Indie-Resource.com

I try to read through a lot of the forum. I have not been able to read through it all yet.

I have not seen the place to post something I would like to ask. "What made you decide that you wanted to get into game development"?

I would have more questions. Was it was a game you played that lead you in that direction? Was it something in school that you just wanted to learn? I want to know what drives you to learn and keep learning and working on making games.

I think this would be good for the pros and the noobs to all discuss. Maybe there is a place for it already that I have missed.

I would like to hear members stories and give mine too.

Thanks
Hutch

This is a good discussion.

What made me decide to make video games was me just being another kid who always says "I will make video games when I'm older". But the best part of all is that the person who helped me realize many many things about game development was actually Halls, he was the first person I worked for on a game and so far has been the last. I'm nervous that any other 'bosses' for game development won't be nearly the same. I remember, I went to 'apply' to work on Apoc Online (when I look back I'm not very impressed) and failed miserably because I had never done 3D art before then. I then heard from halls via a PM when he said that he was starting a project (Forsaken Sanctum) and if I wanted I could join. I happily accepted with eagerness. I started making just awful models but Halls just kept saying 'nice work, well done, improve here, really like this' always that format of compliments, that is truely what had kept me interested in 3D art, and although it has been 3 to 4 years since I've started, I took a long period of a break and came back older and for some reason already better at 3D modelling. I think it was the constant encouragement from Halls that had made me the modeller I am today with the passion I have today. The only time I will join another team (as it stands right now) is if there is a little money in it for me

What drives me to keep learning is I have alot of passion for this, I have learned that passion for a game is really necesary ( I learned that from halls as well). This (sadly) is one of the longest commitments I've been in. I love making my 3D art, I love perfecting my 3D art. I love video games, I love to learn things for this. It is just something in me that loves creating something from nothing and then making that something into something spectacular. I feel that I am missing alot of story but this is the sumed up version of my game creation life.

I started trying to make games based on the understanding that women love people good with computers...

No but really I started because I was always working on something with the computer anyway and programming just seemed to be a good fit. Once I started I didn't want to stop and the past few years have been a lot of fun. Learning new languages or libraries and techniques is a ton of fun for me.

For me it started with the PlayStation. I loved playing video games, it was nearly the only thing I did in my free time. In 5th grade my dad found GameMaker and bought me the Pro version. Once I started using that I really got into the actual making of games. Once I got bored of that I searched all over the internet for other free programs to make games. I did find a couple good ones (RPG Maker XP and Legendary Tales), but I never made anything from them. In sixth grade one of my friends became interested in making an MMO (because of WoW ) and he got me interested in it too. We were going to use TGE, but found it too difficult for us at the time. During some searching I found Realm Crafter. Once I bought a license (the website looked like this) we tried making a game. Nothing ever got made, but everything I learned from that attempt and the years on the RC forum taught me a lot.

So in 2007 I bought TGE in an attempt to make regular games after mostly giving up on MMOs. Didn't go so well. One year later I tried my luck again and bought TGEA, and later TGB. TGEA failed, TGB allowed me to make basic, but fun games. Now I am looking at getting Unity, and use Construct for 2D games.

Played video games since I was 5, been trying to make games since I was 10. Really been fun doing so, and I hope to actually finish a decent game within the next year. Gonna be difficult with high school (freshman year too), but I'm hoping it'll turn out well in the end.


That's a rough idea of my past game development related stuff. I still can't believe all that happened in only 4 years

Thanks for the replies.

I started playing games when Pong was out. I love that game. My parents ended up buying a Intellivision. Wow I thought that was the coolest thing. I had friends with Atari so got to play that too some. I went through the first nintendos, playstations. As a kid I wanted to play outside more though. I own the xbox 360 now.

My paerents did buy a TRS80 when I was real young. I remember having a book that told you how to do some visual creations. I played with it for a little bit and made a few. I was still young and would have rather been out riding my bike.

My first computer was in 2000, a piece of crap laptop with windows me, paid 2k for that crap. Played a few software games and browsed the internet with dialup. I then bought a desktop that had windows xp. I was pretty interested in learning about the computer and the hardware.

I didn't really start playing online games till about 2007. I started playing one game then that really caught my attention. I still play it. The first year I just had fun playing. Then I thought that I would like to have a game like this. I wasn't to driven to do it at that time. Another year later and I thought that I could learn this. That is where I am today. I started googling and ran onto a video tut by Halls on youtube.

I have played with html using frontpage for a while. I am no expert at that but I think I am ok.

I am so new and have so much to learn. I am grateful for this site and all of you that are helping.

For me it all started with the MMORPG Exanimus.

Exanimus was going to be a zombie survival mmorpg, the developers gave it an appearance of it being developed by professionals and sparingly gave out information also in a professional fashion.

It had a large community of some couple hundred active members. As well as a high registered member count. The clans were active and would deal with each other in regards to politics and such.

It really was a unique place that i have never seen formed in a similar fashion. (community wise) i loved the place and must have speant hundreds of hours logged in on the forums. I had my own clan, a group of 15 members, 10 or so were heavily active. I was so invested into this game. I knew that without a doubt, that i was going to play it the second i was released. It was my literal dream game. But then things turned for the worse, dev's posted less and less, rumors of drama in the team began to appear, people began to realize that these "professionals" certainly were not that "professional". The trolls let out their furry, (i was even connected to some of the groups, although i never did any of the trolling myself (except to one member, but thats a different story), luckily i have recently completly severed my ties to these trolls.)

Last Octoboer Exanimus was officaly put on hold, the hold was based on the economy, but we, the community still dont know really if Exanimus had any significant chance to make it anywhere to begin with. Although we had seen concept art, we were never shown any sort of screen shot (then again Exanimus has been critiqued many times saying that the devs should have waited before releasing information to the public about the games creation to begin with).

The site became literally locked, i left looking for a replacement game, but couldnt ever find one that really was like it.

So i said....

**** this, im not letting this stop me!

And.... Now im here, with Z-Day (and some other surprises).

Sorry, for my ramble, Exani had a special place in my gamer heart and soul.