Open World Game

My current project, Welcome to the Wasteland is going to be an open world shooter/post apocalyptic simulator. The world is going to be pretty big so I was wondering if I should put the game into one BIG world or split it up into smaller areas. If I should split it up into smaller areas, why?

Smaller worlds because they don't use as much resources as a big world, unless you make a occlusion culling feature, which is where it only renders what is on the screen. Plus, it would be a lot easier to manage.

Good luck with your project!

Thanks, I'll need all the luck I can get!

I know you probably don't want to hear my advice, but I'll give it anyway because it's good.

I've seen you start and stop a couple different projects in a very short amount of time. You seem to be suffering from an advanced case of what is known as Big Game Fever. This happens to a lot of people just starting out making games. It happened to me. Hell, it still happens to me.

This is always the result:

There is only one cure for Big Game Fever. Don't make a big game. It's that simple. Put those ideas on hold for a while.

What you want to do is make a small game that you can actually complete, just so that you have the experience of knowing what it takes to finish a game. Make Asteroids, or Pac Man, or Space Invaders, or a small arena shooter. Something like that. Nothing more complex than, say, Super Mario Bros. In fact, Super Mario Bros might even be too complex to start with considering the number of enemies that you would have to create.

I am being totally serious here. This is good advice. Literally THOUSANDS of developers have struggled through trying to make their Big Game when they're just starting out, and they have all fallen flat on their faces. They will all say the same thing... start small.

Make a small, complete game with everything in it. Title screen, a couple of levels, game over, scoring, music, sound effects, etc. Put a little polish on it. Completing the thing will do wonders for your experience, even if it's a small, stupid game. And it's a HUGE moral booster. Your Big Ideas will still be there when you're done with the small game, and you will have a MUCH better idea of what it takes to turn your Big Idea into a reality.

If you keep starting and quitting Big Game after Big Game, you won't learn anything.

The only problem is that nobody ever listens to this advice. Big Game Fever apparently affects their hearing as well. Perhaps this time it will be different...

I know, I know. I plan on making a few small projects here and there but I can't help myself. I'm making an arena shooter like you said right now called the THunderdome where I test a few of "Welcome to the Wasteland"'s combat mechanics.

You�re Right! it happens to me, can you believe i was making a castlevania like game? with experience points, skills, abilities like the double jump, a map system that was freking me out!, and some huge maps, but result... i never finished it!, so i might better start with something small.

Thanks for the advice, i though it was me who was wrong, but it seems to be very common along developers.

Even Super Mario Bros is far more complex than most people realize. Before you do anything else with your game, draw out a complete plan for everything that you want in it. It is like writing an outline for an essay or book.

For me, an hour long game is taking a year to make.

For me, an hour long game is taking a year to make.

BobOfAMillion

Did you really intend to post in a 6 year old thread in the - now retired - Construct Classic section in response to a user who hasn't visited this forum for over 3 years?

Sorry dude, I found this thread with a google search.