... you saved precious time for a stranger all the way across the world. Thank you.
FGO...
Arguably the core gameplay is paying for gatcha waifus
this game is extremely visually appealing
@Jayden Britton yes
Definitely on par with DS or Wii games, at least
@@revimfadli4666 WAY WAY better than those lol
@@eduardoxenofonte4004 yea I won't be surprise if a Switch release is gonna be a hit, with such polish
Arthur Dungah depends on what kind
Sneezing mechanic, now that is innovative!
So next gen
@@LycheeGameLabs Imagine if the character randomly sneezes and shoots a burst of bullets? Is it a blessing is it a curse? I guess we'll never know! :D
Don't Starve Hamlet had sneezing. It was horribly annoying.
Space station 13 did it first tho. ruclips.net/video/WKppb-ynofY/видео.html Mostly coughing but sneezing is a common viral symptom. It makes a virus airborne.
@@MINIMAN10000 real life did it first
"the first year was disheartening"
me: you should be happy your character can even move
Yeah
i made a simple 2 game in 30 days of learning, so dont talk like its super hard.
Edit: Man this people are pathetic, defending their pride instead of learning...
@@tyrogames everyone learns at its own pace, so don't go boasting about how good you are. Great for you, but not for others
@@tyrogames copying code is not "making" something lol.
@@tyrogames So it seems your brain cells, or lack thereof either consists of a boasting, egotistical personality, or a dense, ignorant, and careless facade to the difficulties of a full fledged indie game developer, or both, because the appealing amounts of audacity, ego-centric, and carelessness you put into that single sentence, should be enough to rid you of even the basic rights of commenting on RUclips.
"The only way to write good code is to write bad code first" I think this applies to everything: Playing games, writing, designing, making a game, making a movie, a sport, anything.
I really enjoyed this video and your journey, thank you for sharing it with us!
Someone recently told me: "You have to suck before you get good."
That can be understood in two different ways. 1) Through practice and learning you learn to code and eventually you become so good at it you never write bad code ever again. 2) It doesn't matter how skilled and experienced you are, you always start with bad code and shape it into a good one. Like master sculptors who start with a rough rock and turn it into a magnificent statue it's the same principle for coding, first you just slap together some crappy code to use as your programming base or fundament, then you make it good. I think it's the second principle here, if veteran coders never started with bad code then their games would never need to go through debugging and that's virtually unheard of.
Producing children.
@@acoupleofgsanrandaneaniandann What?
looking at the footage and seeing how finished the tests look, im thinking maybe using placeholders wouldve saved a lot of time haha
that’s actually a really good point
Probably, but so much of one's experience with a game is influenced by how it looks that I think depending too much on placeholders could mess the feedback from test gameplays
@@_.-._.-Y0K0-._.-._ I mean like for when he was testing mechanics on his own (atleast from what was said in the video, I had the idea he only got other people to play a couple of times and usually just tested by himself)
and he was purely testing if the mechanics are fun, which the graphics quality doesn't affect
A lot of people will probably see this video and go off into the wrong direction again. All of his "prototypes" had so much polish in them that they probably took 10 times as long to make than would be needed to test if they're just plain fun. If you can't make something fun without complete graphics, animations and particles it's probably not very fun to begin with.
He re-used a lot of his already existing assets (that he created over years) so his "1-month-prototype" looks very polished and would've probably taken 3-6 months to get looking like this from scratch. It would be good for beginners to show some really crude stuff as well.
@@nidgithm his own testing would also be influenced by the looks. I'm not saying he should have used no placeholders, but maybe that should be for the base building and other side stuff. The main game is reliant on exploration, which is a very visually-heavy mechanic - new areas wouldn't be attractive if it weren't for the design differences, and he was also making collectables. Plus the ailment-inducers and healers had to be visually different in order to function, too, so he'd already have to design them well anyways - if he had trouble explaining the mechanics as it was, imagine if the design weren't so intuitive. The newest version especially depends in the monsters' designs.
He ended up reusing a good chunk of animations and effects so they weren't a waste of time but I think they'd be a better point to put on hold (along with tbe sidelines things) until a little later than the basic looks themselves.
To be frank, i lowkey loved the idea of being an explorer on a strange and dangerous land having to figure out the way through dangerous terrain. It seems like that idea disappeared on the later development.
ditto! I liked the turn based slower paced game in the beginning
I hope someone else makes a game based on that idea lol
Honestly I feel like he just didn't really like his own idea and that's why it never worked, until he sort of realized that he didn't like it and changed the game to be something else.
He only "sort of" realized it because he ascribed the change to something else...
The more he tried to "fix" the original idea, the less fun it looked to me, because that's just it: He tried to fix what wasn't broken. The "combat system" that wasn't actually combat looked really dumb. The blocks that filled up with status effects until he died seemed dumb, too.
Status effects should hinder combat or movement or whatever else it is that you're doing, or deal damage over time, or make you more vulnerable to damage from certain sources, etc. Not just straight up kill you. Having separate health and status effects is cool. I also liked the idea of having complex status effects that do different (but related) things depending on how strongly affected you are.
Additionally, I don't get what he meant by not having a "core". The core is: Roguelike turn-based exploration game. How is that not a core? All the other things followed logically but he seems to have lost the idea early during development, so he kept trying to fix it.
A problem i see is that he tried to get inspiration on roguelikes when it was clearly a more survival open world idea to begin with, if he had taken inspiration from games like subnautica, terraria, no man sky, etc, i think he could have save the initial idea or made a new idea that didn't betray the core of the first game.
@@brunorastafa1429 since the game he wanted was rogue like, if he accidentally created something with to much slow survival gameplay, it makes sense he would change it to be a lot more rogue like. rather than broken, it just wasn't the game he envisioned.
Marketting is a really underatted process if a game's success. You have to make sure people know your game somehow.
This video is a very creative way to market a game. Showing how awful the creation process was. But goddamn it works. Now I want to play your game
Same lol
Hope you still do😄
RUclipsrs. GrayStillPlays is a good one
Agreed, I've seen a lot a promising game completely fail in the week following their release because no one knew they existed. Sometimes it was even quicker than a week.
Around the 15-minute mark I realized I was bamboozled into watching a long commercial for his game. :D
But I also learned a lot!
Ah, it seems you fell for one of the classic blunders: Finishing assets before making sure the game is fun to play even with crappy, stand-in assets.
Don't get me wrong, they looked awesome! And everybody wants to turn what they see in their heads into reality as soon as possible, and that's 90% visuals, MAYBE 10% gameplay, but a game with MS paint assets that is extremely polished gameplay-wise will always beat a beautiful, boring game.
Really glad you got it all on track, though! Will definitely be keeping an eye out for this one. Best of luck!
This makes me wonder if I should go make an asset flip game BUT make it fun to play AND use it to spread the word about the people who made said assets...
Thanks for the advice! I will halt my asset creation as soon as possible.
Nah he could legit sell this game as is. Biggest mistake was they didnt get playtesters. Maybe some people like this style of game. It seemed like a really unique puzzle game.
dwarf fortress and early versions of factorio basically
In the end, it's all about balancing your abilities, your motivation, and your expectations. Some people need to see their game with more polished assets to get a better view of the end goal and keep themselves going
Patch Quest: How not to make an indie game
YandereDev: How to not make an indie game
Wait, I thought YandereDev makes a triple-A game. XD
@@rayfirewood nah, triple a games don't rely on else if
@@sweetasterium True.
"Game" is a relative term
lol XD👌
So I take this as a "draw the eye before the eyebrow" type of mistake, except the eye is the concept and the eyebrow is the structure of the game and you drew a very nice eyebrow but oh god it's on his forehead
Mexican JoJo HAHAHA
hahahahaha love that analogy
xD nice one
I actually don't thinl drawinh the eyebrow before the eye is too bad. The eyebrow sits just above the eye socket and connects to the nose, which helps with defining the skeletal structure of the face. It also aligns with the top of the ear, which helps with the positioning of features. I think a more accurate analogy would be to draw the head before the eye since the eye's position is informed by the head.
Another way to look at it is to draw the eyebrow and eye in tandem with one another and to only draw details once you've vaguely defined both. This works with games in the fact that you should make the gameplay and aesthetics in tandam and only finalise and add details once they have both been developped sufficiently.
@@toowiggly Try and do that man, maybe for you is a better method, but for us mortals is like building the ceiling before the walls
I really love how you step back and were brave enough to critizice your own work in that way. If I realized my game isnt good after three years of work, I would just publish it as it is and cry for the rest of my life. Great and trully inspiring video.
"it was hard"
His First game: animations, art, mechanics, coding, design, ideas, shaders
My game: netflix adaptation
My game: (copypasted from Unity tutorial [spoiler alert: doesn't even work])
At least I know the Console.WriteLine(); hacks
What does mean netflix adaptation?
@@Sir_Isaac_Newton_ Writing to a console is a powerful programmistic tool, and the best friend of any programmer. The second best friend is stackoverflow :P
@@plrc4593 Netflix adaptations as in their adaptation is terrible of cartoons or the like
“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” -Thomas Edison is exactly what I thought about when you talked about how those years weren’t wasted but actually helped at 20:22-20:42
Thomas Edison stole most of his inventions from his uncompensated employees.
@@andrewcleary9952 I did not know that. Thx for the fact-check.
Careful with historical revisionism
At least the quote is good
@@liitutereuiui4687 yes? But man, poor Tesla, he was just a good man. And now is Almost just a funny meme about a man that his ideas was stolen
Your original idea was cool on paper, but seeing it in action made it look like a shitty cashgrab mobile game. But your redesigned product looks truly enjoyable.
Exactly what I was thinking myself while watching :)
"Watch an ad to take a shower! (All ailments down!)"
It is! I have a friend that sent me a link to the beta.
it is.
Just wanted to say a couple of things:
1. Even your "failed" attempts looked great, the talent is there. Just the fact that you managed to understand its flaws and somehow salvage parts of it speaks of how good a developer you are.
2. Found out about Patch Quest from a reddit post a few months ago, probably before the pandemic. Immediately loved the idea. Will definitely buy it when it comes out.
3. As an aspirant game designer that just decided to pick up coding at the not-so-young age of 34, this video is actually full of good info and very inspiring. Thank you!
I love stories like this. I’m an aspiring game developer and it always gives me hope to see other indie devs finishing successful passion projects like this.
19:16 "...most games can actually be described this way, as a twist on something that came before..."
All of human creation and ingenuity can be described this way
"How NOT to Develop an Indie Game"
YandereDev: 👁️👄👁️
YandereDev is sad right now he's finished this game in 3-4 years and yandere dev....
lmao 6 years for a demo
@@aitusai There were fans who made a more complete game of Yandere Simulator in a fraction of the time. The man is just lazy and greedy at this point.
@@nottechytutorials yeah yeah love letter
I was gonna say lmao
Awesome video!
Game Development is definitely very tricky and everyone has their own journey, that final version looks great!
And all the time you spent iterating on all those ideas was definitely not lost!
All of that experience gave you a ton of knowledge on what works and what doesn't. It will greatly benefit you for many years and many games to come.
Btw the Steam link in the description is broken, it just goes to the Steam homepage.
Thanks! :D I've also fixed that link now
@@LycheeGameLabs I see chinese's word of die or probably japanese? Haha probably u can add more of them so u can localize to their market.
@@starrynight3945 what
@@starrynight3945 It's a kanji
@@starrynight3945 It is both Chinese and Japanese, actually. They use the same character
The concept of Minimum Viable Product has really helped me when it comes to considering where to go with my projects.
The idea is you strip your game down to its absolute most basic systems in order to function and then you consider "is this fun?" "Is this a concept people will have fun playing?"
The reality is if you game isnt even fun in it's base form then whatever fun features you add to the game will be on the back of an unfun base
I’m amazed at how juicy and professional the graphics looked at every stage. So many little kinks and animations.
Ikr, in terms of aesthetic and design this game was ALWAYS strong.
Just wanted to say a couple of things:
1. Even your "failed" attempts looked great, the talent is there. Just the fact that you managed to understand its flaws and somehow salvage parts of it speaks of how good a developer you are.
2. Found out about Patch Quest from a reddit post a few months ago, probably before the pandemic. Immediately loved the idea. Will definitely buy it when it comes out.
3. As an aspirant game designer that just decided to pick up coding at the not-so-young age of 34, this video is actually full of good info and very inspiring. Thank you!
Where do you start when you have diddly squat knowledge of code, are really intimidated by it (as a musician I understand my own feelings of intimidation at least I guess), and would like to get into sunday game developing one day?
Same here: 31 yo, Paramedic, and moved to Canada just to pursue a career in the videogame industry. A big and hard step but looking at this kind of video is true motivation. Sometimes it's extremely overwhelming not just because of how hard it can be coding by itself but also because of my particular situation and other things, but hey! The biggest rewards come from the hardest difficulties.
@@Felishamois if you want to read a book C# yellow book, if you wanna watch a video i would suggest CSdojo or if you wanna skip basics and dive into game dev brackeys.
@@Felishamois concentrate on responsive soundscape design, if you want to enter the field with your background. A good sound design is often lacking in de indie games.
Its been a year. How is your game dev quest going?
I am asking because I was one of million people who "decided to build an indy dev stutio" with friends in my 20s. You can guess how that turned out.
Anyway, I got back into game dev at 36 and am looking forward to hearing from others who started (or started again) as internet old-folks.
You first iteration on the game isn't that bad honestly, some people do like hardcore puzzle mechanics. I think what actually happened is that along the way you realized you didn't really like that genre and lost your passion to continue the game.
I think that's the case as well!
I think he said the levels were randomly generated though, so that would explain why it felt boring. You'd have to customize the levels to make them challenging.
In any case, my thought when he explained that his game was boring, was that he should just change the target audience then. Make it a game for kids, it already has the look down.
Yeah I was thinking the whole time that it would be a perfect fit for a mobile puzzle game.
I disagree. I think the call he made to start over was a very mature decision. Just because there are games that are similar doesn't mean his core gameplay loop was the right base to build off of
No, the moment I saw that he wanted to mix all those different concepts together in the beginning, I knew it wasn't going to turn out good. It's incredibly impressive he was able to go as far as he did, but it was never going to work. I think he could make an interesting grid-based strategy game, but that's quite different from a rogue-like. Like, you have a grid with a starting point and a goal, and you have to figure out how to get your explorer to the goal while dealing with the obstacles in your way. The key there, is that the strategy has to feel satisfying. Since "roguelike" was one of the main elements he was trying to incorporate, the randomness and the focus on action makes strategic play extremely difficult to achieve.
I read about your "jar" health system on your blog a while back and I immediately fell in love with it. The idea of tracking the amount/variety/effects of damage all in an intuitive way was really appealing to me. I think that if you had played around with your initial prototype, shifting the focus of the game onto managing the damage and maybe having different damage types that cancel each other or grant immunities, you could have found a solid core gameplay loop in what you had. I agree that starting with a tried and true gameplay loop and changing slightly is a almost guaranteed way to find something that works, but I think it limits the kinds of games we have.
I liked the jar too, but I'm skeptical that it would have become anything more than an OK game - something you can impress your friends with yes, but that's a long shot from something that can be commercially successful.
This is one of the best game dev videos I've seen. I like that it actually had a lesson. It even helped me think about the game I just started!
I HONESTLY believe this is going to be a “hit” game. Also seems perfect for the switch, but prepare to port it to everything. Congrats, man!
ruclips.net/video/FsKEQCeTBck/видео.html
thankfully, unity handles ports to other consoles really well
Pain is temporary, but glory is forever. So get out that angle grinder and start cutting away what doesn't work.
Ohh I was hoping you'd say angle grinder
I see the wintergatan fans have started to spread
@@Kaiwala We've always been here; just mostly quiet.
Oh trees i know dirt grows on cats but trees! Thats exciting
And be careful with that thing! If you chop off a finger, THAT pain won't be temporary.
the part wherein you already have the art and animation elements on the ready for reference from your first try, makes me giggle as an aspiring digital artist. You didn't fail at all, you made a collection of great assets that you could use in the future, and that's a big win.
While you did throw it away in the end, your original Patch Quest idea looks like it could have an very promising premise if it is developed as a puzzle game rather than a rogue-like.
At its very basic, many puzzle platformers are really just walking simulators. You give the player a destination they need to reach (a reward chest, quest goal, gate to the next level, etc), some skills and objects they can use to manipulate the environment, and simply task the player to try to reach that destination by manipulating these objects.
The thing though, most puzzle games tend to works best when they contain hand-crafted levels, not procedurally generated. Each level in puzzle games need to either teach you something about the game mechanic, give you a challenge to apply what you've just learnt, or combine the existing mechanics in interesting ways. This kind of progression system in puzzle games is something that's really difficult to achieve with procedurally generated levels.
As to how to adapt these ideas, you can have each monster give you unique skills you can use to solve a level. For example, you may need to destroy an obstacle using the skill obtained by mounting a particular monster but the path to that monster is blocked by another monster and you need to satisfy some conditions to pass through it, for example, you may need to have a muddy status condition so the monster don't attack you on sight. Having a tiled map system can also be useful in the puzzle, for example, if your character has a skill to swap tiles with another tile adjacent to it. Roguelike games don't usually feature these kind of gameplay, but these are elements that are often found in puzzle games.
I think Einstein said something like this: "If I had to solve a problem in an hour, I'd spend the first 55 min thinking HOW to solve it then the last 5 solving it"
The original game had potential to be a different spin-off of patch quest so don't throw it away keep refining it, great vid my man.
I don't think he can. He went in exactly the wrong direction at the very start, like he lost his original vision and what made it work.
I don't think you watched the entire video
The original game was completely unfun
@@PeachDragon_
To you. And to him. It looked fun to me.
@@PeachDragon_ pretty sure it was unfun due to poor execution, not the concept itself(which might turn out better if fleshed out)
Those years weren't wasted if you learned something from it. Rome wasn't built in a day, and we aren't born knowing how to walk and talk. I loved learning your process, and teaching us not to make the same mistakes.
the amount of amazing artwork you did that was never used in the final build is insane. everything looked insanley proffesional
Very cool! While watching I was like, "Oh wow--he's putting a lot of effort into the art for those prototype tests huh?" ;P
I had been working on my game for 8 years. Until up to last year, I finally caved in and scrapped the whole thing to start all over. The new game is so much cleaner, to the point, and most importantly, more FUN. I really wish I saw your video before starting my project before, but just like you said, the years were not wasted: I learned SO much, and because of that knowledge, the game as it is now was made in half the time it would have been otherwise, leaving me more room for improvements rather than just core programming.
Great video, favorite one in a long time!
You've never wasted a single minute. You just spent a lot of time learning how to improve your game, just like he did.
8 years... You mean a few minutes a week as a hobbyist with a day job?
@@damiengates7581 Haha, I wish that's all I put into it. Would make me feel better if that was the case. XD
I'm starting up on an idea myself, and I've got so much story and dialog bouncing around in my head, I feel like I need to get it out somewhere, but this is all just reinforcing the lesson that, the core gameplay comes first.
I'm still writing the ideas down. I'm just not attempting to code or draw or animate any of them, until the blue box moves in a fun way. And I need to be prepared to abandon any idea, no matter how cool it sounded on paper, if it conflicts with the core gameplay.
U have another work that u earn a living from ?
The riding mechanic really reminds me of Crash Of The Titans :D
I really like the idea of a puzzle game with the patch world and pushing fruits into the monsters to satisfy them and keep safe as the world moves and new patches appear...
Your experience just put me up for a "cold" run for my gameplay elements right away (a pen and paper version at least) in order to discover any big issue before it is already done... Thank you very much mr.! Subbed and hope the best for your future projects!
Great idea!
I really liked the initial idea... until I saw the one about riding the creatures. I love it!
I can see a "little bit" of the influence of the other roguelikes that you showed in the video xD
#Fighting!
que grande heynau....
*Roguelites/Roguelike-likes
This took me so long to realize it wasn't an insult
@@reggiemillar5232 SAME LMAO
@@melanoc3tusii205 stfu
Kudos to you on completing your game. Even though I'm seeing this video after almost a year, it couldn't have been presented to me a time better than now. It serves as a big motivation for me to keep moving forward in the path of Game Development. It was a good watch!
Thank you for this! It really acted as a tutorial, since I was creating a game and had no clear idea what to do, and was just freestyling it. As you can guess development was really slow, I got demotivated alot, and would work on it every day, despite even myself hating the game.
can i just say your graphic style is fucking insane!! can't believe you made all this by yourself it's so cute and clean
right? I need to know what he used
Eh i hate it
@@youngeggie He's using vector graphics rather than pixel graphics
Was thinking the exact same thing! I am decent at programming, but man I am horrible at graphic design. This person has mad skillz.
"Cute and clean" and the f word don't fit to together that well. Just fyi
I was honestly surprised how much i liked the game - it looked like it would be chaos with all the enemies, but the gameplay is actually really fun and challenging + really cute art!
I could definitely see it becoming a popular game.
Thanks :D
Thanks for going over for game dev journey. It helped a lot and I think more people should do this
Such an amazing video. Currently I’m struggling trying to figure how to go about making my game idea possible, and your video gave a clear understanding of how I should approach its development. I tend to overthink my ideas and end up shooting myself in foot before I can flesh out the game. Seeing how I was looking at it backwards and needed to work on a prototype that is fun first before expanding is gonna change how I look at games now. When I finish a prototype of my game, you’ll be the first person who I want to play my game.
Nobody gonna mention that he uses a light theme is his IDE
Praise the sun!
@@LycheeGameLabs no! May the dark sigil guide your way.
@@LycheeGameLabs light attracts bugs smh
There are light themes specifically designed to reduce eye strain. (Solarized Light) Sure they don't look as cool but they help a lot
@@pyrogreg8 solarized dark is even better :)
After hearing that dev story, I'm definitely buying this once it's out.
keep coming back to your video because is so interesting and fun to see your progress
This was a fantastic video. Nice job sticking out the journey, and making something great despite the setbacks!
I’ve got an idea for a game called “Color Me Blue”. It’s a pixelated 2d bullet hell platformer that has the protagonist use paint brushes as weapons, with each color having it’s own different abilities (Orange spits fire, yellow blinds/stuns enemies, etc.) that would benefit the player. Currently I’m working on some of the art to get an idea of what the game and it’s characters should look like.
Sounds awesome!! We're rootin for ya buddy ✨🙌
if you want to make the game and is serious about it, use placeholders and spend less time on the art until you have the mechanics ready and fun to play with. change of mechanics a lot of the time you change what things looks like and then you would have wasted time on art you arent gonna use. concept art is fine, but dont make any final art like in this video until everything else is in place
As this video proves, you should work out the gameplay prototype before anything else.
For me it would sound cool as a Boss Battler but Bosses are enviroments as big paintings and you brush stuff on thwm
If ever you make a demo of it I'd love to be one of those peeps to try the game.👉👈
I think its also cool to add in some special tools such as paint bucket(to make a large splash onto the enemy), pen(more accurate targets), pencil etc. that have unique abilities
Then agaaiinnn there has to be a prototype before you get into the rest of the details
Its so... polished. A pure eyegasm. Meanwhile my 'complete' games are unpolished af.
he really nailed the simple yet beautiful art design. I'm way jelly
Guys!
Google what "game juice" is.
Thank me later ;-)
@@igorthelight how is a cartridge cleaner supposed to help?
@@cactusjupiter8533 Ha-ha! :-)
No! II didn't mean that.
I was talking about this: ruclips.net/video/216_5nu4aVQ/видео.html
also quite often major companies' complete games
Thanks for sharing all this, great video and congrats on your journey. As a fan of turn-based roguelikes, I really like the look of some of the positioning-based ideas you had before starting over!
I started developing a game in 2006, and went through so much of this that I was laughing and thinking, "Oh, I feel your pain!" The most-unexpected problem for me was having to learn so many new things and having to wear so many hats that I was overwhelmed. I gave up on the game sometime in 2011, I guess, but it's remained on my bucket list to finish it. You've given me some new hope, although I still don't know how one person manages everything!
That's insane. Do you think a software dev can do game development as a hobby? It seems like it takes insane amount of time. But I imagined making simple indie horror games. how much time do you think it would take.
@@fizruk7644 Game dev is like software dev, stacked on software dev, stacked on software dev, and that's before you get to understanding the psychology of it and asset creation like music, art, and voice
I've been enjoying my time with it, but absolutely, expect it to take years worth of time and go in treating it as a hobby
I mean the 2016 version does sound fun to me it just seem different and sure lot of people don't like trying new thing but I think it could be fun to have overly complicated aliament system and no actual combat it's create challenge in gameplay that most other game don't have thus "different"
It has certain elements that can definitely be turned into a fun an unique game. A game with lots of alignments to manage and where the goal is to avoid conflict not kill the enemies could be a fun deep strategy game. But it really doesn't seem to fit everything else he had around it. A heavily constricted grid movement with a plant growing system thrown in there most likely isn't going to make for a good tactical strategy game.
There was a game pretty similar in concept to this that i got in humble bundle. it was alright except the aging. Couldnt stand my character aging (died in like 30 turns of old age) so quickly. the mechanic was an annoying way to force forward progress and unfortunately, within a few days i deleted the game without a second though.
Its easy to lose audience on simple things. I at least tried that random obscure indie game.
Right, there are so many roguelites out and turn based survival games are much rarer. Something similar could be quite interesting if done well.
@@frosthammer917 just get rid of the grid and that hideously flat mobile game artstyle and it can be made to work
This is an amazing document, it’s really rare to get a peek at the “failures”, because they are often invisible to the outside but everybody faces this. My past tiny gamedev life winced at these lessons because I had to learn them the hard way, too. Honestly, it’s very clear you learned a lot about the value of animation in conveying state (and giving nice, juicy feedback) within the game along the way. We focus too much on output and not the value of process and iteration sometimes, not just in gamedev but in any design and development context. It looks like a blessing in disguise because the core mechanic of your game looks extremely satisfying and fun to play. Congratulations on the beta release and I wish you all the success!
Great video! I really liked the nostalgic background playlist :D
Loved it! Thank you for sharing this experience, it really helped me out of my slump
I feel like so many step into this same trap because they get into making a game not because they want to make a game, but because they want to make "THIS" game (for whatever value of this). Their idea is/was their drive to make the game, so prototyping and finding it isn't fun is difficult to swallow in that case.
I think that's normal, really. Your drive to make a game will always come from the ideas, and this is true for most creative endeavours.
I think the real trap, though, is thinking that your idea wouldn't be fun for anyone because it isn't fun for you. I think Patch Quest's 2016 version of the game is awesome, and I would love to play it, but he finds it not fun and was disheartened. Just because your idea isn't fun for you, doesn't mean that no one would enjoy it. Fun is, after all, subjective.
@@ViryaDharmawanVGE I have no idea how you succeed at building a game that isn't fun for you though. How would you change it, improve it? Even if you could, would you really want to?
The video: half-way through
Me: oh god this guy always already has all the graphics and animations finished before even having decided on the game mechanics
The video: 10:54
Me: thank god he figured it out
That's how I spent the first half the video
Everyone has their own hurdles and game development and this guy had his. We all can laugh about it but shouldnt make fun.
Although I will say... excitement probably took over.
YandereDev: still hasn't figured it out
@@beepbep4302 no one is making fun of him.
Art work is something you should save until after you’ve made a fun gameplay. The game I’m making, I am just using some premade assets as place holders. Once I have something that feels fun to play, then I will look into getting real artwork for it.
Great video! I'm just starting with game development and this helps a lot, thank you!
This was a phenomenal video. I will be purchasing your game to not only support you but the game looks kinda fun. Cheers mate keep on going!
Don't worry those first years where not wasted, especially since you showed us all what you learned. Thank you!
Though I've never completed a game on the level as this guy, I can relate. When I first started in game dev, I had all these awesome ideas. In my head I was thinking my player can do this and that, and even do this when doing that. And they'll have this option, and that option. They'd have endless options. They can do anything. Yet when I created my games they quickly got bogged down with too many options. My play testers my nephew and niece were rather blunt. They got right to the point "This is boring."
I quickly realized I had wasted countless time designing features which the player's didn't even take a split second's notice of. Some they never even knew about. For example, in one game I spent like 3 weeks designing this highly complex atmospheric system based off of the amount of trees in the world. It was cool to me. Yet to my players, they didn't even know it existed.
It gradually dawned on me it wasn't my ideas. It was how I was implementing my ideas. I realized you can't think fun. You have to experience fun. From then on I made a point that the core of my game would be fun. No longer would I imprison myself to one framework and try to squeeze everything into that one system. Instead I gave myself the freedom to experiment and do whatever seemed most fun in the moment. This all started from this one experience...
On one play test I had created just a base terrain and ocean. While wandering around the world, I quickly got bored. So, I went to a really high point and ran and jumped off a high cliff in the ocean. After I had done this, I thought hey that was kinda fun. I wonder if I can jump farther or wouldn't it be cool if there was another ledge farther away and I can see if I can jump on it.
From this experience, I developed what I call the fun play test. I have a simple idea. Play around with it and change it up a bit. I then build off that and so on. Fun mechanic leading to fun mechanic. So, I still follow my ideas. But, my ideas are just that ideas they aren't rules. I haven't reached my core yet. I still have lots of mechanics to explore. Yet I know at least when I find my core, I'll have plenty of fun mechanics to choose from.
i think what you are referring to is what game designers call follow the fun. there is a whole video about it on a youtube channel called "Game Maker's Toolkit" if you want to know more. its sometimes also said that these kinda games design themselves.
@@Roockert That's really cool. I didn't know they actually had an official term for it. I agree. The game really designs itself. I tell people I'm making a survival game. They're like cool. What's it about? I always struggle here. Cuz I have a bunch of ideas, but I have no idea which direction its gonna go. I've never surfed, but I think that's a good analogy. I'm just following the wave wherever it leads. Thanks, I'm gonna look into that Follow the Fun concept.
Great Video !
By far this is the best game dev video I've seen, the way u explain things from the start to finish is perfect, the pacing is also perfect and the graphic u already nailed it from the start of the game, the visual is very appealing, I loved every minute of it. I don't mind at all if I have to watch it again, so happy the game turned out the way u want in the end, all the hard work was not wasted and the game looks really fun! I love the monster designs and artstyle!
this was really inspiring thank you, looks like I still have a long way to go from now, still learning 3D modelling the character tho HAHAHA
I am pretty impressed that alot of things you tried were very polished :O
So basicaly: make it simpler 1st then develops its idea.
The reason you should make it simple is to make it quickly playable to see if it works, but you still should include as many core mechanics as possible and make sure it works well right from the beginning. If you can't get it to work, it probably isn't fixable, you can't expect it to magically get better later. If you have a mechanic in your mind, it should be in the prototype, you can't just expect to add it sometime in the future and expect it to work.
In my honest opinion, many modern games are based on pretty weak foundation that is either very simple, or the ideas just don't work together in any meaningful way but are forced together with bandaids. An overly simple foundation can be a result of a failed foundation had to be dumbed down because it didn't really work. Then the remnants are loaded with tons of irrelevant and disconnected features to keep the player busy, professional graphics and sountrack, and there you have a modern triple A game. To me it becomes pretty quickly apparent what was in the foundation and what is tacked on.
Making an actually good foundation is very hard and takes a lot of experimentation. Well planned is half done. Good ideas rarely come out of an expensive assembly line with deadlines. More stuff should belong in the foundation. Inexperienced devs tend to expect too much out of their vision and skimp on a working prototype, maybe even to avoid facing the truth.
@@rtyzxc Woah your words are so inspiring. I never thought it that way. You're right, we do need a very strong foundation. Thank you for that. I'll save your comment.
I'd say even more than that, you should always be able to describe it simply. The phrase "twin-stick action roguelike where you can mount and ride every enemy" describes everything meaningful about Patch Quest, while leaving the details out.
But yeah, prototyping seems super important. Makes me feel a little better about never being able to get beyond that first step. :p
At the first prototype you showed, I was like *"wait, is this that very interesting Monster Taming / Ressource Scanning / Tile Capturing game I've seen Wanderbot play?!"*
At 9:40, I'm now sure that it's the same game. Great job on your game, it has really gotten far since the first prototype! I hope it gets released on Switch so I can experience it.
Yes it's that game
I love your art style! It’s very endearing.
Amazing video composition and excellent presentation!
Amazing looking back at how the game went through the years. I myself forgot what the game was like in its humble beginnings.
Old Patch Quest (2016-2018) Rest in spaghetti never forgetti
"Overly complicated ailment system"
*Tales of Maj'Eyal has entered the server.*
Wow this was really inspiring. When I saw the footage of the game earlier in the video it looked frustrating and annoying to play to me too, but the end result looks really cool and I might even consider getting the game. Awesome vid!
I love all your UI, great job!
Moral of the story, grapple hooks make everything great.
Joking aside, since I've failed a lot of projects and remaking new ones, I loved watching this video.
My current project is a sort of puzzle game easy to play, and the sandbox is the real challenge. This was inspired by Trackmania and Halo 3, both games that have simplicity and depth at the same time. Thank you for sharing your development.
PS: I love your artstyle, even from the other projects.
true. grapple hooks make everything great.
Dude I love the trackmania and halo 3 race tracks i wanna see whatever game you are making
Oh, what does Ace Attorney memer does at game dev vids? You wanna create your own ace attorney?
5:40 This health system is really cool. I don’t think you mentioned why you seem to have gone back to a simple numeric HP system by the end, but maybe this one would be good for a different genre? Like a survival sim where each effect has a different way to cure it, so Blunt damage goes down over time, Bleeding gets worse over time and you need bandages to cure it, Poison requires an antidote, etc.
Great video, really interesting to see your journey to this point!
thank u for your testimonies 😭 you had such an adventure, you kept going and you found the clarity that the future would give, the struggles, the questions attracted the answers and you found it, and then u share it as a content nZhdjsnfJsjs another proof that hardwork and trial and everything that comes along with it, organisation, taking care of your energy, anything else-- just starting things will really yield into something, it may or may not be something that you were dreaming, but it builds you up
I’d just like to put this out there...I respect your opinion and you were obviously closer to the projects than I was, but in my personal opinion I thought the first game was more intriguing. Rogue lite shooters are a dime a dozen, and frankly I’m just not interested in playing another one. Your strategy terrain tile game on the other hand looked unique and it seriously piqued my interest. I kinda wish you had approached that game differently than just writing it off after a few years. That said, I enjoyed the video! Thanks for taking the time to make it.
I totally agree! Making a game based on positing was very intriguing and different from most dungeon type games. Maybe in the future he will make a game and pick the idea up again
Same. I can tell, however, that three years of faithful servitude to his 'wish list' only to see it crumble before his very eyes like a disjointed mess made him lose faith in original concept he first settled on.
I cannot blame him. Three years is a long time. Must feel longer when spent working for something that eventually couldn't return the favor, which is sad because I can tell he treasured the initial concept and his designs (opting to carry over the monsters and what-not to the final product albeit with some makeover) and was disheartened when the first attempt failed.
I do hope someone else tries the first idea later down the line. Hopefully with more insight, inspiration and success. I'm pretty sure I even saw/played some game that loosely resembled that concept... not sure when and where though.
(PS: I know this is a month old comment but I just felt like responding. Oof.)
I felt the same way. His original idea was just screaming to be a puzzle game but it seems he just never tried it that way. Just needed some simple mechanics like making it turn based, having the ability to alter the terrain, having monsters move.
I felt the same way, but I guess that leaves it free for someone else to nail it.
@@steinaech I think it's really important to emphasize the 'puzzle' part. It looks like a really cool and complex puzzle game, with random generation maybe not being necessary? But if he wanted to go more for the rogue type game, then it wouldn't've worked and I think he made the right call
I've played your game after watching this, and it's great! Played for about 3 hours and am looking forward to play more. It definitely would sell on steam.
Man i wish this will be available in mobile that'd be super
Incredible video.and the game is looking amazing well done for sticking with it!
man, i really love the visuals of this game. And as an aspiring game developer myself, i found this video quite handful. This could be a holy book for a game dev, because it really tells the story of how an idea could gone worse then how to overcome it and start over. I love this, +1 sub 🤟
"There are no mistakes, they are just happy incidents"
Although the video is based around game design, at its core this is an excellent video about project design and workflow! I'd say your journey helped a lot in making a very focused and informative video. Congratulations and I hope the game is a hit!
Thanks so much for sharing your journey ! :D
This was very motivating thanks! I will try the beta soon
dude just seeing the monsters makes me want to play it
"every game needs its own unique twist"
*Looks at cod..... FIFA.....*
Yep
Pokemon...
As an indie you need a unique twist, because otherwise nobody will ever play your game over the triple A title you´re copying.
You need the twist to ensure that you´re not directly competing with anyone.
@@lonelymusicdisc2175 The metagame changes in pokémon. All COD is one giant clone.
@@lonelymusicdisc2175 Pokemon metagame changed after every generation. In gen 2 you got held items, gen 3 introduced abilities, gen 4 polished things as well as add more really good items like Choice Scarf and Specs, Focus Sash. Gen 5 introduce the Weather Wars. In gen 6 we got Mega Evolutions, gen 7 gave us Z Crystals on top of megas. Gen 8 gave us Dynamax(It's kinda shit compared to Mega Evolutions and even Z Crystals were more balanced)
@@sirlezard670 yeah, you're right.
your game is now in my wishlist, it looks so good!! and the audio is super well combined with the animation
the UI is stunning. I'm surprised you didn't talk about that at all. I would love to see the process.
Streets of Rogue soundtrack included. :)
A man of culture.
was gonna say the same :) one of the best games of all time for me
I'd like to add a few more things.
Do not be afraid to throw stuff that just doesn't work. It's hard, you've probably spent a lot of time on it. But in the end, if it doesn't work, it just doesn't work. Don't get too attached to one specific idea. Try out lots of crazy stuff. And don't polish too much until you've found something you feel confident with.
When you get a bit more experienced, you'll sometimes have to throw stuff that works but that doesn't fit the game.
A game needs to be fun, but a good game also needs to be coherent. Adding realistic guns and blood in a Mario game would probably be fun to play, but that's not at all the kind of experience that game is supposed to bring.
Always keep in mind what your intention is, and always question everything you do. Don't just ask "Is my game fun?". Ask yourself:
- Why isn't it fun? What am I missing?
- Why is it fun? How can I keep building on that fun?
- Why did I add this feature? What does it bring to the game? Do I really need it?
Try to have a fun game with as few mechanics as possible. Then continue iterating on it, exploiting every single aspect of that mechanic. If it makes the game a bit too short, you can try adding a second mechanic that ties in nicely with the first one, and makes you think differently about the game.
Keeping low the amount of mechanics in your game will greatly decrease the amount of work, and you'll feel like you're developing a lot faster. Most indie studios just don't have the time or the money to develop large systems and lots of different content.
It'll also probably make for better game design, as just cramming lots of different content into a game to make it last longer is generally a sign that your core idea isn't that great on its own.
"A game needs to be fun, but a good game also needs to be coherent."
Yep, a good feature that damages the other features isn't actually a good feature.
This is very useful thank you! Also love the look and sound of your games!
Your art design is really beautiful! even in the first versions the game was looking nice
It's better to start over with experience than forcing something that won't work. You have the passion to create a great game. I'm going to buy this when it comes up in steam or something.
I do not aspire to be a game developer, but I do want to be an independent software developer, and your story felt very recognizable. And the fact that you managed to pull true is very inspirational (and also you are a very good story teller). Thank you for sharing.
Awesome video , very well made !
Your journey is really inspiring !
keep up !
I'm glad you decided not to give up. Watching this, and hearing and seeing about the game state after you decided to change it up, I wanna play it.