If you're not uncertain during your development, something is terribly wrong.

We should be uncertain, because if we're not, we're not properly framing the potential pitfalls that will destroy our projects in the future.

Early on, your uncertainty should be: "Am I even good at this gamedev thing to begin with?" Do you have the pain tolerance to polish systems to an acceptable state? Do you have the honesty to be able to tell systems that aren't as fun as they need to be should be gutted? Are you able to value your talent and coworkers with this same honesty, holding them to equal standards so the product can reach the highest quality possible? There are entirely too many people in this industry who are simply not good at making games, or aren't having their feet held to the fire enough to grow into their potential. I don't care if this offends anyone, it's the truth. And not speaking to this core issue has destroyed our industry.

Maybe I'm crazy, but I feel like we've become semi competent game developers in these parts, I think we have created several systems that are knocking on the door of being fun. I am no longer uncertain of my abilities, I know i'm ok enough at code and Unity to get things online eventually. It may take me longer than coders who have spent their entire lives doing this, but I like to believe I have a knack for fun, and in the long run, THAT'S THE SEACRIT SAUCE!

So I found myself being uncertain again, and there are two ways you can go about uncertainty, you can ignore it, push forward with your current plans and hope things work out!

Or you can analyze why you're uncertain, regroup, and come back more confident in your plans and excited to work on the project in a way that's going to yield tangible benefits. (If you can't tell, this is the smarter option)

This all goes back to why the big studios have failed so utterly spectacularly in the past several years. The less you understand your industry, the more incompetent you are, the more you just assume other people know what they're doing, and you don't have to be concerend yourself. You end up with entire empires of people who have no stake in the project and they build up others who have their backs, because at the end of the day companies are not filled to the brim with people who want to produce a better product, they're full of us humanoid monkeys who just want to be surrounded by friends, given free cookies, and will believe whatever nonesense emboldens us to live our best lives.

Oh what a joy it must be to be carefree, collecting fat paychecks and busying yourself all day long with trivial nothings, having no breath on your neck to have to execute at a high level and product a quality game.

Oh well, we have something different in these parts. We have purpose, we have ambition. And though it's trying year after year, it's exciting to think we may eventually beat the odds and produce a great game.

So back to the topic at hand... what are we concerned about?

I have spent so much time creating an upgrade system, and after an initial implementation i'm not finding it to be a great experience to kill enemies and recieve these bonuses. As it stands a fish will spawn with colored eyes and it will drop an orb. You collect that orb and it will say something like "+HEALTHY". Something about this orb just doesn't fit, and I'm not sure the player is going to understand that certain fish give certain bonuses when you kill them. I need to play the game a bit more and come up with ideas.

Anyway, we're getting into the weeds too much. Point of this blog was more to talk about the mechanics of these problems and how most studios are unable to solve them because their employees are so detatched from core problems, and they inevitably end up sailing years on end doubling down on poorly planned features and gameplay. This blog is an admissoin that our gameplay systems aren't working as well as I had hoped and I need to spend some time coming up with ideas to convey what is actually going on better. Or it could simply be that the visuals suck! I'm JUST ONE DUDE WEARING ALL THE DAMNED HATS, good god I gotta do particles, materials, shaders, code, gameplay, EVERY DAMNED THING UNDER THE SUN TODAY JUST TO MAKE AN INCH OF PROGRESS.

But i'm not bitter that these large incompetent teams of back scratching smarm Fooks have all the money and resources, not in the slightest.

ANYWAY!

Gonna take a nice long bath and think these things over after I do a little playing of the game. MY LIFE IS SO DAMNED HARD HOW IS ONE TO SURVIVE THESE CONDITIONS!?

I'm also totally analyzing some code logic I want to add for spawning zone specific treasure chests as opposed to making exorbitant ammounts of prefabs just so that shops have the specific item I want in them in area to area. I realize none of this technobabble is going to make any sense to this non existent audience. Such is life as the modern indie dev in this increasingly stupid and self absorbed indie machine that extends support and platform for all the wrong reasons. Short term goal: Come up with a solid plan we are confident in that will bring together all this hard work and make the game genuinely better. Beyond that, get to usin' up the remaining elbow grease.

Deep breath. We're gonna try to make the game better today. Can't get too uncertain about things. Focus on the constant: get solid work done, make the game better. And f*ck this stupid, d8mb sh*t world.

The game doesn't have to be perfect, it just has to be better than the dog wash produced by the posers and gaslighters.