Not sure where to go.

Now I am not sure if any of you are aware but lately I have been trying to work on a game I refer to as Project Recall but as of right now I am in a bit of pickle on what to do. Right now my dev group only consists of myself and a friend who is mainly helping with art assets and such. We haven't really made much progress outside of the concept stages. My friend has mainly been busy with college and other things and I don't know squat about creating sprites and models. I have attempted asking around seeing if others would like to help but I havent had much luck.

I am just curious what would you suggest I should do at this point. I don't want my project to die but it's not easy when you have just two people and not much help otherwise.

 

Do a part time or full time job in a game development company. I have been through this kind of time, once upon a time. One man band literally for months. Now time has been changed, hopefully your time will change soon. Best wishes.

 

Right now I am just looking for part time work in other places to earn money to support my other ventures. I mainly live in Iowa which isn't really known for having game dev companies.

 

Realistically, is your project something that 2 people working part time can accomplish?

Also, what do you want to get out of working on it?

 

Well it must not strictly be any game development company. For example, there are companies who do not exactly make games, but deliver projects on AR-VR and other interactive applications made with unity. Joining them would help you practicing and learning your unity skill, and also in the general game development skill. The correct term for this is "gamification" or "game-advertisement". Basically it is a good and safe idea to do a regular part time or full time job to support you. If the job can be related to the game development then it is a win-win.

 

It will likely be a non gaming regular job. Also we are focusing on doing a 2D game to start out with since it will be less work for us

 

I'm assuming you are around college age yourself. I'm gonna lay down a few Truths™ on you, and you can feel free to take them how you will.

You live in Iowa. It's probably one of the few areas in the country that has fewer professional game development opportunities than central Pennsylvania, where I live. You are right to not be seeking out a job doing game development at this time.

You don't have a game yet. You have an idea. There's nothing necessarily wrong with that, especially if you've only been working on it for a few months. I've put about a year and a half into a project before realizing I still only had an idea and not a game. My point is that if your project dies, it's not the worst thing that can happen to you. And if it does die, there's nothing that prevents it from coming back to life later.

You're not a Game Developer... yet. You're still very new to the world of game development. That's fine! Enjoy it! Learn everything your young and plastic mind will absorb! But stop thinking of things in a professional sense, and start thinking of it as a skill you're just working on improving. You don't need a game company. You don't need an amazing name for your current project. You don't need expensive assets and ranking on Steam or App Store charts. Just be a student of gamedev and let it follow its natural course.

You are a game developer. So get to developing games! Everyone (myself included) seems to want to skip past the small, manageable projects that teach you so much important stuff that you'll need to know to have a hope of finishing that dream project you've been tossing around. Show me two inexperienced developers, one with great potential and huge ideas, and the other with discipline and consistent work ethic, and I'll bet money every time that the second guy is the one who actually gets a product to market.

Get a job. You have a degree in a decent field. Consider focusing your career in that field, and keep game development as a hobby. If your dream demands that you get that professional title of Game Developer on your business card, then work towards that goal, but ensure you keep the lights on in the meantime. And you'll never get a job doing game development unless you have demonstrable experience doing it, so use your hobby as a way to build a portfolio.

Stop worrying about what you should do next and just do something. Anything. More is lost by indecision than wrong decision.

 

Use "programmer art". Make your own sprites. They don't have to be pretty.

I've created sprite with nothing but a gray square and a single letter representing what it is. "P" for Player, "m" for monster, "M" for boss monster, and so on. You can develop all of your game mechanics with this sort of placeholder art. In fact, there is an argument for at least starting out this way anyway, because pretty graphics won't fix bad game mechanics.

So make some simple sprites so you can continue working on your game. As your friend has time they can supply you with better images, or you can find someone else to help with it.

Also, Googling how to make programmer art:

https://www.google.com/webhp?source...&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=how to make programmer art

Also, there are sources for free assets you can use as placeholders: http://opengameart.org/

Or there are some free assets on the Unity asset store.

There is no reason a lack of art should stop you from making forward progress. Fill in what you need now with crap, make your game, replace the crap as you can.

 

Out of curiosity, where in Iowa? You're not the only one here from flyover country.

 

I would suggest going to your local B&N and picking up some Photoshop and blender books. I was just at B&N recently and discovered that they have a plethora of books on those subjects (much to my surprise). In the past it was really hard to find any sort of tutorials things to learn from (especially blender).

That should deal with your art asset problems but I would also suggest looking in to design guidance. My initial art for my game made no sense, it didn't even look cool. Someone posted a link to a Youtube video about industrial design and entertainment (you might find it if you search those terms). It was very eye opening for me. There's skill in creating art but there's also skill in knowing what game art should look like.

 

You can always move. Picking up and moving for work is not that unusual in the technical fields. If you can't make the work come to you, then go to where the work is.

 

That sort of mobility costs a lot of money.

 

Yes. And...

If you are good at what you do, and your skill is in demand, then companies will pay to relocate you. If noone wants to pay to move you, its worth questioning if the job would actually exist in a game dev hub anyway. While game dev hubs do have a constant stream of jobs on offer, they also tend to have game dev schools pumping out a constant stream of graduates. So competition for those jobs is often high.

Moving itself is only expensive if you have ties. If you have a spouse and a couple of kids, then picking up and moving will set you back considerably. Plus there is the sheer disruption to the family to consider. On the other hand if you are on your own, moving can be pretty cheap. Its just a case of finding a cheap backpackers to settle into, then loading up the car and driving.

I've picked up a wife and two kids twice for work. Once moving between cities, paid for by an employer. Once moving internationally with my own money. Its certainly doable, though not the easiest thing I've ever done.

If physical location really is holding you back, then moving really is a possibility. And its certainly an easier hurdle to overcome then many others in game dev.

 

I think you should consider yourself a 1 man band get a part time job, even a S***ty job and use some of your money to pay someone to do the art for you.

 

That depends on what skill sets you have. Companies aren't going to pay you to move if your primary experience is in retail. You're also making a loooooooot of assumptions about how expensive moving in North America can be.

 

I had to look up where Iowa was (thats crummy American geography education for ya) but you're just across the Missippi from Wisconsin. There's talk of moving I was thinking you could possibly move to some place in or just outside of Madison, WI. From what I've read Madison has one of the lowest costs of living vs income for software devs. There's also a massive University system there, which is prone to have students majoring in art or CS. I'd suggest maybe considering a move there instead of maybe CA. If you do decide to move to CA, sleeping ones car is not illegal in many CA cities and you could work (or look for work) while you're there, if you're single like some have said.


PS. I may live in MT, but I grew up in WI

 

Madison has some pretty good job opportunities as well once you have some computer science education. And if you want to stay in Iowa, West Des Moines is a fairly happening city nowadays, or so they say. There are a lot of major companies with offices there - Wells Fargo (ugh, but pays well), Pioneer, John Deere, and plenty of others. Cedar Rapids used to have some big opportunities, but not so much anymore. Go Daddy has offices there (Bob Parsons is from Cedar Rapids), some insurance companies and such. Iowa City has some big hospitals and of course the university.

So there is opportunity here, but you probably can't stay in a small town that's further than a practical daily commute into a city.

Wish I could move out there.

 

How expensive can it be? If you are single it's just the cost of fuel and the bond on a new apartment. If you have a household to pack up you might spend a few grand on trucking. Either way it's certainly doable with a little effort.

 

A bond on a new apartment here is typically two months worth of rent. When you're moving to areas that typically have tech oriented jobs, you're looking at rent being a fair bit higher than other places, unless you're able to commute, which isn't always a given. If you're working a job that doesn't allow you to transfer easily, you're typically going to be earning just a bit more than enough to get by, which makes saving up for a move like that a lot less of an easy prospect.

 

So really no different from the rest of the world. And yet people manage to do it all the time. Stop thinking of obstacles and start thinking of solutions.

Of course moving might not be the solution. In this day an age remote working is very much a thing. Especially for competent developers.

 

This. When it comes to games, doing > all else. Take an idea - a simple, dumb idea - and make it happen, as quickly as you can. The experience you will get doing this is priceless. Also, it's something you can put on your resume, so it benefits you there, too.

 

Dear god, why? There are so many obnoxious conservatives here, and there aren't many people here like myself. Well I can't say there are "so many obnoxious conservatives" but there are definitely those kinds of people here in greater numbers.

Lets not talk politics.

Granted the mountainous part of the state is friggin' gorgeous but I don't like to ski or snowboard or really do anything outdoors so it kinda sucks.

I'm kind of an oddball. I'm not sure how many hours I spend on the computer per day... but I think its about 75% to 80% of my free time.

If you do try to make the move, avoid the great plains. Eastern Montana and even fifty miles distance from the rockies really sucks. There's not much opportunity. Eastern Montana is like western ND, just with an artificial border lol

Oh and one last thing. A bit of life advice. If you think you can't move somewhere before you've even took the time to figure out if its possible then you're defeating yourself before its even begun.

I didn't think moving away from any MT city would be possible for me but here I am, I did it. Too many people stay in my S***ty hometown because they are afraid they won't make it in a big city or afraid of all the crime or whatever. In truth prices are higher but so are wages, and the crime ridden areas are just areas. They're not the entire city.

Those people who stay, they get old and they live out their life without really experiencing anything worthwhile. All because they were too scared to move. It was almost me.

 

Pretty much this. I love backpacking and the outdoors, but there's nothing too exciting to see in Iowa. We have some nice trails, but they're relatively flat and featureless. But yeah, it's pretty impractical and the desire has never risen to the point of taking action.

 

A few things I should clarify

I don't really live in the city I actually live in the country on a farm

Recently just graduated from college. I went to Kirkwood which has a pretty good engineering program. I have an Associate of Applied Science in CAD/Mechanical Engineering. I have some proficiency in select 3D modeling programs such as Autodesk Inventor, ProE/Creo as well as Autocad. We didn't really learn Solidworks.

With my current financial situation and unemployment moving isn't really an option for me at this time.

I might go with what some of you said an act as a one man band at this point. I did mention I have a friend who is helping me with art but he has offered to help for free.


I actually have many ideas but I am not sure where exactly to start. I have always though of starting out with something simple

 

Are the graphics important for the game? Or can you do a text based game, or something with simple geometric shapes? Or you could even use free clip art. Or find someone online to collaborate with (difficult as you're unlikely to find amazing artists willing to work for free!)