I've noticed that wolfire was able to put out a good game with a small number of people in a reasonable amount of time. Isn't the creator supposed to still be in college also?
I was wondering what sort of advice he has for quickly putting together interesting games. Does he use preexisting game engines? Networking libraries like raknet?
For a school project I've been putting together a small 3D game on top of ogre, ODE, and raknet (we're pretty much done at this point). My professional interests lie elsewhere, but I enjoyed the project and have enjoyed game development in the past. I'm wondering what sort of practices, tools, etc you use to make games quickly.
advice on game design from lugaru creators?
I did most of the work on Lugaru back in high school, when I had much more free time than I do now in college. I know what I am doing more now, but I have much less time. Just one more year!
Anyway, I don't use pre-existing game engines, but I do use cross-platform libraries like OpenGL, SDL, and OpenAL. In terms of doing things quickly, my strategy was to prefer 'doing' to 'planning', and focus on one thing at a time. First I just focused on creating a terrain engine, then on character animation and physics, then on designing a new combat system, and finally on putting it all together in a coherent framework. If you try to plan everything out and then tackle everything at the same time, it is really intimidating, and hard to figure out what to do next. If you divide it into pieces like this, then it is always clear what you have to do next, and it is easy to see your progress. Basically the most important advice I can give is to apply game design principles to the development process itself. If you can make it fun to work on your game, then everyone will spend much more time working on it, and that time will be productive.
I spent a long time last year doing contract work, and those projects moved like molasses because it wasn't fun; everyone involved was just in it for the money. I think this is why there are so many games with seven-figure budgets that turn out to be trash. If the developers are bored, then they will probably make a boring game.
Anyway, I don't use pre-existing game engines, but I do use cross-platform libraries like OpenGL, SDL, and OpenAL. In terms of doing things quickly, my strategy was to prefer 'doing' to 'planning', and focus on one thing at a time. First I just focused on creating a terrain engine, then on character animation and physics, then on designing a new combat system, and finally on putting it all together in a coherent framework. If you try to plan everything out and then tackle everything at the same time, it is really intimidating, and hard to figure out what to do next. If you divide it into pieces like this, then it is always clear what you have to do next, and it is easy to see your progress. Basically the most important advice I can give is to apply game design principles to the development process itself. If you can make it fun to work on your game, then everyone will spend much more time working on it, and that time will be productive.
I spent a long time last year doing contract work, and those projects moved like molasses because it wasn't fun; everyone involved was just in it for the money. I think this is why there are so many games with seven-figure budgets that turn out to be trash. If the developers are bored, then they will probably make a boring game.
I'm not in the team, but...
Planning is definitely very important, though. Or can be. Depends on what you're making. Doing pre-work can make a difference between a very good game, and a crappy one.
Let's just be bluntly honest here... If there had been done more preparation with lugaru 1, it could have been better than it already is. Sure, it's one of the most entertaining games I've laid my hands on, but stuff such as story could be much deeper, and it seems David got ambushed by his own idea of forked stories as it doesn't work properly.
Planning, just as taking it as it comes, can make everything clear to you (and especially the team!), but it also concretize everything and makes people more aware of what they are doing.
Just watch out for those people who are bored with the work and only do it for the money, as David said.
My two worthless cents,
- Nuky
Planning is definitely very important, though. Or can be. Depends on what you're making. Doing pre-work can make a difference between a very good game, and a crappy one.
Let's just be bluntly honest here... If there had been done more preparation with lugaru 1, it could have been better than it already is. Sure, it's one of the most entertaining games I've laid my hands on, but stuff such as story could be much deeper, and it seems David got ambushed by his own idea of forked stories as it doesn't work properly.
Planning, just as taking it as it comes, can make everything clear to you (and especially the team!), but it also concretize everything and makes people more aware of what they are doing.
Just watch out for those people who are bored with the work and only do it for the money, as David said.
My two worthless cents,
- Nuky
Planning is important, but honestly before I made Lugaru I had no idea what was involved in making a full game, and any plans I made would have been worthless. You are right that planning is better than not planning, all other things equal, but if you are just starting out as a game developer then you will not have enough experience to make a solid plan.
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BunnyWithStick
- Gramps, Jr.
- Posts: 4297
- Joined: Mon Dec 05, 2005 12:14 am
- Location: New Zealand
Yeah, I get the feeling Maxis tends to let people do what they want more than other game development companies, just look at all the wacky stuff hidden below the surface of things. Also the llama-ness is definitely not something you'd normally see.Nayr wrote:Just tell the developers to do what they want, and pay them for it. See spore!