A couple of things recently got me thinking about this. The IGM review of Neil Rajah was one of them. Some of my friends who read that responded with “Well, what are they comparing it to?”, or something along those lines. The other was an email conversation with another developer, who made a comment that went something like “You’re doing pretty good for someone who has a job and a family, and is doing this part time”. On the family front – my wife and I just had a baby a couple of days ago. This is our second, and anyone who’s a parent knows what that means in terms of free time.
So, what exactly am I doing here? I’m definitely not competing against companies like Rovio, or the smaller indie game dev studios with a handful of employees. In fact, I’m also not really competing with the one-man game developers who do this full time. It took me some time to understand and accept that. I created Neil Rajah because I love platformers, and I wanted to make something that was like a traditional platformer. However, that means that the game will naturally get compared with all the other platformers out there, and it will definitely come up short. I’ve been looking at other games out there that are so much bigger than anything I can reasonably create – online multiplayer, multiple modes / upgrades, etc. It’s not that I can’t code any of that. I’ve done my share of network protocol work at my day job 
But realistically, I cannot take on projects of that size and have any hope of getting it done in a reasonable amount of time. And I’m not going to spend years working on a single game, I will get bored and quit.
So that was a bit of a realization for me – stop trying to do the same things that I see bigger developers doing. And even if you’re a solo developer, if you’re writing games full-time, you’re ‘bigger’ than me. And really, isn’t that what being indie is all about? Working on what you want to work on, without trying to conform to someone else’s expectations?
So with that long preamble – what kinds of games should I be making? I don’t know. However, the words ‘small’ and ‘different’ are what I keep coming back to. Something smaller in scope, that won’t take a year to code and hundreds of dollars in art and music assets for it to look even halfway decent (Neil Rajah really needed another world or two, but I ran out of time and money). Maybe something involving puzzle-solving rather than running and shooting. I’ve always liked puzzle games too, and it seems like a genre where you could reasonably take one core idea and make a game around it, without people automatically expecting that because it’s in genre ‘A’, it’s not complete unless it has features ‘X’, Y’ and ‘Z’. ‘different’, of course, is harder to work on, but it will also be more fun to work on. I’ve had some ideas for a while that more or less go along the lines of “It would be cool if there was a game that involved doing this“, whatever ‘this’ is.
One of the games that inspired me is GYRO. I heard about this recently on the libGDX forums. This is a great example of the kind of game I’d like to make – a simple, unique gameplay idea, doesn’t require a big investment in time/money to create, and a lot of fun to play.
So that was my sleep-deprived “Wow I forgot how much work a newborn baby takes” stream-of-consciousness self-realization blog post
Hi, I`m the dev of the GYRO – I`m ultra glad that You like our game
I followed Your blog since couple of months, it was extreamly usefull to get the feeling of what we can expect from android market. Keep up the good work, I`m looking forward to Your next project
To be honest we made similar mistake at the beginning, we started to develop game that turned out to be really complex and big – don`t get me wrong, I love that game and I will do everything I can to finish it. But it already took more than 7 months of hard work in all of my extra time, and probably will take another 2/3 to finish. And even after that time, it probably won`t even scratch the popularity that we get with GYRO in just 2 days…
Hi Filip,
Thanks for stopping by, and good luck with your games!
To be honest, I don’t think I made a mistake with attempting a game like Neil Rajah. It was a lot of fun, I learned a lot, and the parts that I got finished turned out more or less the way I wanted it. Yes, the game could use more content, and I didn’t have the time to get all of that done. But, no regrets.
It’s been pretty cool to see all the ratings that GYRO has received in just a few days. It’s good to see that a new idea can become popular if it’s well executed.
Congratulations on another child, wish good health and to become the android developer.
If we put down sounds and graphics Angry birds is not some huge bite to swallow. There always would be words about clones and so on but I think its not something that you need to care about because if someone like your game he/she would play it.
Gyro has very nice concept and it send a message that you do not always need some awesome graphics with great sounds to reach success. This is a way (in my opinion of course) to go until you earn some real money so you can invest in bigger projects.
Those are all good points. But I think the sound and graphics (and the overall design in general) are a large part of what makes Angry Birds so appealing to everyone, which contributed to its success. Like you said, the game itself isn’t very difficult to write, and all of the clones that were created are proof of that. But it’s the design that sets it apart, and good design takes work too
Congratulations!
Although I don’t have kids yet, I’ve kinda recently (~2 years ago) got married and can testify to the decrease in free programming time that occurs with these changes. For me it’s been a tough balancing act between family time, my day job, and my personal projects.
I too am a indie developer and I can summarize my goal as an indie developer as making some extra money while doing what I love.
There are very very few overnight successes. Rovio had a lot of unsuccessful games before Angry Birds. This is your first game… and I would say it’s pretty good for a first game. Just keep on learning, and keep on making games and you’ll eventually have a hit.
Thanks. And that’s always a good thing to keep in mind for perspective – Rovio’s “overnight success” with Angry Birds came after (I think) 51 previous games.
Do a game you like to play.
Very true. Not much point in trying to convince others to download your game if you don’t like playing it yourself
You say that you’ve had ideas along the lines of “It would be cool if…”, so create yourself a prototyping environment if you don’t have one already and try out some of those ideas. Ideally your prototyping environment will let you try the ideas quickly, so when an idea doesn’t work then you won’t have spent much time on it and you can quickly move on to something else.
Once you get an idea that you really like, then you’ll know it, because it won’t let you go. Then just run with that idea and polish the implementation until it sparkles. It’s all the little touches of polish that make games like Angry Birds so good, because the idea definitely isn’t new. Similarly, a seemingly simple game like Plants vs Zombies has a lot more depth and polish than it first appears.
I don’t know if there’s a psychological principle involved, but when it’s clear that a developer has put the effort in, then players feel that a game is worth their attention and start to rave about it.
Neil Rajah is a good example of a platformer that has some nice touches but is a little rough around the edges. To me, it’s a great game, and I certainly enjoy playing it, but consider how well it would do if you were able to polish it some more. I wouldn’t be surprised if you gave us its spiritual successor in a couple of years because the fact that you love platformers comes through loud and clear.
Setting up a prototype environment / project is a good idea. I don’t have anything like that, I’ll have to put some thought into that.
“A little rough around the edges” is being pretty kind
Neil Rajah is the most polished game I’ve created so far, but I’m well aware of how much more polish it could use.
hi ziggy,
i know exactly what you mean.
my first daughter is 3 years old and my newborn is now 4 months old.
my wife hates my app and she thinks i am playing and doesnt understand that coding doesnt mean playing
but boys need hobbies..
so keep working (the same do i)
bye
phil
Heh, sounds like you’re in a similar situation as me