next »

[mewse]

The other way to force yourself to stop procrastinating is to set deadlines for yourself, and make sure that everyone you know knows about the deadlines.  This is how I've managed to do my "Game in a Week"s;  publishing the deadline beforehand gives you a real social incentive to actually finish up on time, even if you have to cut down the game at the last minute in order to have something you can call finished.

I was hoping that the PG Compo's deadline would work the same way for me, but I'm falling a little behind from where I'd like to be at this point.  A deadline thirty days away just doesn't seem to motivate me into action quite so much as a deadline that's less than a week away.

[Seth]

Right now my current method is to play video games for inspiration.  I'm pretty sure once I get past this next room in DROD I'll make a game in no time.

[Sar]

I was hoping that the PG Compo's deadline would work the same way for me, but I'm falling a little behind from where I'd like to be at this point.  A deadline thirty days away just doesn't seem to motivate me into action quite so much as a deadline that's less than a week away.

I find game-in-a-month deadlines almost perfect for me, and I've successfully done a couple in the past. But I'm having trouble motivating myself for the PCG just 'cause I had a prior engagement for the first week, and some long hours at work the second week, which have dropped me into a "I couldn't really expect to finish in the timeframe anyway" frame of mind. I figure I'm going to run over anyway, so my brain shrugs and says it doesn't really matter how much I run over by. :/

[joshg]

I had to stop reading any PCG entry posts here just so that a) I would spend more time working on my own instead of playing all the other entries, and b) so I would just make what I want to make instead of comparing what I'm doing to everybody else's ideas.

The "Mark all messages as read" button here is a great anti-procrastinator.

[Dim_Yimma_H]

I guess many of us suffer from this problem. We have a nice idea about a new game, or game mechanic, but we never get it done.

The words "suffer" and "problem" are wrong words to describe procrastinating, the way I see it.

Procrastinating can be our mind's way to prepare itself to be creative. Because usually "creative" doesn't equal "productive".

That may seem contradicting, but good ideas are often in our periphery, and can only be seen with a relaxed focus.

So the question is, is procrastinating really problematic, or is it rather good?

I listen to music.

Interesting solution, I've heard several others that do that. Personally, I sometimes find it requires additional energy/thought to listen to music.

Does anyone else find music energy-consuming?

[Sar]

Procrastinating can be our mind's way to prepare itself to be creative. Because usually "creative" doesn't equal "productive".

That may seem contradicting, but good ideas are often in our periphery, and can only be seen with a relaxed focus.

Except that right now I already have a firm idea of how I want my game to work, I just have trouble setting aside the time and energy to pursue that design when I could instead be sleeping or staring at forum posts or something. ;-)

Interesting solution, I've heard several others that do that. Personally, I sometimes find it requires additional energy/thought to listen to music.

Does anyone else find music energy-consuming?

I find that it very much depends on the music.

-If it's something I know extremely well (e.g. Pulse) then I have no trouble working while it's playing.
-If it's something I don't know that well which has lyrics, then I have trouble concentrating if it's playing.
-If it's something entirely instrumental then it's usually OK.

Background music from TV or anime is often best, for me. For the most part it's designed to be unobtrusive and to fill in that background part of your brain which is thinking about things other than that which you're concentrating on, so it's perfect for coding to. The last game I did, I think half of my time was spent listening to the Haibane Renmei OST, and the other half the Brandenburg concertos.

[Corpus]

Procrastination is definitely not a good thing, for me. I can work well once I get started - it's just the sort of creative inertia that's my problem. The capacity for creativity is there, I just can't always summon the willpower necessary to actually do something.

I can concentrate on art and programming with music on, but for anything else - such as writing, or work for subjects such as Italian or physics - it completely distracts me. I can't tolerate music when art is not going as I want it to, though. In those cases I tend to take my irritation out on the music (by turning it off).

[Dim_Yimma_H]

Background music from TV or anime is often best, for me. For the most part it's designed to be unobtrusive and to fill in that background part of your brain which is thinking about things other than that which you're concentrating on, so it's perfect for coding to.

That's a good point, that a part of the brain isn't thinking on coding anyway. So if you find a certain mood the music could be relaxing in a way, with its rhythm.

Music is very good at setting one's mood by the way, so knowing the music well should help in reaching a good mood for coding.

I can concentrate on art and programming with music on, but for anything else - such as writing, or work for subjects such as Italian or physics - it completely distracts me.

I wonder, maybe art and programming benefits from rhythm in that they have a relatively continuous work flow. While physics is so based on rules that it's difficult to proceed with a constant pace.

[moi]

Background music from TV or anime is often best, for me. For the most part it's designed to be unobtrusive and to fill in that background part of your brain which is thinking about things other than that which you're concentrating on, so it's perfect for coding to.

Seconded definitely, it's really good to distract that part of the brain that is in search of...distraction precisely. But be careful not to tune into something you might become interested in (such as old classical movies for example) because you become addicted and it's difficult to get any work done afterward.

[Bree]

I listen to a lot of different music, so that I can twist my brain in every direction. I'll just hit shuffle on my iTunes and jump from Modest Mouse to Nobou Uematsu to Papa Roach to Rick Astley...

...what?

[Shambrook]

Honestly I find the best way is to not actully give yourself any other options.
I do the most work on my laptop on the train cause I have no itnernet connection or games installed on it/

[Sar]

Honestly I find the best way is to not actully give yourself any other options.
I do the most work on my laptop on the train cause I have no itnernet connection or games installed on it/

Step 1: Code simple game.
Step 2: Waste several hours playing simple game rather than working on making it a not-so-simple game.
Step 3: Curse self.
Step 4: Delete simple game in interest of getting some work done.
Step 5: Repeat from step 1.

[Corpus]

If you waste several hours playing it, it's probably pretty damn good, and you've already conquered procrastination!

[joshg]

I wonder, maybe art and programming benefits from rhythm in that they have a relatively continuous work flow. While physics is so based on rules that it's difficult to proceed with a constant pace.

It's great when programming actually does have a continuous work flow, but more often than not I run into some friggin' annoying thing that isn't doing what I think it should and I have to track down what the problem is.  This usually hits my boredom/frustration trigger really, really quickly.  FWIW, I'm probably borderline ADD though.

[Sar]

If you waste several hours playing it, it's probably pretty damn good, and you've already conquered procrastination!

Or I'm easily pleased distracted! ;-)

[Michaël Samyn]

But it's there! It's a matter of finishing it! Adding enemies, some combat rules, some levels and voilà. But that's the hardest part for me - way hardest -.

It's the same for me. Setting up the system in broad strokes is fun. It's very gratifying because you start from zero and end with a lot of stuff. The difference makes you feel like you've accomplished something tremendous.

But back in reality, setting up the big system, solving the main problems, is peanuts. It's nothing. a piece of cake. A tiny fragment of making a game. And certainly the part of the production that takes the least time and effort. It's basically a matter of translating your inspiration to working code.

After that starts the real work. And in my experience, it takes up most of the time. And since the difference of what you accomplish is not as great, it takes a lot more effort and courage to get started and continue working.

But its' worth it! That's what motivates me. Moving from an interesting concept that might impress your friends and colleagues to a finished game that real people can enjoy is worth all the effort.

[Moosader]

Like someone else said, the multiple-project thing has actually been helping me out, even though I thought it would hold me back. If I don't feel like coding my own stuff on a particular day, I'll do some tile graphics for my friend's dreamcast RPG that day.

Also not having full-time uni classes during the summer, and the stress of wanting to get stuff done before I go back to doing homework almost all the time.  o.<

[Dim_Yimma_H]

This afternoon I went and drew class diagrams so I could code... later. But seriously I think visually designing the code helps making it more fun to implement later. But stuff like that is treacherously close to procrastinating, I know.

I listen to a lot of different music, so that I can twist my brain in every direction.

Ah, some kind of musical brainstorming I guess. Maybe like creation crack formed by sound waves.

It's great when programming actually does have a continuous work flow, but more often than not I run into some friggin' annoying thing that isn't doing what I think it should and I have to track down what the problem is.  This usually hits my boredom/frustration trigger really, really quickly.

I recognize that, usually I have a difficult time coding to music (especially when some code problem requires rethinking stuff), and the pause button is pretty relieving then.

[Moosader]

I prefer listening to trance, classical, or something non-lyrical when coding or doing homework instead of rock music, which I listen to most other times. 
Though I'm just the sort who feels... weird... if there's no background noise going.

Another thing I think that helps with motivation is either sharing the game with people, or maybe posting a video.  A video would probably be better for projects earlier on, since you can kind of... "play it right", instead of having people run around and find bugs everywhere.   But then you can get feedback and such and it makes you want to complete it more.

[team_q]

I don't mind bands whose lyrics almost fade into the background, or whose voice is softer then most of the music, I can listen to those while coding no problem. Examples: Iron and Wine, Final Fantasy, Beruit.