A Few Seconds For Your Opinion Please. . .

I am Currently just Graduating a Coding Bootcamp, which we cover 3 full stacks. We Cover PHP, MEAN Stack, and Ruby on Rails. Although I enjoy programming web applications to some extent, my real passion is with games. I am currently still living at home, so I could definitely dedicate my time to learning unity and try to get into games. However I also don't want to be living at home forever.. in other words I need a job at least fairly soon.

So my actual question for you guys is this: if I spend a great deal of time trying to learn unity for game development, is it realistic that I can start making some money at this in a fairly short period of time, or is it more of something that I should pick up as a hobby as I work another job. And maybe someday if I am lucky I will be able to get a team together that can launch a game that might make some money.

I know its kind of a broad question but I am interested in some of your guys thoughts on this, and your opinion as to whether I should simply just get a web developer job and use unity as a hobby, or if this is something I can dedicate time to and will result in some income.

 

I would suggest learning Unity and making a couple of small games to not only build your skills, but to build up a portfolio as well. Publish these games on the app stores, or if a PC game on one of the desktop gaming sites.

Once you have done this, you can start hiring yourself out as a contract developer.
If you don't have a portfolio of games, people won't touch you with a barge pole.

So get started on that portfolio

PS : Make sure the games look good too, if you can't afford an artist, get some assets on the asset store.

 

Making money short term is unlikely, but not impossible. Its kind of like winning lottery. Every day you have a 1 in 5000 chance in releasing an app that goes viral. Not bad odds, but not great either.

Even simple games can take months to complete. Obviously you bang out games quickly as well, but likelihood of success is limited.

 

Wow, brand new to Unity as well as the community. Such fast responses, thanks so much. I guess I figured as much as it would take time and I would have to build a portfolio and all. I guess I should have phrased my question differently. I mean to ask, Is it something you suggest that I invest my time into completely. . . or to simply find work outside of the game field and try to build a portfolio, etc in my spare time. And then when I think I have become good enough try to transfer into the gaming industry. Right now I'm assuming its going to be really hard to hit the ground running within a year or so, which makes me think I should find a job and study this on the side.

PS: I know this is all speculation and its different for every person and every case. But just trying to get a feel for this industry and etc.

 

Do it now while you are living at home.

Switching into games when you already have a full time job and a family with kids to feed is much, much harder.

 

Dont come into game dev reading about games like flappy bird and thinking youre going to make millions overnight. They are the exception, not the norm.

If youre young, living at home, spend some solid time working on it. It will just get harder to find time later in life. Putting it off wont get you anywhere.

If you want money now, go work at mcdonalds. If you want to spend a lot of time working on something you enjoy with no guarantee of money, work on games.

 

Why not work for an existing game company? You would get experience AND money that you could later put toward making games on your own.

 

This is really what I was afraid of.

And this also is sort of what I am afraid of on the other end of the spectrum. I have no problem putting in tons of hours of hard work (I just graduated a coding bootcamp, so I am already in the rhythm of things) However I hate to put in 6 months to a couple years learning this skill, then realizing I can't even make money doing this, and have to start over from ground one. I don't know enough about Unity to know if the skills from unity could transfer over into other work in case games doesn't work out.


So I guess this whole topic is me being scared of dedicating too much time into something that could simply lead to a dead end ;P

[Edit]

Well I would love to do this in order to get some experience, however what we learned at the coding boot camp was purely web development, so I am pretty sure it would be hard to find a job. On top of that.. I would assume that game dev jobs are pretty competitive. But I mean this is partly why I am posting here, I don't know much about the industry and am trying to pick everyone's brains a bit ;P.

Thanks everyone for all the suggestions BTW.

 

Its not as bad as it sounds. At least with coding the skills you learn will be somewhat transferable. Once a coder always a coder, another language is just a new set of APIs to learn.

Learning to code in Unity wont do you many favours when it comes to learning good coding standards that are applicable to other non-game apps, but the skills you learn wont be a waste either.

It could be worse, you could be trying to be a successful musician/artist.

 

Some skills you learn when developing a game in Unity are skills that are specific to Unity. But a lot of the skills are useful in other game engines and even other industries. Learning programming is never a waste of time regardless of what you do in the future. Programming is an extremely useful skill. 3D modelling is a very useful skill. Same is true of many of the other skills needed to make a game. The individual skills are not Unity specific or even game development specific.

If you want to build games, practice with Unity. It is a fantastic environment. You will develop skills along the way that you can re-use for other non-game projects if you later decide that you want to do something else with your time.

 

Glad to hear it you guys ;D Thanks for all the feedback. I've decided to full dive into Unity. I appreciate all the feedback and reassurance. I figured I should obviously do all the tutorials that unity provides. After that I don't know of any specific tutorials that are best to follow. Does anyone know any courses that I could possibly go through to learn all the fundamentals up to advanced. Or do you guys simply suggest jumping around and finding tutorials as I go?

 

learning C# is useful also for visual studio, can make "Windows Universal Apps" .. i guess lol

 

My2cents
Your motivations to develop games are misplaced and you're setting yourself up for let-down (some call it failure).
Making money shouldn't be your number one reason to want to create games. If it is you'll most likely be disappointed.

Put yourself in a different mind set and you will have positive successful game development experiences.
Know at the beginning - you are not going to make any money at all. You might break even on one or two in the first 5-10 games you create - but if you are so focused on making money - your game will suffer because you will make bad decisions in development to make money - instead of making an entertaining experience.
Entertaining games - sometimes - make money but it's not because they were designed by people who's sole desire is to make money - it's because they were designed by people who want to create a fun game to play.
And marketing helps too - when the game is good. If the game is crap - marketing is a waste of time.

Being a successful indie game developer isn't about money - it's about creating quality gaming experiences.

You might want to consider getting a web developer / coder job - and earn money - at the same time enjoy learning Unity in your own time, and enjoy creating games that are entertaining.

Success is measured differently for different people -
Would you rather have 50,000 downloads of your game - that you released to the public without any expectations of return on investment - but with the satisfaction in knowing 50,000 people played and maybe liked your game?
Or would you rather have 500 people download your game - that you released for $.99?

 

I agree for the most part, yet disagree as well to some extent.

I love games, and being a part of creating an awesome game has always been a dream of mine since I was little. However, this is why I want to create games for a living. Who wouldn't want to have a job and make money doing something they love. I think it is possible to both want to create a great game, and also try to have a goal to make money ( whether its on that game or a future game ).

Also, in my opinion, I believe if someone needs to make money, they should be driven even harder to create a great game with great user experiences ( because if users dont enjoy their game, people won't play, and they creator wont get any profit. )

I tottally see your point, but i personally believe that I can focus on creating a great game (or at least try to the best of my ability) and still hope to turn it into a career one day.

 

Remember when you start doing 'something you love' everyday, it becomes work.

True success is measured in $. Having people play your game is also success. but that kind of success doesnt pay the stupid bills.

 

Hahah isn't that the truth.

 

I honestly believe peoples who resist as "game developer" are actually peoples who put passion first, then money. I agree with all other comments here, peoples was pretty honest to explain you how the situation is actually.

 

I also agree with you Ants -
Just to clarify - I don't think people who make money off there games are passionless. Far from it. But those 'ones' who's sole purpose (or misguided #1 goal) is to make money by developing games - don't have the priority list organized correctly - and usually experience failure because they are expecting that big payday when there first game drops on the store, until they see they got 10 downloads in a week, 7 from close friends and 3 from family members. Instead of seeing success from the fact that the 10 people who downloaded the game loved it, had some quality feedback and want you to continue creating more levels, or whatever.
Those misguided - are thinking about how to best monetize the game when the character controller isn't even organized correctly, and how to incorporate IAP into any type of game they create before the design is fleshed out co - a lot of times at the determent of a good game idea. They create those games that upon start up shows an add before you've even been allowed to see the game at all.
(Aside - if used in game - IAP's should be considered when designing) ha -

I'm just saying - if you can set out to create a super fun game that is pretty and you as the developer are excited about showing to the audience, maybe innovative - that motivation is a lot more beneficial to you as a developer - than thinking how best to monetize whatever creation you end up with.

I think were agreeing mostly.
I wish you the best of luck friend -