why bother being a game dev in 2026? there's so many games already, can (you) do something so special, that it could be worthwhile amongst the giant see of games already out and in development? And I'm not talking about if you could make a living out of it, or not, but if you could make something that's truly artistically special.
>>107810929theres always demand for vidyasloppeople play a game, get bored, buy a new one
>>107810929Are any of the recent indie explosions not artistically special? FNAF? Undertale? I haven't even played these or any of the other indie games but I'm aware of them and can see that they did one thing, or several, right, at the right time. https://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/18i5wmp/what_are_in_your_opinion_the_best_indie_games_in/I would expect the art/memetic impact to be more important than entirely new ideas and mechanics. Or the way you bring old ideas and mechanics together in a novel and fun way.
>>107810997you forget about the slew of indie games that were hip for a moment but now are largely forgotten.like songs of syx, zero sievert, ftl, the list is long>art is the most importantno, its not.look at rimworld, project zomboidhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4KJaDazfeiQ
>>107810997>Are any of the recent indie explosions not artistically special?They are, and that's the point. There's tons of cool stuff being released, tons of older games already, and even commercial tier totally free games. How do (you) manage to contribute meaningfully to the medium? It's getting only harder...
>>107811034(nta)ok then just lie down and let yourself die then.the core element of a good game is a good gameplay loop btwjust look at shit like plants and zombies
>>107811034why should I have to? would you go up to the guy doing woodworking in his garage and ask him how HIS coffee table was artistically special and stands out in a sea of great coffee tables? It doesn’t have to.I can just make the game I want for me. get out of my garage.
>>107811073I had fulltime game devs in mind writing OP. Also the woodworking comparison doesn't work out, because coffee tables are (also) utility commodities, and not purely artistic, like games.
>>107811166when people want a coffee table as an untility object they buy from ikea for 20 bucksnot from a woodworker for 2000
>>107811034Some game genres, like deck builders, have ravenous fan bases that will endlessly look for new titles once they’ve figured out their current one. They don’t need it to be super original, they want a variation on the mechanics they know that will challenge them. Other genres, like horror, are more artistic. Your mechanics are less important, and it’s more about presentation and the story to tell. We’ve not yet come even close to running out of stories to tell.Other games like Factorio, RimWorld or Dwarf Fortress come to rule entire genres, typically due to fantastic modding support, well designed simulation elements, and a lot of freedom for players to create their own challenges. These are a sort of escapism/puzzle for autist types.There’s also more casual puzzler type games like Mini Metro or the Zachtronics games. You can only figure out a puzzle once, so people who enjoy this experience go looking for more games similar, that are new.If anything, I think the game market OP most succinctly captures is AAA. They’re neither innovative in story, nor in mechanics.In short, the game market is only about 30 years old. Thinking we’ve already exhausted the possibilities is a bit silly. For a game to be remembered and considered special, it has to do one of these things, ideally multiple:- Innovate on, create or synthesize fun mechanics- Possess impactful and unique visuals- Tell a story that is either compelling and well written, or is told in a unique and compelling way.All of these things are achievable, and without insane amounts of spending or time. It just requires careful thought, testing and iteration.Oh, and if you’re a mobile developer you just study how to best exploit gambling addicts.
>>107810929For some people it's not about making profit. It's about creating stuff that others might enjoy. FOSS devs and game devs can be similar in that regard
>>107810929Yeah, you probably will never be able to invent a new way to render things like Carmack with the invention of first person shooters, but there are million different ways of innovating in gaming, tons of unexplored generas or ways of making the same idea but perfected. For example we have yet to have a perfect:Survival gamePorn gameCreature building gameRougelike adventure gameRealistic swordfighting gameVR gameActually scary horror gameAnd that’s just from the top of my head, every game in these categories is fundamentally flawed in great way and are just waiting for someone to figure the new way of iterating on that idea that actually works. Maybe it is over programming-wise since building one of these perfected games probably does not require some autistic levels of engine innovation and can already be done with Unreal blueprint/vibe coding, but artistically and game design-wise there are still many possibilities that are both known to be lacking and also unknown.
>>107810929This is sort of a controversial take but you either do something for yourself and most likely nobody else will appreciate it. This option gives you the most freedom but the least recognition for your effort.The other option is that you become sort of a slave to a community of people that you force yourself to love, but who only want to extract value from you and don't really care about you. This will give you recognition but you lose freedom as your community will begin to resent you if you don't give them what they want, regardless of if it is what you also want or not.
>>107810929yes, I'm doing it right now. I can't tell you what it is because you would steal my idea though.
>>107810929You have a point, but you don't realize it applies to all art and all media. It's pointless to make more art of any kind. There's too much of it for any human to even hear about, let alone consume.There's too much of everything on thi planet honestly. Too many things. I vote we cut down the number of things on earth to a manageable number, say one million (this involves reducing total human population to about 100 people since more people is pointless, you'll never meet them).
unfortunaly people are wasting their energy so much>one gorrilion terminals>one gorilllions ides>one gorillions text ediot>one gorillions name the softwaresure it's good to see people trying to do their own things etc but i feel it's just a shame people can't actually just team up with others.Doesn't help that no ones "normal" anymore so you've got skyzo number one who can't get along with tranny number two and autist number three don't want to work with average joe number 4.Just whining i've no solution.The whole lisp community could work on a lisp os and a lisp machine ,i'm pretty sure there's the talent there but they would rather all tinker emacs or do idk what than actually recreating a modern lisp machine and that would be super super awesome.oh well. That's something i liked working with animals ,they just don't create problems for the shake of it.dramas etc.
>>107811166>video games>artYou gave me a good chuckle, mate.
>>107815580>>107811166Video games aren't art, but they have art in them.
>why bother being a game dev in 2026?Because I want to>there's so many games already, can (you) do something so special, that it could be worthwhile amongst the giant see of games already out and in development? And I'm not talking about if you could make a living out of it, or not, but if you could make something that's truly artistically special.It's possible, but only if I put in the effort and do my best
>>107815580I just finished playing through the original Silent Hill 2, that's an artful video game and it's been out for 25 years
>>107810929why bother being a dev at all? AI is replacing you and I think it's great. we went from the 90s and early 2000s with solid software and excellent support to, now, shit development, software full of bugs, broken code, and requiring subscriptions.zooms and millennials couldn't write a hello world script without fucking it up 10 ways to sunday.i am GLAD AI is replacing your incompetent asses. maybe you should have studied your major harder and spent less time in gender studies arguing about what a woman is.
>>107810929fortunately, there is a virtually inexhaustible depth to faggy-ass posts to plumb, as OP has so eloquently demonstrated
>>107810929>waaaaaa muh discoverability>waaaaaa muh no one buys original gamesSchedule I made 140 million+ so far, is made by a single guy and is the most fucking fun I've had in years.Game devs need to stop coping and start roping. Your games keep failing because they're dogshit no one wants.
>>107815926>Tyler Goldstien>$140 so farhmmmmm I wonder how that happened??????
>>107815673>steroid use>apple productslol LMAO ROFLMAO ROFLMFAO
>>107815954Yes every successful indie game ever is because of the jews. Or maybe it's because daddy always crawled into your bed and touched you as a child troon?
>>107816021hi tyler, your game is shit, buy an ad chud
