Hi

I'm F4lloutFan and my real name is Michel... yep I know, "Michel"! Strange name for a guy, but that's the way it is ^^

First of all: Thank You very much for clicking on this devlog (developer log). No, REALLY, I'm dead serious, it means a lot to me.

But why? Well, because this is the first time doing devlogs at all. So yeah, I'm nervous on how you will react, if you'll find it interesting, will it give something to you, did you learn anything, etc. If I can't provide anything to my public, what the point then? That's why this first attempt means the world for me. Thanks for being part of it!

Why did I join a Game Jam?

That's a big chunk. But bare with me, it's important that I talk a little bit about my past to give a proper answer to that question.

Since 2018, my new goal in life was to become an independent game designer/developer. Well... I really WANTED to become one but I struggled to BECOME one. I had a good start to be honest:

- I resigned from my 8 yo job, 3 years ago
- Went then back to school (I was 37 yo at that time) to study "Game Design and Programming" for 2 years
- I successfully got my degree last September

I truly believe that I HAVE the ability to create games. Maybe not great ones, but at least I am able to do so, right? All I need to do is getting started and gain experience, right right???

Well, not really. After graduating, I found myself more lost than ever. All my life, there was always someone to tell me what to do:

- "You have an appointment with a customer at this address. You have to do this and that"
- "Learn these X pages, create this and that and upload it before the deadline"
- "Deliver your project until that date"

... and so on.

After all that, I am still incapable to get things started the way I wanted to. Furthermore, I had collegues and classmate around to work with. Today, I'm on my own.

Well, that sounds depressing, but in reality, it isn't. I simply broke my old habits and needed some time to find new ones.

And here I am, participating in a Game Jam to get committed, participating with other people, showing the world my creation. That's why I joined a Game Jam, to get started with some concrete work, finally getting that valuable experience I need.

In what Game Jam I am participating?

https://itch.io/jam/60-90-jam

Why did I chose this Game Jam

I found it really appealing for 2 reasons:

1) Getting 1 hour of concrete work done every day, for 90 days.

I really like the idea of getting something done in a regular manner. Considering my difficulties to start anything, I couldn't ask for a better Game Jam. 1 hour of work a day, it sound so easy. Yet, no work at all is still not as good as getting that golden work hour done each day. Truly the perfect Game Jam for me.

2) Having to do devlogs

Devlogs on the other hand are a great way to commit myself. I even went voluntarily further: I decided to do VIDEO devlogs to push my commitment even further.

Tools I'm going to use during the Game Jam

To be honest, except the theme and the rules of the Game Jam, I haven't decided yet on the direction I want to take. By the way, the theme is "endurance". I also have to come up with a game idea that will fit a 90 hour total of work, considering all the parts that a game is composed of: mechanics, game/graphic/sound design, controls, UI, user experience,...
Until then, it's also really difficult to talk about what engines and software I will use, will it be 2d, 3d,...? Hardware-wise, I don't think I need more than what I already have:

1) A Windows Computer
2) My iPad for drawing

I also use a 12 yo Apple iMac + iMovie app for video editing. It will not be used for development.

What's planned for the next devlog?

1) I will show you what hardware/software I decided to use and explain why.

2) I need to think about a fitting game.

What I mean by this is that I want to find something that would be realistic to do for the next 90 hours. That part sounds brutally obvious but it is also the trickiest. I technically could use a sheet of paper and write all my fantasies as a game designer and try to make "fun" and "player experience" magically happen.

It's like giving an 8 year old Mario Maker and tell him to build me a level. It'll probably look like this:

...I also think that he had a lot of fun creating such a level, but is it really fun for the player? That's exactly what I need to do: not exaggerating and Keep It Stupid & Simple (KISS). I really think that for a "game jam" game, the core of the game MUST be KISS. Once I have that, I will need to prototype the idea.

3) Create a paper prototype to see if it's still fun and valuable in investing time on it.

For that part, I won't need to program anything, pen and paper indeed works just fine. The goal I want to reach here, is to recreate a situation as a player and see if the game would still take the right direction. You probably noted that I emphasize a lot in the "fun" part and that's right, I really would like the game to be fun. But it does NOT NEED to be like this, I could also try to get the player to feel motivated, like in a die-and-retry game. Or maybe get the player to feel relaxed but not too much... just the right amount.
It's painfully and extremely difficult to get such answers at such an early state, but with such a prototype, even on paper, it could give me the glance I need to decide the direction I would like to take for the next 90 days.

If you are interested about the importance of prototypes and avoid wasting potentially tons of work, time and effort, I encourage you to check out the video of patch quest, right here:

4) I want to create my first "real" devlog.

"Real" as getting right to the subject of developing a game for the game jam I chose. No more big block of text about myself. The only exception, where I think it would become relevant to talk about me again, would be that the progress of the development got influence because of me in any way.

The future of devlogs

I plan on keeping this devlog format for the future:

1) A video devlog, short and concise
2) A text devlog, like the one you are reading right now, lengthy and detailed

Video devlogs and text devlogs are NOT the same BUT treat the exact same subject in 2 different level of depth. Let me explain:

I really hate it when a video gets monotonous, long, boring and/or tedious. To avoid these, I want to get as fast as possible to the best crispy parts, while keeping a certain level of entertainment. Thus, "short and concise".

On the other hand, the text devlogs exist for anyone wishing to get more information. I'll go much deeper into details for anyone that is interested.

Closure:

That's it for the introduction. Thanks a million for getting to the end.

See you soon for the first devlog.

See ya

- F4lloutFan -