Well, you probably heard this saying. And it could be that you have positive feelings about this idea.
This article is my take on this saying, and how this saying send me off in the wrong direction.
This is an article in the ‘Research’ category where I dive into a subject on game production.
The start
It started with me wanting to make a game. At that time, I did already know it would be hard to keep focus on finishing the game, so I sought advice. The interwebs are full of advice, and the ‘create something you love’ is one of the advises you get for staying motivated.
So, I thought ‘what would be something I love?’
‘Well, me and my son (5 at the time) enjoying building the game together’
And, after some more thinking
‘Yeah, lets create game with a little bit more depth than the average child-focus game in a world child’s of 5 could love, and with mechanics they could understand’
That was my start of ‘Find the Gnome’.
The catch
Immediately I ran into problems. My son did like to draw monsters and play monster vs monster scenes with Lego. So I thought it would be a cool thing for my world to contain monsters. But to get it child-friendly, those monsters would need some ‘friendly-ness’ over them. This proved to be very hard. And on top of that, I personally don’t like games with monsters fighting monsters.
So I switched focus from ‘Lets build something I like‘ to ‘Lets try to squeeze in every possible goal I want to achieve in life’
That was the start of the 3D-ish puzzle-like game ‘Find the Gnome’ with Gnomes.
And I discovered I don’t like to create puzzle games…
The assumption of the phrase ‘create something you like’ is that you know what you will like, that things you like to play are the same as things you like to create, and that things you like will stay like-able until the end of times.
In hindsight
I do personally think it is hard to find something that you like to play and create, and continue to like to play and create.
And after a few months after releasing this game, I found out that there is something else. Creating games professionally (subconsciously my intention) require other parameters to be satisfied than games created for private use.
I am a professional software developer so each day I build software related things. Thankfully I find everyday something I like in the job I do, so everyday I do what I love to do.
But do I like the subject? Or the people I’m working with? The requirements? All the tasks I have to fulfill? (Answer: not always everyday, but enough to keep the fun in it)
It is this mentality that I had to translate to game dev to get things going again.
And at last, a youtube I did find about this subject. I think it is a bit harsh on personal projects, but on the other hand: developing professional is a whole different game. Thankfully. Because, if not, what would set me (professional business software developer) apart from all those guys crafting excel-sheet-tools in their office-basements?
GameFeelings 