Forums / Fun! / Creative

Wasn't sure whether to make this topic here or the video games forum.

Was curious about whether or not other people on the site dabble with making their own games.

I don't have any completed projects (because I am fickle and easily distracted) but I'm hoping to lay the ground-work to make an RPG.

I'd love to be able to make my own RPG Maker games, but I'm the type of person who aims too big, and thus abandons everything. I'm also bad at scripting so I can probably never make anything concrete.

I think of lots of stories, but I have no way of finishing any of them. Not as comics, and not as games. I could write a story, but I'm not really a fan of traditional writing (or particularily good at it).

BUT I really loved mapping with RPG Maker. I never made much, since I realized it would never amount to anything, but I had lots of fun nonetheless. I loved making my own maps on games that supported it ever since I was a kid. TES Construction Set and Morrowind were fun to too.

I'm actually in a vocational college for game development (but that doesn't mean I'm any good at it). We've mostly done things with unity, own small projects and ripoffs of other games mostly just for testing purposes

There are more but this is already too many pictures.

Also we and a group are making a forklift simulator type of game right now, it's actually looking pretty good, I currently only have a picture of a model I made for it so take that for what you will

I have made a couple RPG Maker games, but they aren't very good.

Trying to get around to making a fighting game. Normally it would be an enormous amount of work to come up with anything nearing competent working alone, but the programs I'm using make things stupid easy.
A walk cycle that's not done, but I like it anyway:

I also like to work with RPG Maker from time to time

I mean, I've had to make game-like programs for graded projects, but they're all text-based.

I've been trying to get around to finishing the blueprints for a game I've been meaning to make at some point (like when I have sufficient expertise and resources, as well as a working modular story).

I have dozens of shitty game ideas that I have never started working on. Most of them are either one gimmick or core concept without enough meat to make a good game out of, or an overthought brainstorm that is too broad to be realistic and needs to be pared down. Some stuff that I have done:

• A character-based action game. My original plan was to do an RPG, but this came out instead.
  
• A simple iPhone action game called Slingy that was a team project at school. You drag your finger on the phone to launch a ball to collide it with other balls falling down the screen. I think one of the other team members is selling it.
  
• A Pillbox/Gorilla.bas clone that I wrote one summer with the intent to give it to younger kids in a programming for kids class, but I did not finish it and the code quality was such crap that giving it to them would have done them more harm than good. Instead of giving them that mess, I slapped together a clone of a simple moving-objects flash game that had my attention at the time. The kids ignored the code and played the flash game.
  
• A ForkHeads-inspired hentai game parody that I started on back when Sim Date clones were popular on Newgrounds. It is text only and broken.
  
• Way back in the day I made a hexagonal space station map for Doom that I would rate at 0.5 out of 5 stars. Its features included a central engine room with a 32-sided pillar representing the engine core, a medical bay with an inlaid red wall to put a cross on the wall, and a room with a false wall to hide a demon ambush. There was basically nothing else in the whole map. I didn't do a lot of work on it. I lost this a LONG time ago.
  
• Some missions for Hellfighter and Pendulous.

My dad also seemed to want to get into game development but never did. He coded a game from a Choose Your Own Adventure book and added some artwork made with the blocky symbols that the TRS-80 gave you to work with, a predecessor to ANSI art.

I've always wanted to be involved with game development. My technical skills are lacking, but I'm good with language,so I was able to join a small team that was trying to make an indie action RPG. We came up with some interesting ideas, but the project went up in smoke because we were all on different pages. I'd love to try again though.

I'm a developer in training.

My game design teacher was one of the animators/artists who worked on Ultima Online.

I've got no real complete games to my name, but at least he thinks I'm ready for game design work.

I've often wondered whether or not my Novi Dei story would make a good rpg/action adventure game.

But beyond brainstorming, nothing really.

I've dabbled in making RPG Maker games for several years now but have never actually made a full game. Funnily enough, I just bought RPG Maker MV today but haven't decided what game I want to make for it yet.

I have the complete story of 2 different RPG games that I want to make already written plus all the locations and characters that would be in those games. There's only two problems that I'm currently facing involving working on these games:

1. My main RPG Maker engine that I use, VX Ace, crashes on occasion when I add custom music for the game.

2. My actual laziness to work on making the actual game hinders me at times.

I'm hoping RPG Maker MV will help resolves these issues so that I can actually make something playable!

I thought about building off of the work of others, but I've had several people advise me otherwise, so I'm making everything from scratch (mostly because I desperately need the practice/experience.)

Several people have mentioned RPG Maker, which I've never experimented with. How much freedom do you actually have with making RPG Maker games? For instance, if I wanted to implement something like action commands, would that be possible?

For the most part, it is possible but it's generally based on your level of knowledge of coding. If I recall, most RPG Maker engines run on the "Ruby" scripting language (though the newest RPG Maker game, MV, runs on Javascript). If you know how to write code in that scripting language well enough, then implementing something like action commands shouldn't be too difficult.

That's pretty cool then. I'm pretty familiar with coding logic, but I'm awful with languages.

I played a lot of Warioware DIY when I was about 14/15. I didn't know it at the time, but it was teaching me a lot about the logic used to make games.

There is a disgusting lack of arcade racers on PC, and I'm gonna rip off Asphalt 8 and make it free of microtransactions and unfair advantages.

I've played this for quite awhile only to learn the pay-2-win is too strong for any sane human, there's obviously lots of skill involved so I think "what about I remove every bit of what makes this game unfair and just turn it into a competitive donationware game, like DotA 2 with cars?"

Toss in some 90s ａｅｓｔｈｅｔｉｃｓ and Japanese drift culture references and boom, everyone has fun and I'll be penniless in a year.

I'm in college studying games design, looking to continue this in University at the end of the UK academic year. While I have no personal work to show (Due to excessive procrastination but am wanting to try and create games more than play games), I have been working in a group to produce a game in GameMaker Studio. Which is still in the early conceptual phase with a heavy inspiration from Retrowave.

If I do get myself in gear and spent at least half an hour developing, I'd probably start with something small and simple to produce.

Since 'tis the season, I'll suggest that winter break is a good time to start working on a game or teaching yourself programming.

or getting your @#$*ing tools to run…

Wow, that's really weird, I'm also a dev in training, and my head of department and lecturer also worked on Ultima Online (As well as EverQuest and the original Diablo).

I have a Mario Builder engine along with SMBX and Game Maker 8.1 with some Mega Man devkit to make some of my dream games, but I'm a bit lazy and haven't learned to make cut scenes and menus and other advanced stuff.

I did made a choose your own adventure book game on a game story maker website . I'm working on another one, though lack of motivation is what prevents me from doing it.

I did a thing. If you want to make a crafting system where component quality affects the quality of the resulting product and some components can have a greater effect on the output than other components, there are several functions you can use.

I'm currently developing a spiritual successor to Zelda II, found here

It has 3 main dungeons and 95% of the world map completed. It's actually one of the games that got taken down from GameJolt a few months back.

I also made a couple of games back in 2007-2008 on Yoyogames, but the old site shut down so they're gone (for now). If you're bored, here's an old friend doing a boss rush in my Mega Man game

I've tried making a couple RPG maker games and a Gamemaker game. I mostly do sound and music. I helped make this at the 2016 Global Game Jam http://globalgamejam.org/2016/games/inferno-fight

I've always wanted to make a video game, though as an artist i find code to be impossible to work with (like reading moon runes)
Plus i lose motivation after a week or two, shit sucks

Gave it a download just to test it out, and I'm pretty impressed. You do solid work!

I really liked Zelda 2 and always wanted more (and yes, I've played most of the commonly recommended games, including the Adventure Time one.)

Thank you! That means a lot to me :)

I currently have plans of making video games. In fact, i’m already attempting to develop a game! It is a 8-bit 2D NES-inspired platformer about some undead child who must defeat an necromancer who plans to take the souls of everyone, but in order to save others from such fate he must also collect souls to amplify his power. There will be 9 Levels, each includes the protagonist exploring places searching for souls (1 is hidden, the other is recieved by defeating a malevolent nightmarish being ).

I’ll be developing it on a engine called “Stencyl” (which is very, very easy to use for those which rather low skills on programming) and it will be entirely made by myself only, which means I will be creating the characters, designing stages and composing the music, etc.

Here’s some music that I have made for the game:

The overall fun I had with gaming is what made me try to create my own game. I really enjoy playing video games, getting intrigued by the story, characters, fun or uniqueness it may present really makes me smile! And that’s why i’m trying to become a developer and create a fun and likeable experience!

So putting this out there if any you guys are putting together a game and need some music of sounds let me know. I'm trying to make a career out doing that and want to get my name on more projects.

Do you have any samples? I'm not at a point in the project where I'm thinking about that yet, but if I get there I'll keep your name in mind.

Since I was in my late single digits. I've always wanted to be involved in game development. In sophomore year I took a programming course and I wanted to take another this year (Junior). But my schedule was switched around and I wasn't put in it cause there were no openings. So I'll learn on my own.

I'm currently working on a RPG like Undertale but with some stuff inspired by Duke Nukem and stuff. Idk if this the final title but it's called NUK= (the = is suppose to be a hamburger/3 bar symbol)

All i did was
-Concept some shit in my mind
-Make the first room, which is the bedroom of the main character, first thing you spawn in
-Some soundtracks from Mixcraft and some soundfonts

I'm making the game in Clickteam and will hopefully will have a March 2018 release. Or later, depends on dev speed.

Would post the bedroom of the main guy but I'm at my dad's and my main dev folder is at my main house, so ill wait a couple more hours. ;)

Apparently KYM hates editing posts, so instead ill just post it without editing.

The hentai poster thing above the PC is temporary. I'm trying to add some details to his room. Sprites look like shit, but that's because Clickteam loves it like that.

Is it a good idea to watch many analysis, reviews and critiques of video games if I want to make games?

It wouldn't hurt, but don't forget an important thing: make a game that you would enjoy. Cater to yourself before everyone else. That's what I've been doing since 2007 and it's worked so far.

That's more important for game design rather than game creation.

No. Whatever you do, don't start there.

If you want to make games, go hands on. Make games. Being eternally bound by the opinion of self proclaimed professionals won't help you, because all the mistakes made by a game designer aren't unknown to the designer, they are oftentimes made when they are forced to ship their game due to time constraints. Critics aren't game designers, they are consumers.

The only instructions you should be following is from people who have actually made games. And the only learning you should subjugate yourself to is making games for yourself. Trying to learn game design from doing nothing but watching Extra Credits or any other analyst is like thinking you'll become a math expert by skimming a textbook and not doing any of the equations.

Without Application, You will learn NOTHING.

So go make a game. Do it. Doesn't even have to be a video game, it can be a stupid party game involving nothing but plastic cups and spoons. Make up the rules, figure out what materials you will need to play, and make up the winning and losing conditions, then test it to get feedback.

Do that, and working on any other game should come second nature.

Guess it's a generational thing. It's been two decades since that game came out, so I guess both of them turning to teaching can't be coincidence.

I've personally learned a good bit from watching those kinds of videos.

That said, I'm already used to articulating my tastes, and I have established tastes and some experience with making games. My own views on game design are further refined, not initially defined, by these analysis videos.

My personal suggestion would be to not let critiques inform your tastes or opinions.

I may very well find that I'm in contention with what reviewers say about games when I actually get my hands on them, but the expressed values in aspects of gameplay – aspects which one person happens to see in a game, that I just so happen happen to not -- are still values in aspects I agree with according to my tastes, and I can still apply these lessons and articulation I've learned or refined to my game design.

As someone without a lit of money who doesn't play too many video games regularly anymore, I depend on hearsay and gameplay footage to vicariously experience recent releases, or most games in general, new or old. But I have games and hard tastes when it come to game feel, and I write and philosophize about video games, movies, and broader aspects of life regularly, which all share underlying principles that can, and should, be applied to game design.

I wouldn't say start there, but it depends on how you learn and what you're gleaning from watching those videos. If nothing else, well written videos can help articulate game design in the panning stages, making a final vision of the product clear.

Also. Because of the nature of platforms like YouTube, the internet has seen an influx of content created by people who don't know what they're talking about – in more ways than one. I'm picky about people actually having a more-or-less complete grasp of the English language. Super Bunny Hop said "cacophony" as 'Kah-kuh-'foe-knee in his video about every first level in every Sonic game, and I couldn't tell if it was a joke, and I've taken his opinions and odd cadence with grains of salt ever since. He's said other words wrong for sure though and I'm sick of seeing it when it's preventable, specifically with preemptive reading and listening to educated people on talk shows and documentaries.
(Like I say and write stuff wrong too there may bee some typeos in this post but com eon man look up every word above 5th grade level in a dictionary to be safe, as you are writing your script not after, and double check it. You're producing content that hundreds of thousands of people are gonna watch and you go out you're way to be pro in editing so be pro in what I came here for you're speech aaaaaand I'm rambling oops)
Editing this post was a nail biting bitch I sent like half an hour on this