Matt Tuttle

I've been playing piano for almost 20 years now and the phrase I hear all the time is "Practice makes perfect". In fact now that I am teaching kids how to play, I find myself saying that exact same phrase my piano teachers told me. And it's not just a saying for me, it's a lifestyle.

The same goes for game development honestly. Every time you make a game it helps you improve your skills and you should always have something you learned from it. Mistakes are frequent when you start out but as you keep working on your craft you'll find that you get better and better with less mistakes. That's why most experienced game developers tell the new ones to just start making games because that way they can start to learn from their own mistakes.

This is why for the past two months I have been doing a lot of game prototypes to try to improve different areas of my programming. One game was specific to AI, another for pathfinding, and yet another to just try to make something more fun to play. Each iteration I make mistakes and the next game is always just a bit better than the last. I'll be sharing my prototypes on this blog and probably will release source code for a few of them.

If you are reading this post, and have wanted to start game development but didn't know how, just start making games with whatever you are good in. If that's python, game maker or C++ it doesn't matter. What does matter is that you just start practicing now so that later you might create that "perfect" game when all your practicing pays off.

Brenton and I have been working on a flash game for about a week to improve my AI programming. It's pretty much just a simple boss fight where you battle against the evil cursor that has imprisoned Jezzball. The original game was a favorite of ours and we wanted a game with a bit of a twist.

So this blog post is my reflections on how development went for the game and what we could have done to make it better. Game development is an interesting process and we're always looking for ways to improve.

Things that went right

We both had goals before the game on what we wanted to improve skill wise and so we wanted something that required more animation and AI than the previous games we had developed, which were mostly puzzle games. This helped us keep the scope at a minimum and gave us a clear goal to work towards. I really feel that we accomplished what we set forth to do and that was definitely a good thing.

Our original concept of the game was just an object that smashed into things. By coming up with the base mechanic early on it made us focus on simple problems first. The actual art and idea of using Jezzball as a theme came after we had a working prototype. Instead of getting a ton of art done on the game and then scrapping it we just had the programming working while we tried to make it feel as fun as possible.

We also used the Flixel framework for flash to quickly get a game up and running. This has really useful classes that make it easy to start a new project, handle sprite loading, collision, and other nice features that sped up the prototyping process.

Things we learned

Adding music and sound effects to a game really help make a game fun. I used FamiTracker for the music and sfx which I had never used before but it has a pretty short learning curve (compared to other trackers) and I was able to compose some simple music. We both wanted it to be a chiptune cover and while I considered MilkyTracker I didn't want to take the time to set up some complex samples/instruments. Even the most basic music can help make the game better.

Polishing even a simple game takes time. We probably spent just as much time polishing the game as we did making the original prototype. The actual gameplay was done in two nights and we spent about three more finishing up the game to make it feel right and to add elements like the gui, main menu and instructions screen.

What we could have done differently

I'd love to have more people testing the game before releasing it but for the most part we showed it to friend and family to gauge difficulty and see what needed to be added to the game. It was surprising to find what people had troubles with and the charge attack was not clearly understood until we added the meter.

Final Thoughts

The game was meant to be a learning experience but also something we could polish as much as possible. I feel it was successful for what it was and hope other people will enjoy it. Obviously knowing about the original Jezzball game will help it make sense but I feel the gameplay stands up on it's own.

This may seem obvious but it is something that has tripped up developers including myself. When designing a game you need to figure out what platform it should be for. The most important part of this is the controller.

The Controller

One of the most popular games on the iPhone is Angry Birds. If that was designed for PS3 it probably wouldn't sell that well. The game is meant to have that tactile feel of pulling back a slingshot and flinging birds through the air. Without that feeling it would be just another physics game.

The same goes for console games trying to make it on mobile devices. The majority of their success comes from their graphics but let's be honest, how many of those are actually fun? They come of as tiny clones of their console siblings and feel like a cheap way to make an extra buck.

So how do you know which controller works with your game? Well, you need to prototype it. If you require swinging motions with your hands maybe the Wii is a good fit. Or if it will require lots of buttons then a traditional console or PC may be best. Is the game simple enough to be controlled by swiping, tilting, and touching a device? Then mobile devices or flash may be your pick.

Graphics

I'd be lying if I said that graphics didn't matter. If you have a team of artists that can crank out tons of awesome 3d models and animations then you might be able to hit the console market. Otherwise I'd stick with the more slimed down markets where 2D and simple 3D graphics can make it.

However, this isn't true in all cases and many times if a game's graphics are quirky enough they can make it on larger platforms with success. To really be able to quantify this you need to look at your target consumer and what would be visually appealing to them.

Marketplace

This really boils down to your players. Who do you see playing this game? If it's anyone 40 and older than you should definitely consider the mobile market or PC games (flash and other). PopCap, for example, has been a huge success in those markets because their games are more targeted to an older age group.

When you have fast paced action with anything more than 2 buttons then a console should be a obvious choice. Especially if there is co-op involved. PC shouldn't be factored out but generally consoles are more accessible to a large range of players. And honestly I'd rather sit on a couch and play then be cramped up in my office chair. :)

Next time you design a game, consider these factors while you are prototyping.

I think every blog needs a first post and so why not start with Hello World. If you're a programmer you know exactly what I'm talking about and it doesn't need much explaining. If you don't have a clue then you might have taken a misstep somewhere along the line and found yourself in an unknown dimension. Nevertheless, welcome to my personal blog and I hope you enjoy your stay.

What's that? You want to know more about this site? Huh, well I guess I can tell you what I plan to do with it an how it came to be. So to start, how about a little life story? I'll be short... I promise.

A bit more than a year ago I decided to take a dive into the deep-end and start a business making games. I didn't have much of a plan but wanted to try the waters and had a little success. A friend and I started Frozen Orange, and started attempting to make games. Yes, I said attempts. We had a small success on the iPhone market by at least shipping something but not much more than that. So here I am a year later looking back at what I've done and learned and wanting to share it with people like you.

Maybe you're a student wanting to start a business of your own, or a systems programmer, or maybe you're a friend of mine that just felt like Googling my name. I know who you are. ;) But whoever you may be, my hope is that you find something useful from this blog. Some sort of insight that might get you through the day or help you come up with new ideas.

I'd like it if this blog is more than just me writing in front of a screen but more of a conversation with a friend. So welcome friend, sit back, grab a drink, and read a few posts.

Have you ever said this phrase? I have. In fact I took it to that extra step to actually start one. But enough about me, just what do you have to do to start a game development company.

Well first you should understand why you want to be in game development. If your answer has anything to do with money I'm going to bean you with a sack of potatoes. Once you have figured out why you want to, write it down on a piece of paper. This will remind you a year from now when you question yourself.

Now that you know why you want to start a game development business you can start to take steps to making it a reality. The steps I am giving are merely a guideline and not a road map.

Team up with others

I can't stress enough how important this is. Find other individuals who are interested in making games and start working together. If you can create a game with these people then you are quickly on your way to being successful. This will help you figure out how to function as a team and whether you can produce results or not. Make sure to define leaders before a project starts and have them hold people accountable.

If you can't find people in your area to develop games then reach out online. In college I started working on a game mod for Half-Life with a group of others and it was a great learning experience for me. I also couldn't find artists in my area so I found someone online and we eventually created Frozen Orange.

The other reason I stress this point is that it helps keep you motivated. There are times when you are going to get discouraged and without other people to motivate you the project may just get dropped. Always praise team members when they are doing a good job because you are their motivator as well.

Find your niche

As a start up developer you need to find what your niche is. Guitar Hero was originally developed by a company that loved music and games and decided to merge the two together. Imagine if someone else would have created Guitar Hero. The music game genre would still be dead and truthfully I think co-op games would not be what they are becoming now.

The easiest way to find your niche is to talk among your team members. If that's just you than it should be pretty easy. Talk about what you love to do and share your background with the team and ask for everyone to do the same. Once everyone is done you should start to see some similarities in interests and experience. Uses those to fuel your game inspiration and design.

Good luck on your journey and I hope you find this information helpful.