What's the longest part of developing video games?

[PhoenixX92]

Title.
What do you all think is the most time consuming? Personally, I think it's the artwork that takes the most time out of the process(and I'm no artist, I can't even draw stick figures with the help of the line tool on MS Paint, lol...) I've just watched some people work and based my opinion off of that.


What do the forums think? What's the most time consuming part of the development process?

 

[Kes]

This is going to be specific for every single person, because each one will have different strengths and weakness, will be developing games with differing requirements, will involve e.g. writing your own plugins/scripts or using other peoples, and so on.  One person will spend forever mapping, while someone else will bat through it.  Someone developing a game with 200+ maps will spend a much bigger percentage of time on that aspect than someone who has only 80.  Someone with 9 playable characters will spend more time working out skills than someone who has a total of 4.


Speaking personally, I'm working on my 4th released game, and what has taken the most time has changed for every game.

 

[_Shadow_]

Procastination period.

 

[PhoenixX92]

This is going to be specific for every single person, because each one will have different strengths and weakness, will be developing games with differing requirements, will involve e.g. writing your own plugins/scripts or using other peoples, and so on.  One person will spend forever mapping, while someone else will bat through it.


Speaking personally, I'm working on my 4th released game, and what has taken the most time has changed for every game.

Very good points. Everybody has strengths.

 

Procastination period.

I like this one. lol.

 

[boyflea]

If the engine exists, like RPG Maker does, then that's a big consideration out of the way: artwork is by far the most up-front commitment, but testing at the end is also a large consideration.


If a project has a clear goal, it can be quick to achieve - but really, no project ever ends up as you plan it: and that's probably where the most fun is.


Anyway, if artwork is a problem for you, perhaps source some of the fine work available all over the internet and give clear credit: people love to collaborate more than you may think, and you'd be amazed how sharing ideas makes even better games all round.


Sorry if this is just obvious: I'm painfully new here

 

[Hudell]

Depends on the game project. In my case the most time consuming part is writing.

 

[PhoenixX92]

If the engine exists, like RPG Maker does, then that's a big consideration out of the way: artwork is by far the most up-front commitment, but testing at the end is also a large consideration.


If a project has a clear goal, it can be quick to achieve - but really, no project ever ends up as you plan it: and that's probably where the most fun is.


Anyway, if artwork is a problem for you, perhaps source some of the fine work available all over the internet and give clear credit: people love to collaborate more than you may think, and you'd be amazed how sharing ideas makes even better games all round.


Sorry if this is just obvious: I'm painfully new here

I have a friend who's incredibly great at traditional artwork, but he's terrible when it comes to digital.

Depends on the game project. In my case the most time consuming part is writing.

When you're writing yours, do you write it out like a screenplay or?

 

[Kyuukon]

I'd say the longest and boring part is eventing+testing. The most "mind" consuming part is where you have to think like writing/mapping/art (also the most fun lol). But like they said above, I think that varies from person to person and also when you become better at certain areas. I'd like to believe I'm pretty balanced overall.

 

[boyflea]

I have a friend who's incredibly great at traditional artwork, but he's terrible when it comes to digital.

May not be a bad thing: if you can find a way to import it, for example - you may have some nice backdrops to battles and so on.


There's no such thing as one way to do anything and you may find sometimes compromising how you 'should' do artwork can create something really unique (or terrible, but hey everything is worth a shot right?). 


I would say go and experiment: create a small prototype level and then showcase it to gauge feedback, if you are unsure. (Has worked for me before anyway.  )

 

[boyflea]

I'd say the longest part is eventing+testing. The most consuming part is where you have to think like writing/mapping/art.

Depends on the game project. In my case the most time consuming part is writing.

and on writing...


how much do you guys plan ahead when writing? is a lot of it already in your head before you open up the program?


for me, writing can be incredibly fun to do: so many projects have grown for me by just 'adding stuff' - but I do tend to go on: I always need to remind myself that action comes first, story second. What do you think?

 

[kovak]

I'd say that this is up to the human factor, though i still think that the shortest one would be the game design itself.


Art can delay, programming can delay, even debugging can delay...

 

[Kyuukon]

and on writing...


how much do you guys plan ahead when writing? is a lot of it already in your head before you open up the program?


for me, writing can be incredibly fun to do: so many projects have grown for me by just 'adding stuff' - but I do tend to go on: I always need to remind myself that action comes first, story second. What do you think?

Personally, I first write the entire story like a screenplay (in Word or Twine) and then do the mapping and for last eventing. Having all maps completed helps a lot in picturing the direction the eventing is going to take. Finally, when I'm eventing there are lots of times I end up adding to the writing and even changing the maps a bit. It's not a waterfall process but rather kinda like a tower where you have to go up and down all the time lol. Very fun too!

 

[boyflea]

Personally, I first write the entire story like a screenplay (in Word or Twine) and then do the mapping and for last eventing. Having all maps completed helps a lot in picturing the direction the eventing is going to take. ...

I've seen Twine and was curious about it: I agree you should have a strong idea - but I lack the discipline to stick to the story, so yeah: it deviates a lot quite quickly. I'll look intoTwine, that's a good recommendation, cheers.

 

[Milennin]

For me, I think it's testing. Every time I make something, I test it to see how it goes. Every time I change something, I test to see if I like the changes. Despite that, I still never have enough time to test every little thing or possible outcome.

 

[Hudell]

and on writing...


how much do you guys plan ahead when writing? is a lot of it already in your head before you open up the program?


for me, writing can be incredibly fun to do: so many projects have grown for me by just 'adding stuff' - but I do tend to go on: I always need to remind myself that action comes first, story second. What do you think?

I have in my mind a general idea of what I want the story of each character to be. I write a little bit of each character at a time so that I can keep new ideas coming for the existing stories.


My game isn't linear and you can follow just the stories you like, so maybe that won't work for every game.


I usually create draft cutscenes and conversations, then I play them on the game and constantly change them until I think they are good. Sometimes I keep changing the same cutscene for weeks.


I write everything on a text editor (I made a parser so my game converts the text files into common events automatically). This is how it looks:

Spoiler

http://imgur.com/a/VCQVF

 

[PhoenixX92]

I have in my mind a general idea of what I want the story of each character to be. I write a little bit of each character at a time so that I can keep new ideas coming for the existing stories.


My game isn't linear and you can follow just the stories you like, so maybe that won't work for every game.


I usually create draft cutscenes and conversations, then I play them on the game and constantly change them until I think they are good. Sometimes I keep changing the same cutscene for weeks.


I write everything on a text editor (I made a parser so my game converts the text files into common events automatically). This is how it looks:

Spoiler

http://imgur.com/a/VCQVF

That is absolutely brilliant. I never thought of that before. I use Notepad++ to write quests for Modern Algebra's quest journal, myself. But mine's simply copying and pasting into the scripts. How do you get your text editor to convert them into common events? That's seriously the coolest thing I've ever heard.


P.S.
I love the HUD you have, I use a modified version of it myself, too.

 

[Sharm]

boyflea, please avoid double posting, as it is against the forum rules. You can review our forum rules here. Thank you.


The longest part is most certainly the "almost done" phase.  It always takes way more time than you think it should too.  You think you're just about done but in trying to get it all wrapped up you find bugs or last minute things that need doing and it's all tiny stuff but they add up really quickly.  It drives me crazy.

 

[Vox Novus]

I think this is slightly dependant on the type of project you are doing to. A short game where you are making a lot of custom art might see that take up much of the time. While a much longer game might have more time spent databasing, eventing and mapping.


On a personal level im a bit of a slow artist when it comes to drawing stuff up. I also usually take a bit of time on my maps. I tend to also slow down my development speed when nearly done with a project so that last bit of stuff takes much longer than it should otherwise.

 

[Celianna]

For me, the preparation of the game. I like to organize everything, so before I even begin to work on my game, I have to be sure to save a slot of variables/switches/common events for their appropriate events - because you cannot 'move' them once you've named them, and started using them in an event. Right now there's 0 minutes of gameplay in my project, but I've already reserved over 150 common events, 100 variables and a bunch of switches.


Then, I have to finish the writing before I enter it in RPG Maker.


I also don't like placeholder art, so I have to make the art first as well...


Basically, I have to do a lot of prep work before I start the actual game making work ... for me, that's what takes the longest.

 

[EternalShadow]

Debugging @_@