Hello,

I hope your year is off to a good start. 

Did you notice that we’re already about 3.5% into 2020? 

Think about all the things you’ve done since New Year’s Eve. 

You only have 27 times that before the year is over.

Kinda crazy to think about.

Anyway, here are this week’s ideas.

3 Gamedev Ideas

I.

When doing something every day, you don’t really notice your progress. 

But compare your current work to what you were doing a year ago and you’ll see how much you’ve improved. 

That became really clear to me when I redesigned a bunch of enemies I had made when first starting out.

It’s always a good thing to look at when you feel like you’re just treading water.

II.

Code for humans first and for computers second.

For example, I’d say reusing the same variable in multiple functions in order to save a memory spot is generally a bad idea. 

The time you’ll waste trying to figure out a weird bug as a result of that is not worth the abysmal optimization it represents.

III.

Should you get a job or try to make it as an indie? There are a lot of factors at play. 

Here’s one thing to consider: indie gamedev is basically an investment.

You have to put in a lot of effort for months or years before seeing any tangible result. And these results might never come at all.

Contrast that with having a normal salary job. You put in effort and get the rewards almost instantly in the form of a monthly paycheck.

If you choose to go indie full time and you have no prior experience in gamedev, I’d say you should not expect to make any revenue from your games in the first 6-12 months.

There are a lot more things I want to say about this and nuances I want to make. But I’ll leave it there for this email.

Until next week,

Thomas Gervraud,
Developer of Space Gladiators: Escaping Tartarus