tutorial: how to make games better
Paul Eres:
suggestions on how to make a game better which are doubtless going to be disputed but these are nonetheless genuine suggestions:
- a lot of indie game developers don't focus very much on the graphics, i think this is a shame because it leads to a lot of interesting games that nobody plays. graphics are the first thing people see about your game, a lot of people will only ever seen screenshots. good graphics help a game tremendously, they can even make a game more fun, because unless something is visually pleasant to look at you aren't going to enjoy it as much as otherwise. konjak's games are very playable, but if not for his skill at graphics they wouldn't be as fun. i don't mean you have to spend a thousand hours on the art, just learn what makes something visually pleasing, learn to balance colors: cactus's games are made quickly but have very nice visuals compared to most indie games.
- make your games longer; add more content. some indie games are too long, but even more indie games are too short. it's better to overshoot, because someone can always stop playing if they felt they've played long enough, but someone can't make a game last longer if they want it to last longer. i don't mean make games that are 80 hours long, but 6-8 hours long is usually great, and a lot better than 10-15 minute-long tech demos. it's not too time-consuming to add content: just add more levels, more enemies, more types of weapons, more playable characters; vary on what you have. once you have the basic engine done the content goes quickly: creating the a game that is ten hours long doesn't take ten times the effort as creating a game that's one hour long, it's more like only twice the effort.
- speaking of that, spend more time on games. some people can make great games in a short amount of time, but most can't. don't be afraid of spending a year or three years on a single game. there are plenty of exceptions, but games which people spend years on tend to be better on average than games that people spend weeks on. iji, glum buster, barkley: shut up and jam: gaiden, cave story, aquaria, braid, etc., all took years of work, not weeks of work.
- playtest your games more, don't just release them and then address issues that people complain about in blogs and forums. it can damage people's first impression of a game if the first release is buggy and unpolished, and they may not try it again even after you've fixed all those problems.
- add more story to your games. this doesn't have to mean lengthly cutscenes, it can just be backstory, but story is important: it gives people reason to care about the game's world, the characters in it, and what happens to them.
- work in teams more: if you're not good at something listed above, find someone who is and work with them. teams also keep you motivated, just talking about a game back and forth is valuable, i've been co-creating indie games with others for 10 years now, and i can't imagine ever going back to working on games alone, it's just a totally different experience and not as rewarding.
William Broom:
It all sounds like good advice to me. Regarding longer development times: What you say seems sensible to me, but what I worry about when planning to spend a long time on a game is that I will lose interest in it, or I will realise that the game isn't really what I want to make. This is, I think, especially pertinent to myself and some other Tigsource members who are still quite young. Three years ago I thought FullMetal Alchemist was a great work of literature. I have no idea what I will like in 3 more years' time!
So... do you have any advice on making sure that when you settle on a game for 1-3 years, that it will not be something you regret later? One thing I read here (from brog, I think) is simply to sit on an idea for a long time before you actually start work on it. If you still like the idea after, say, six months of thinking about it, then you will probably still like it after a year of working on it.
ChevyRay:
Cool post. :D I actually thought it was a joke until I saw who the poster was.
Quote
add more story to your games. this doesn't have to mean lengthly cutscenes, it can just be backstory, but story is important: it gives people reason to care about the game's world, the characters in it, and what happens to them.
I think this is close, but using the term "storytelling" would be a bit more accurate. I think good storytelling helps bring a world to life, definitely helps immersion, and accomplishes the same thing. The thing is that not all games need or have a story, and some games actually might be damaged by having one. Storytelling on the other hand, never hurt.
The difference? The way I see it, storytelling is the portrayal of your characters and world, rather than the actual content. If you have a puzzle game with a cute character but no real storyline, make your character do interesting things, give him expression, make him react to things. Instead of making the blocks fall from the top, make a big machine at the top that spits them out in a fancy animation; then, instead of being just game mechanics, it's a game world, and things tend to come to life a bit more and become more interesting.
If something gets damaged, make it actually look damaged, make it look hurt, so that your "damage" is actually something real that's being portrayed in your world, rather than just a number operating in the background or a bar in the HUD.
That's storytelling. Communicating your game and world to the player. You don't need a single line of text to do it, but I think can improve your game as Paul was describing.
partymetroid:
I've already planned to do all of these things. :)
About the "more content thing", I agree; and I think the reason that people don't add more content is because the "hard", more fulfilling things are over. I think that adding more levels and things just feels "too easy".
Paul Eres:
@Chevy
i agree that there's more to storytelling than plot twists (nothing against plot twists) -- even just like giving a random npc a bit more background by implying a guy was once a doctor who fled his home country after finding a cure for a disease or something is adding to the story, since it makes the world come alive more, makes it feel like the place has depth and a history to it.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page