Late in life indie game developers, Talk to me.

I wrote my first "program" at age 17 on a Radio Shack TRS-80 Model I. 16K of RAM and a cassette drive. That was 1982 so I bet I'm truly the code geezer here

With that said, I'm very psyched to learn this C2 "GUI" tool and different style of coding. Perhaps now, with a couple of good friends helping, I may finally finish and publish a game! I'm really looking forward to learning a lot from you guys here in the forums.

locohost

Welcome to the world of Construct 2. I've found it to be quite robust and powerful. Are you currently involved with a project, or just learning?

I wrote my first "program" at age 17 on a Radio Shack TRS-80 Model I. 16K of RAM and a cassette drive. That was 1982 so I bet I'm truly the code geezer here .

Think again?? I beat that (just). exact same pc though

locohost

Welcome to the world of Construct 2. I've found it to be quite robust and powerful. Are you currently involved with a project, or just learning?

Working on a game idea with a couple friends Still working on how to break up the project files for team dev.

> I wrote my first "program" at age 17 on a Radio Shack TRS-80 Model I. 16K of RAM and a cassette drive. That was 1982 so I bet I'm truly the code geezer here .

>

Think again?? I beat that (just). exact same pc though

Ok, ok so I'm not the code geezer, but for the moment I'm top two with codah

I was a junior in HS in '82. How'bout you coda?

>

> > I wrote my first "program" at age 17 on a Radio Shack TRS-80 Model I. 16K of RAM and a cassette drive. That was 1982 so I bet I'm truly the code geezer here .

> >

> Think again?? I beat that (just). exact same pc though

>

Ok, ok so I'm not the code geezer, but for the moment I'm top two with codah

I was a junior in HS in '82. How'bout you coda?

We don't have that junior \senior crap over here ??but yeah 81 for me with the trs80, 16y.o

Edit: you know, that doesn't quite work out.. Maybe it was '82 ? in which case it's a tie. But you best me for dev years. Only 20 for me and I AM sick of it ??

Any of you late in life game devs ever turn a profit on a game? After a life time of hobbyist game dev (and never releasing anything beyond demos of simple game mechanics) I am hellbent on launching a game, but the amount of time effort and dedication I've been putting towards this thing is intense and it's like 5% done. How do you litmus test your ideas? How far along should I be before marketing and kickstarting?

Only 20 for me and I AM sick of it ??

I'm younger than you but I'm rounding past 15 years, I will never become sick of being a programmer and being a doctor do little of computers. Every day I am blessed that I can do something I love.

skelooth

I'm working on my first game. Getting the word out has been... frustrating. Though I'm not a lifelong developer, I am a lifelong gamer. I get the sense that the indie game landscape has changed drastically quite recently. I think that over the past couple of years, a few things like C2, Unity, the Steam Greenlight program, and the popularity of cheap, quickly made mobile games have caused a flood of both good and bad games to enter the market. How do you stand out with a mountain of games around you? I don't know. Relatively few people pay attention when I post, so I've decided the important thing it to make a kick ass game and not worry about the rest. If I make money off it, good. If nobody ever gives a damn that's not good, but oh well. At least I made a kick ass fun game.

EDIT: http://www.crunchpickle.com B.LAST

The game market has always been saturated except for a short stint from 90s to the 2000s (after arcades died). I remember when the game industry as a whole started faltering because there was so much garbage released for atari systems (hello ET! or donkey kong with hammers that don't reach the barrels!).

We're in a bubble again. Minecraft just sold for 2.5billion, and flappy bird caught some weird internet wind. As long as things like greenlight and kickstarter are still growing as opposed to shrinking or being stagnant, I believe the market share is still available.

You're right about games being easier to make now though. We should probably do our best to not tell capable people about C2 j/k

> Only 20 for me and I AM sick of it ??

>

I'm younger than you but I'm rounding past 15 years, I will never become sick of being a programmer and being a doctor do little of computers. Every day I am blessed that I can do something I love.

Let me clarify. I'm not sick of being a dev, just tired off a lot of other stuff surrounding it.

codah We should probably have a meeting with management to discuss getting a meeting with the client to talk about the meeting at the end of the month.

The horrors they don't prepare you for in college.

You are never too old to do anything. Being 30 I already notice an invisible wall between myself and many others in the indie community. But that doesn't stop me. I've just gotten used to working on my own.

As for a saturated market, I disagree. Everyday millions of people try video games for the first time and everyday more games come off the shelf making room for new technologies, art design, and mechanics. I sometimes ask my self, has this game been made? Nope? Keep working on I then.

Being original is the only thing you need to worry about. When you start making Flappy Bird clones then you are just setting yourself up for failure.

Hope I made some sense, I'm super tired.

I've been working on game ideas for the last 15 years. There are two reasons, well three, why I haven't published anything yet.

1) I keep changing game dev tools and porting my code. Not sure why, but I've done this several times. I guess I see new "toys" coming out and just have to buy and try them. Dumb.

2) I've been trying do everything alone. Very dumb. You need a team to keep ideas flowing, to help resolve issues and to do all this work and keep everyone motivated and moving forward each day/week.

3) I have a family, mortgage, bills and a real job which limits my ability to do game dev all day every day. This one is definitely not dumb, just life as a grown up.

locohost

I've been working solo on my first project for about a year now. Lately, I've been considering searching for a partner/partners due to the amount of work still needed to finish my game, but I haven't had a problem with motivation, progress or ideas. Perhaps I'm just weird that way. Sometimes, I think I have too many ideas and have to tone it down a bit. I am starting to see clearly what my game will look like once its completed, and that motivates me like nothing else. I'm making something to be proud of, and It could be a truly great game by the time it is done. But yeah... SO MUCH WORK TO DO.