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[Bonesaw]

Honestly, the main problem here is that I want to develop rather than program, but I don't really see any other recourse. I wish I could summon up a horde of lackeys, but I realize that it's either do it myself or never get anything done.

Game Maker seems interesting and all, but I'm no artist, and unless you want an ambient track made of me mashing my drums, I wouldn't count myself a musician, either. I'd much rather make, say, a DOS text game as my first real venture into viddydom, personally.

[Hajo]

@Bonesaw

If you are more the designer than the coder/painter/musician type, you might be lucky - or not. It all depends how well you understand to present your designs, and find people who value your ideas over their own and actually will try to help you.

It can work. There have been examples. But often the idea people get slapped "Ideas are cheap and plenty to get", and it's hard to find followers if all you have is an idea. But then, it's a question of advertising your idea.

[muku]

Game Maker seems interesting and all, but I'm no artist, and unless you want an ambient track made of me mashing my drums, I wouldn't count myself a musician, either. I'd much rather make, say, a DOS text game as my first real venture into viddydom, personally.

Ah. In that case, you'd definitely be better off learning some "real" programming language (or using what you already know... I think you still haven't told us). I usually recommend Python because it's quick to get started with, but again it depends on your current skills.

If you want to make "graphical" text games (like a roguelike), you might want to look into libtcod. It's a C/C++ library, but it seems there's a Python wrapper available.

On the other hand, if you are interested in making text adventures, Inform might also interest you.

Really, it's not all that important what you start out with. Choose a language you're comfortable with and do something.

[Bonesaw]

I'm not saying I specifically want to make text games; I was rather implying that I don't personally want to bother with the sprites and the music and the whole lotta polish (did I mention that I'm a perfectionist and a procrastinator?)

Maybe I should just network here and see if I can't sell my VISIONS to some of the random goers. Honestly, I don't care who (or possibly what) makes my games as long as they some how are made in the first place. ORIGINAL IDEA DO NOT STEAL does not often come from me.

[Alex May]

So basically you don't want a mentor, you want a slave?

Get back to work Bonesaw, "I'm no artist" is no excuse. Anything can be learned.

And your annoying writing style won't help you win the heart of some hapless multitalented game dev willing to make your perfect game.

[Hajo]

"I'm no artist" might be a killer for any game making ambitions. Regardless if you design, write, paint, compose or code, all of those require some artistic skills. And all of those turn out to be serious work, if you do them right.

And if you want to enthuse others about your ideas, you need good talking/writing skills, too. Don't make them feel as slaves. Make them feel as contributors to a great and fun thing. And even this can be work

[Alex May]

In most gentlemanny manner I am going to disagree about keeping it small. If you do it small, you'll just end up running into the second project syndrome instead. What that means is, you make a small project as everybody says and think to yourself, "Yay, I did it! Now I am ready to do my MMORPG I always dreamed about!" and run into the same problem that everybody wanted you to avoid.

I think you should do it the other way. Try to remember why you are learning to make games (and it's not "Pong"), and then try to do exactly that game. You will fail, but that's the point. On the way you will have learned new stuff, and when you make your second project you will be able to adapt your plan. Maybe the second project will fail too, but that's still fine. I think the best way of getting better at something is to make many mistakes.

At the risk of giving this guy any more advice to wilfully ignore, this is also a good plan as long as you realise you will make mistakes - I can't tell you how many projects I abandoned because I simply wasn't up to the task of making them. In the end what it took was practice, smaller projects, and better tools/ide/languages. Failing is enlightening, so either way is great as long as you know what to expect.

[William Broom]

The fact is, Bonesaw, nobody is going to be your artist or your programmer or whatever. Nobody is even going to be your mentor. Nobody can stop you from procrastinating but yourself. It's called indepedent gaming because you have to be independent.

[Μarkham]

Just go do stuff and you'll get better at it.  The only way people ever get to be the big decision maker are either by being really good at what they do (as in having skills at doing the things that they are directing) or by having lots of money.

[___]

The fact is, Bonesaw, nobody is going to be your artist or your programmer or whatever. Nobody is even going to be your mentor. Nobody can stop you from procrastinating but yourself. It's called

gaming because you have to be

.

Word.

[deadeye]

Get back to work Bonesaw, "I'm no artist" is no excuse. Anything can be learned.

And your annoying writing style won't help you win the heart of some hapless multitalented game dev willing to make your perfect game.

Though haowan might seem a little blunt I'd have to agree on both accounts.  "I'm no artist."  Well, that's fine.  Make colored squares.  Or stick figures.  Games don't really need fancy art.  Fancy art is a luxury item... if you can't make it yourself you still need to work for it somehow.  So if you get your game to a playable state with colored squares or stick figures, you'll have much better luck shopping it around for an artist if that's what you're looking for.

Moral of the story:  Nobody is going to work for you, but if you show that you can work, they might work with you.

Anyway, you have more than enough advice to get you started making games.  So go start making games.

[diwil]

I'm a procrastinator, and a perfectionit as well; I've discovered to have certain tresholds which I need to cross each time to get something done, but for that, I have a few simple things to overcome those blocks:

• not jumping head first to the deep end; break down the project into smaller and smaller parts, each being their own little project, which are then perfected, learned from and brought together to the bigger project
• for the above, using the ol' pen and paper is a good way to break things down, and plan ahead
• set yourself some deadlines, I cannot stress this enough, and reward yourself with something whenever you finish a segment of the project; grab a hefty meal, or do whatever that you don't do too often and which makes you feel good
• when feeling that treshold of "I should start, but I don't feel like it", just close your eyes, take a deep breath and say "I will finish this small part tonight, I'm not going to sleep until I have something done," and then do it (might work better if you're an insomniac, I reward myself with sleep!)
• get supportive friends who are into gaming, and who'll motivate you to continue your progress

That's pretty much everything I can recommend... And as for going straight with a C variant or such, I'd recommend going with PyGame or Game Maker and start off really, really small, just so you'll figure out first how exactly do games work. It's not all straight forward, and I've spent many a sleepless nights with something as simple as collision detection.

[Alex May]

Get back to work Bonesaw, "I'm no artist" is no excuse. Anything can be learned.

And your annoying writing style won't help you win the heart of some hapless multitalented game dev willing to make your perfect game.

Though haowan might seem a little blunt

Haha thanks dude - I went a little bit "red mist descends" there!

[increpare]

If you want to keep programming to a minimum, try out game-maker I guess.  It'll still take some work.  You said you don't mind graphics and sound too much, which will make things easier still.  Best to get straight to doing something though. 

Also, to ditto what other people said:  People will give you advise (as I'm sure you can see), and if you start a thread with your project idea on this art and design thread, people will comment on specifics.  And, people might collaborate with you.  Nobody will ever do any donkey-work for you.

[neon]

it's all true.  get out there - grab game maker, look at some of the sample games and see how they were done, and then just start trying to make something.
i'm kind of in the same boat as you, as are a lot of other people, i'm sure.  what it comes down to here is you having the motivation to pull yourself up by the bootstraps and say, "fuck this wishy-washiness, i'm going to just make a game no matter how shit it is."  and then you do it, and post it here, and we go    and pretty soon you'll be on your way to making something frighteningly technical and complex.

[Bonesaw]

I think the initial point of this topic was missed, but the goal was achieved, so I'm not going to whine about it.

help they hurt my feelings

[deadeye]

Well, you did say a firm boot, yes?

[Bonesaw]

I guess you could say I'm just a little bit... butthurt.

[Powergloved Andy]

what everybody else says. Start small, etc. etc.

What I recommend is not making pong or space invaders. Make a mega man program.  Go to a site and get some sprites, tiles, and sfx. THEN read enough tutorials to know how to make him move, shoot, and climb a ladder.

That's what I did. Then go from there!

[Bonesaw]

Also, as a final question, assuming that I actually am somewhat serious, how important would be upgrading Game Maker? Would I miss any of the features?