What is your development cycle and how to avoid 'defeat'

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togFox
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What is your development cycle and how to avoid 'defeat'

Post by togFox »

I'm currently stuck in an awkward place where I want to code something but I don't want to code something. I love lua and LOVE and I love coding around problems and achieving goals but I find that every project I start gets about 25% done and then I realise some key mechanic means a significant code change and then I go - "oh - netflix ... " and project dies. It's usually something like I should have used classes differently or 2D tables instead of lists or a state machine that has gone horribly wrong - things I can fix but the level of refactoring, to bring to essentially the same spot (result wise) tends to send me off onto a different distraction.

Conversely, I try to plan out my project as much as I can but of course much is unseen and unknown at the start.

Checking how you guys approach a new project. I suspect, by reading forums, the vast majority of projects don't live up to the initial dream. :(
Current project:
https://togfox.itch.io/backyard-gridiron-manager
American football manager/sim game - build and manage a roster and win season after season
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pgimeno
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Re: What is your development cycle and how to avoid 'defeat'

Post by pgimeno »

A guy who recently completed an 8 year project posted this in a different forum:
https://www.msx.org/forum/msx-talk/deve ... rseverance
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Gunroar:Cannon()
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Re: What is your development cycle and how to avoid 'defeat'

Post by Gunroar:Cannon() »

- Be intrigued by the idea you have for the project. If the idea doesn't intrigue you, then ditch it, or else you won't have enough motivation to pull it off.

-If you don't want to ditch it: Seems like a solid, origional idea but you just can't come to love it as your own child? Then add stuff to it until it starts to intrigue you. If it still can't intrigue you then propally best to think of another idea.

-Does it seem fun to play/is it useful. Like is it, really.
I once had this idea of a game where a bunch of survivors are stranded on/in a closed space(like a boat, or a shelter in a zombie apocalypse), and they do dofferent actions at each turn. The player here just taps on a person and controls the emotions of how they view another person(with points they earned somehow), which would change thier reactions to that person. The premise there was to last as long as possible(until the last survivor died) without having conflicts due to jealousy, craziness, extreme anger at another person, etc and stuff like suicide due to depression of survivors...I liked the premise...though in prototyping soon realised that(at least the way I made it )wasn't that fun to actually play.
Screenshot of the prototype, I called the game "Three's a crowd"
Screenshot of the prototype, I called the game "Three's a crowd"
Screenshot_2021-04-30-08-14-39.png (166.01 KiB) Viewed 7674 times
Why their all saying kak I don't know
Why their all saying kak I don't know
Screenshot_2021-04-30-08-14-56.png (141.58 KiB) Viewed 7674 times
-When it comes to changing systems, I say you push yourself to do it. I like that part of coding, it reminds me of demoliting buildings to make better ones :rofl: . Rip of this whole section then improve it, but the debugging to get it to work right might be frightening. Anyway, once you finish improving that bit you can just claim the exp. points :awesome:

-leave netflix :brows:

-Use the Pokémon move foresight(?) and make sure you can handle everything that may come up in the project(mostly easily, but can be with difficulty, as long as it's possible).

-Imagine the idea as a finished/playable thing and move to that as motivation. I normally draw sketches of how I want final gameplay and concept art, not for planning completely, mostly for fun and motivation.
(When morivation fails all fails :o, but more importantly, what the heck is morivation)

- This my project didn't get completed for two main reasons:
1) I wasn't that intrigued by it
2) I wasn't capable( at least at the time) to do all the stuff there
(3, what,3?) The noise generation made the game run slow, kinda falls under 2

I'm still working on a game that I've been working on for the past 8(?) months and its near completion, just waiting for an opportunity to compile(but for now taking a break from lua to learn java with aide and libgdx)

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Edit: there's also this .
The risk I took was calculated,
but man, am I bad at math.

-How to be saved and born again :huh:
gcmartijn
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Re: What is your development cycle and how to avoid 'defeat'

Post by gcmartijn »

Fun fact, at this time I was thinking. It is Friday I have time to code now.
But first check love2d.org , check internet, watch a documentary. Ow now I don't want to code anymore, its to late now...

I did check the first repo commit date in my project and that is 2019-12-30 (a lot of code). So I guess the project in lua started in 2019-06
But It go a way back, I did use monkey-x before lua, but the creator did stop working on that language. So I guess that the first code is from 2017...

And where i'm now after +/- 2 years working with love2d and lua, at 50% but it is a long way to go. I only have 1 hour a day to work on the project. And I can't create graphics, so I'm only do all those things for creating one 'kickstarter' promo, in the hope to get enough money to complete the game.

What I want to say: Don't stop, take your time and keep the code base as clean and simple. And use a lot of automation (I use many shell scripts) and ldoc to generate documentation (So I know what i was doing after 2 years). And some unit/integration tests. Most of my commits have the name "refactor" but that is oke.

Ow and use a TODO.md so you know what todo ;)

And very important for me is this this friendly forum.
I hope that I can share my creation within 2 years, going to start Visual studio code now (maybe I can write another 5 lines code) :)
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Gunroar:Cannon()
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Re: What is your development cycle and how to avoid 'defeat'

Post by Gunroar:Cannon() »

gcmartijn wrote: Fri Apr 30, 2021 6:32 pm Ow (*oh?)and use a TODO.md so you know what todo ;)
Definitely. :rofl:

Also start your prototype as soon as possible. It will encourage you to continue on the project and allow you to check whether it's worthwhile for you.
The risk I took was calculated,
but man, am I bad at math.

-How to be saved and born again :huh:
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togFox
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Re: What is your development cycle and how to avoid 'defeat'

Post by togFox »

Very useful tips and I read that blog from someone that has been there. Thanks all. :) After reading that I went back to a project that I promised would update and never did and released a new version feeling all motivaty. :)
Current project:
https://togfox.itch.io/backyard-gridiron-manager
American football manager/sim game - build and manage a roster and win season after season
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Xii
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Re: What is your development cycle and how to avoid 'defeat'

Post by Xii »

Work has to be the first thing you do when you wake up.

The instant you watch a video or play a game you'll do nothing else all day.

Try doing a little work every day. Make it a habit. Then start pushing the length and scope up.
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4vZEROv
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Re: What is your development cycle and how to avoid 'defeat'

Post by 4vZEROv »

One thing that keep me motivated is following inspiring people that progress on their respective projects.

Like Jonatan Blow who create a programming language (https://www.twitch.tv/j_blow) and Andreas Kling who create an OS (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3ts8c ... Zw9JSD3pqQ).
Xii wrote: Sun May 02, 2021 2:34 pm Work has to be the first thing you do when you wake up.
What a nice way to burn out !
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Xii
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Re: What is your development cycle and how to avoid 'defeat'

Post by Xii »

4vZEROv wrote: Sun May 02, 2021 5:22 pm What a nice way to burn out !
Can you expand on this? Why would that lead to burnout?
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Gunroar:Cannon()
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Re: What is your development cycle and how to avoid 'defeat'

Post by Gunroar:Cannon() »

Maybe 4vzerov thinks you mean, like, hours of work or something. The tip makes sense, just do something like a small fix to this file, or an addition to that file
...
...
Or maybe 4vZerov is laz- I mean has a different productivity style :)
The risk I took was calculated,
but man, am I bad at math.

-How to be saved and born again :huh:
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