Thread by @HarryAlisavakis

I don't like making long threads, cause I don't want to clutter my page with text instead of cool little experiments, but I need to vent about a subject I've touched in the past: my creative slump when it comes to gamedev.

I'm kinda writing this on the fly, so it may end up encouraging or discouraging for new devs (sorry if the latter ends up being true), but I wanted to share that stuff, if not to help others, to maybe rubberduck-debug these issues.

I was watching @Iannitram's "The toolbox fallacy" video for the umpteenth time, as it's the video that resonated with me more than any other piece of media. It makes me think of the time I started out, especially the part about being "fearless"

I taught myself about Unity and gamedev cause my uni's curriculum didn't include anything on the subject, and I remember the passion and joy I got by trying out new ideas and tutorials, making new prototype projects and learning.

There was a time where I procrastinated with uni assignments to work with my Unity projects, whether I wanted to try and publish them or not (spoiler: I didn't publish any).

I was starting out, I was learning, but mostly, I s u c k e d.

I came up with generic ideas for games, tried to digital paint characters or make 3D models, same with audio, music, etc. They all seemed cool at the time, but now I know they sucked and kinda did then too, but I didn't care.
I was having fun.

But then I actually started working with games and learning more and more stuff and suddenly, experimenting and creating became super hard.

This is my best-worded description of this whole issue:

https://twitter.com/HarryAlisavakis/status/1169231575046873088?s=20

My mind started working like a successfully broken neural network: the best way to avoid failing is not starting at all.

I tried implementing ideas and projects only to stop and think "damn, I have to make art for this and I'm not good at art" and give up.

And I'd have this pent up creativity filling my chest thinking "I want to make a game" but the process of even making a new empty Unity project just seemed super daunting. And even when I started, I got overwhelmed by all the things I'd have to do.

And I'd freeze up and wouldn't be able to make a simple script to start moving a cube on a plane, and then feel bad about not being able to do that or art or sound or music or make games while I call myself a "game developer".

I'd make little atmospheric scenes with HDRP to try and make something pretty at least, but then be frustrated at those because, sure they make nice wallpapers, but they're not games. And I know making games is *hard* but I didn't plan on making a big thing; just sth playable.

And that'd be bad enough on its own, but I think back to the times where I wasn't thinking like that. 2.5 years ago, I was alone in my room while I was abroad for Erasmus+ and I joined the compo of Ludum Dare 38 and made this all on my own:

halisavakis.itch.io/leucos

I coded the thing, made models, shaders, animations (!), a pretty generic game design, SFX and music in less than 48 hours!

Is it perfect?

Fuck no.

Did I care?

See answer above.

Somewhere along the way I learned more and learned what was wrong with what I was doing before, but I don't know where I picked up that mistakes matter so much.

Or why making mistakes when I'm making something on my own is so bad that I should probably not even try.

I still haven't figured why I'm having so much trouble with this, especially when there's really nothing at stake. Could be what burnout feels like, could be that I need a change of pace and a change of routine but mostly I need to stop being so hard on myself and my mistakes.

Wish I had some great conclusion about all this, but I really don't 😛 I'm still struggling with this but at least there are some moments here and there where I get a taste of that old passion back, and end up getting lost while making something out of my comfort zone.

I feel like I had more to share but they don't come to mind rn; if they do I'll add them to this thread.

In the meantime, here's something somewhat pretty to break this wall of text-tweets.