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Discouragement

Well, to be perfectly honest, I'm feeling pretty discouraged about this project. I know that's a bit of a personal disclosure, and that this is a gamedev blog and not a live journal but...I'm not sure what's more essential to amateur game dev than motivation.

I didn't think this project was explosively super-perfect or beyond reproach or anything, but I did release it with the total certainty (in my mind) that I had created something that A) was very polished and B) most importantly fun to play. Actually, I thought it was not just fun to play but addictive. I usually don't release something until I think it's just about done. Maybe if I released things I thought were sort of rough, half-finished crap then people's "feedback" would be easier to take (though I kind of doubt it) but as it is I don't release things until I think they're "pretty much good and done".

So many people seem to feel otherwise, though, about this one (I still haven't read the any of the comments from the nasty review, and I don't plan to; stress triggered medical condition and all; I don't seem to notice anywhere near as many people agreeing with Kumada's review) that the amount of work I'd have to do to make the game--which I already thought was really fun--fun for more people seems depressingly insurmountable. I was looking forward to working on the rest of the game's content and to promoting the game on other sites, but now that "make other people think the game is fun somehow" is added to that list, it just seems like a Sisyphean task, rather than merely a Herculean one.

This isn't canceled or anything, I hope to keep plugging away at it. But it just seems like an obligation now, whereas before it was joyous. Whenever I think about working on this I just feel kind of sad.

Maybe we could discuss. How do you guys keep working on games when the joy goes out of it? (I think for a lot of people, myself included in the past, the answer is far too often "I don't".)

Posts

Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
Also, make better games and the community will probably like them more.

The greatest lie ever told.

This is just such a total, outright lie that I can no longer even be angry at the frank dishonesty of it.

After a while, you just have to laugh at all the bullshit.

Every game I have released in the past three years has been better than the last game I released and has had a worse reception with more hostility.
Just one thread. Just one thread without a flamewar is all I ask.

Max, Craze, table it.

While there are elements of game design that appeal to a wider audience or appeal more intensely to a specific audience, 'good' is subjective. We can talk about the overall polishedness of a product, or the effort put into it, but there is no impartial way of assessing how good any art thing is.

The actual gam mak-ing that could be accomplished in the time you spend disagreeing with each other boggles the mind.
DE
*click to edit*
1313
author=Max McGee
Every game I have released in the past three years has been better than the last game I released (...)

The greatest lie ever told.

It's as if you honestly believe that a person's work follows a straight, y=x line instead of an uneven curve. Delusions of grandeur much? Going by that logic, Spielberg's War Horse should be his best movie, no?
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
To clarify, by good I don't mean in the sense of the ineffable: good art, good cinema, good literature or whatever. I mean in the sense of the definitively calculable: production values.

I mean that they've been slicker, better produced, better coded, graphically tighter, and had less flaws AND that they've been carefully honed by the constant bitching and whining of RMN to not do any of the things RMN doesn't like. (A good example is how Journeyman uses minigames for things that in the past I'd done as simple dice rolls, because of all of the RNG hate generated by Iron Gaia: Virus, Everything Turns Gray, and To Arms! and the lesson that taught me: RNG bad.)

Which is fine because I'm pretty sure that's also what Craze means by good.

Sorry, Kumada, but whether this game or not is highly relevant to my decision to continue developing it or not. I certainly intend to make it even better either way, but if it's not already good I could save myself a lot of time and hassle by just starting over with something else.

Delusions of grandeur much?

Grandeur? Where does grandeur enter into it exactly, if I did actually believe that EVERY person's work was CONSTANTLY improving? What the fuck does thinking that everyone gets better have to do with delusions of grandeur?
DE, it depends on who you talk to. I've heard people make that exact claim about War Horse. I disagree, but that is my opinion.

I think the target audience for Max's games has shifted slightly from when he started. There's generally more polish, but there are a lot more stalled projects, too, due in no small part to this pointless adversarial relationship that's evolved between the dev and the people following the games.

This isn't serving anybody, and I honestly don't care who thinks who is to blame. Everybody in these threads shares some responsibility, and if you're pissed off about that, then have a go at me instead of each other.
Versalia
must be all that rtp in your diet
1405
Max, fuck you. I don't even know you. I have absolutely no past experiences with you. We've never chatted, we've never spatted, we've never passed each other in the street.

And I didn't like your game.

BUT I GUESS I'M JUST THE HIVEMIND TALKING

Just one thread. Just one thread without a flamewar is all I ask.

Max fucking begs for it. He's the one posting pity-me my-game-sucks-and-now-I-realize-it-boohoohoohoo threads and then flipping the bird to the entire website and every member of the community who bothered to give him feedback. This is just pathetic, and there's no reason to accuse others of "flamewarring." Max's attitude is inflammatory. He's gasoline.

author=Max McGee
AND that they've been carefully honed by the constant bitching and whining of RMN to not do any of the things RMN doesn't like.

You can't even improve upon your games without BLAMING other people for 'bitching and whining' about 'things they don't like,' 90% of which are completely valid game design concepts that apparently have to be explained to you. That bitching and whining? You admit right there that it helped you sharpen up your games.

author=emmych
I need to address this.
The way I see it, in order to make a good game, you must be willing to consider cutting/reworking everything, even the things and ideas you are most in love with. Let me give you a personal example - I'm an artist. I am a visually thinking gal. I made some character designs for my game that I was in love with. Someone mentioned the hero looked too much like Locke Cole from FF6 and the heroine looked too much like Terra (in a not so nice way, mind you!), and you know what? They were right. I was ridic discouraged by this, I was super upset, but they were still right. So, instead of moping, I changed the character designs. I fiddled with palettes, tweaked haircuts, blah dee blah dee boom baddly boom and hey, look at that, I ACTUALLY LIKE THEM BETTER NOW.

I'm not saying that every bit of criticism must mean you change your game (because pffffft will you ever finish anything that way? NO.), but you do need to be willing to change things. If you go into something believing you've made the game the best it can be without much feedback, you are letting your ego get in the way, and that is the worst possible thing an artist can do!

Hits the nail on the head over, and over, and over again. If you're making changes and decisions based on every single bitching and whining you get, then that's YOUR fault for being unable to filter through criticism.
User was warned for this post
author=Versalia
Max fucking begs for it.


Versalia, I don't know you, but I know you're better than that. Don't stoop to that kind of logic. No one 'begs' for it, no matter how much you dislike them. Be a little bigger than you're being right now.
Versalia
must be all that rtp in your diet
1405
author=kumada
author=Versalia
Max fucking begs for it.
Versalia, I don't know you, but I know you're better than that. Don't stoop to that kind of logic. No one 'begs' for it, no matter how much you dislike them. Be a little bigger than you're being right now.


I'm not encouraging senseless attacks. I'm merely pointing out that Max not only leaves himself wide-open to but also encourages a caustic attitude from those giving him any kind of feedback whatsoever, due to his own shitty attitude. This whole blog post is just a cry for attention and pity. GUYS MY FEELINGS ARE HURT HOW DO I MAK SHIT GAM :<
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
Man it's super awesome how this forum doesn't have an ignore user function really glad we got rid of that that was definitely a great decision.

Versalia: go fuck yourself, to death.

There is literally no part of anything you posted that isn't 100% wrong. I can't even be bothered to break down why on a sentence-by-sentence basis for everyone to see. It would take too long.
User was warned for this post
Versalia: saying that you're not doing something and then continuing to do it anyway wasn't what I asked you to do. Kindly go post somewhere else for a bit.

Max: this is getting cyclical. They say something, you say something, they say something, etc. Please go take a breather while this all dies out. No one is doing anything productive here.
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
Kumada I appreciate that you have really the best possible intentions here, and it's actually really sweet (and I don't mean that to sound condescending) but...I have just never been the "turn-the-other-cheek" kind of guy, and I think it's too late in life to change that. I have been...extraordinarily zen like in response or non-response to certain comments certain people have made, just letting it all blow by me but that really couldn't last forever and I am damn tired of not defending myself just because my attackers outnumber me.

For what it's worth, I thought this was actually a civil and even potentially productive conversation and not a flamewar at all before Versalia showed up with his abusive childish bullshit.
I'm not defending you. I'm trying to break this pointless cycle so that I can play a game that I really want to play without a whole bunch of drama stalling its development to death.

There are far more productive things we all could be doing than getting into this exact same argument over and over again.

Thanks to the folks who have listened. If everyone else is dead set on having another pissing match, fine.

Peace out.
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
I'm not defending you. I'm trying to break this pointless cycle so that I can play a game that I really want to play without a whole bunch of drama stalling its development to death.

I got that. It's what I was responding to.

There are far more productive things we all could be doing than getting into this exact same argument over and over again.

I don't even know exactly what argument we're having anymore. I'm not sure it can even be described as an argument. I said that I was sad about the negative feedback the game had gotten and people posted things like "fuck you!" and "you're not allowed to be sad!".

Maybe we could discuss. How do you guys keep working on games when the joy goes out of it?

I do like how literally no one has even attempted to answer the OP question, though. It was actually meant in earnest.

EDIT: Jude did.
Okay, Max. I'll bite.

How do you guys keep working on games when the joy goes out of it?


I sit back and reevaluate everything -- myself, my thought processes, my motivations, and what I want to do with the game. This has happened to me on multiple occasions with the same game, even though I have a wonderful and loving partner (who admittedly does like 99% of the work haha) to talk to about my ~feelings~. I have burnt myself out with over-thinking pity-parties about how I'm just not good enough, or how I wish I could do more to help out. I'm still a huge newb when it comes to RPGMaker itself; I mostly write, do art/tiles, and am here to bounce ideas off of, so sometimes what I can do is pretty limited.

During the times where I got so stressed out that I just worked myself up into a stressball frenzy was usually when I was trying to do art. I definitely still need to work on self-esteem in many departments, and I struggled with the game art and struggled with it until finally I kept putting it off more and more. This, understandably, impacted our game, which just made things worse, because then I felt horribly guilty on top of it. These things smashed heads with my work life, as I was just starting out full-time at my job. And then school came into the mix, and really, at the end of the day, the last thing I wanted to look at or talk about was the game or my shitty art.

Granted, as I said, I have a partner to fall back on and talk to when things get rough, and I eventually broke down and had a good cry (I know, it's silly) and she took over for the art part of the project. It was very, very hard for me to let go of that, because it was one of the only things I could offer up for the game -- and this is where I had to start thinking about where all this stress was coming from and why the hell was I getting so worked up over a project, with my girlfriend of all people, who is so understanding and supportive and it was just all so ridiculous. It did me good to step back, unclench, and let go of things for a bit.

Even if you don't have a partner, I definitely recommend stepping away. Let yourself stop loving your project for a little while (though I see you're already well on your way there, just not in a very...neutral way); it helps so much to be able to look at it more objectively, or to look at it not as something you have to do, but something you want to do on occasion when the desire strikes you. You'll only make things worse if you work on it when you're not feeling it, y'know? I know when I'm upset, I play videogames to feel better. I certainly don't make them.

This being said, I am an artist, you are an artist, and as an artist you really need to have to step back from your creation, your baby, and be able to, if not tear it apart, then to at least see that it is not perfect and will probably never ever be perfect, and will be criticized, constructively or not. Accepting it will cause you so much less stress, even if you just grin and take the criticism and thank the person for their time. You don't have to agree with them, you don't even have to like it, but there is merit in almost every piece of criticism (flamebait and such barred, of course). It's easy to forget that people actually spent time playing and recording their feeling on your game, and cared enough to write about it.

I can only speak for myself here, but I'm much more willing to approach someone with an open mind if they're more positive than negative about criticism. Being positive works wonders, but is hard to master, and it hurts for awhile. It took me years to build up myself to this point, especially with aforementioned low self-esteem.

I have never spoken to you before, and didn't know you before this sordid affair (I'm still very new to RMN, haha, I lurk a little and hide under a rock. My partner's much more active), and I almost wrote a review of your game, myself. I ended up not doing so, for what I hope are rather obvious reasons, and I'm glad I didn't. You definitely don't need another one right now; I know you're still cooling off from the first one you got, and I'd rather not restoke the firepit.

All these tangents aside, think about how you're feeling right now -- pretty down, right? Maybe now's the time to do more research for your game. And by that, I mean do things like playing Skyrim or Terraria, look up Minecraft let's plays, fiddle around with mini-game ideas (it's really strange, I know it is, but when I played your game all I could think about was Pokemon Stadium's mini-games). I know you said you weren't interested in making another version of your mini-game, but surely it couldn't hurt to look and see what other games do. I really, really think this would benefit you in the long run.


Either way, good luck on what you do get up to, and I hope I've helped in some small fashion even though all I've done is basically ramble at you. What can I say? I'm long-winded, haha. OTL
author=Max McGee
Maybe we could discuss. How do you guys keep working on games when the joy goes out of it?

I do like how literally no one has even attempted to answer the OP question, though. It was actually meant in earnest.

I'll bite! I don't have anything of note to say about the other stuff, anyways.

Generally if I'm burned out on one project, I hop to another. Which might sound counterproductive at first but surely there are plenty of other people who do it and know what I mean? I really only work on ONE project, but have no qualms about writing down/thinking about potential future ideas.

If making games in general burns me out, it's a cue to give them a break for a little while. I have other hobbies/things in life to keep me busy, and barring one exception(psy_wombats if you read this IT IS YOU), in general I've only got myself to answer to... so I don't feel bad about stepping back for a breather if I need it. I mean yeah sometimes I work through the "ugh this is terribly unfun make it stop" feelings anyways, but if I want to do anything that requires creativity, it requires some kind of enjoyment or happiness or else I make absolute crap.

I just think a sense of perspective is important to have. Sometimes I remind myself that for me this is a hobby, and primarily I do it because I enjoy it. If I'm not enjoying it, I should find something else to do because I don't need to add "gam mak" to the list of "things in life that cause me significant stress".

EDIT: HOLY CRAP JALEN YOU NEVER POST AND SUDDENLY IT'S THE SAME TOPIC AND WE SAY THE SAME SILLY "I'LL BITE~" GET OUT OF MY HEAD RIGHT THIS INSTANT but I guess you beat me by 8 minutes so I'll get out of your head now OTL
Editedit: Pffft and then you say all these nice things about me and I don't even mention you
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
Jalen, that's funny, my girlfriend handles all of the art too. : )

I see you apparently seem to fall into the small camp that thinks there's something seriously wrong with the gameplay of Journeyman or that it's not fun to play. That's fine. I don't, personally speaking, fall into that camp. So I'm less concerned with "fixing" the game (which I don't believe to be "broke") then I am with staying motivated about completing it when there are a few pretty vocal people who seem to really vehemently dislike it. Besides the obvious reasons, that's discouraging because I know from experience that it makes the people who did like the game less likely to say so, for fear they'll be attacked too. I've seen this happen time and time again. It's nice getting PMs like "I really liked your game, but I didn't want to post anything about it because I was scared to get flamed" but it's certainly not nice being in a community where that kind of thing happens. So I do try, in the little ways that I can, to change that aspect of this community.

The problem with putting the game down even for a moment (to consider any of the things you said) is that I am always completely surrounded with other ideas for projects I want to start, and it's really, really hard not to when I give them the other ideas an opening like that. Not that I haven't already set Journeyman aside to give myself a chance to cool off or whatever. But I don't have anywhere near the discipline that PentagonBuddy does in sticking to one project.

As to the whole topic of criticism and how to give/receive it; that's a big conversation we ALL really need to have some time. But it's too big for this blog post.

Thanks for the (oddly confessional) post though.
Max, it's a little silly to put me into any sort of camp when I said neither of those things. On the contrary, I did have fun with parts of your game! I completely and utterly love games with alchemy and item-collecting and the like; I'm a total sucker for that, and a completionist on top of it, so I get fueled into an item-making bonanza that lasts me ages, haha. OTL Most of the weight on my character in Skyrim comes from mountain flowers and skeever tails.

I do not think there is something seriously wrong with the gameplay of Journeyman, and neither do I think it's not fun at all. I played your game for a good hour and a half before I called it quits, and with the record I've had with RM games, that's a pretty long time. Do I have to be in a camp of HATRED AND MUCK-RAKING AND FECES-TOSSING to leave criticism on your game? Or can I enjoy some things about it, but also mention things I think could use improvement? These aren't mutually exclusive! And in the end, yes, everything is definitely your choice, but it couldn't hurt to also hear some thoughts from your players.

Maybe someday I'll download your newest demo (I played the first one you put out, and I know it's out of date now) and jot down my thoughts, but I'll definitely wait until things have cooled over and you're feeling better; just please don't think I'll be raining doom and gloom all over you! I wouldn't even have to leave it as a review, I could always just toss it your way as a PM.

You could always get those other games out of your system before you try Journeyman again. :) Sometimes it's good for you to do just that! I'm not encouraging dropping it by any means, but if you're burnt out and keep trying to work on it, you're just going to dislike doing it more and more. RMing should never devolve into something you feel...IDK, obligated to do? That's not really the word I'm looking for, but I think you understand.

I agree on your point about criticism -- giving it as just as much of an art as taking it (...haha okay I'm not so immature that I'm laughing at that, I swear), and people have many different ways of expressing it. EITHER WAY YEAH not meant for this blog post.

I get so rambly at the end of the day after work. OTL You're welcome, at any rate! I figured I'd been lurking enough and should probably finally say something.

AND PENTA, gurl, get outta my head, gosh. 8I You're in there enough! AND PSSH DON'T FLATTER YOURSELF WHO SAYS I WAS TALKING ABOUT YOU~
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
I apologize then, I didn't mean to pigeonhole you like that, Jalen.
Take the shit people give you and use it as fertilizer for your flower.
Max I don't know how you do it... You just managed to make this the most used and read blog on RMN. Good Job! Anyway I was not going to try this game for awhile, but I have to now.

I have always loved the games you've made and have the greatest respect for the content you make. So as a fan of yours keep making great games. If you ever need help on a game you know where to pm me!