The Hardest Part...(for me)

I have been practicing, and practicing my knowledge of Actionscript for 2 straight years. I started with AS2, and have gone to AS3. I have got to the point where I want to make something worth it, not just something that gets me 150 views and stays with the forever holding rating of “under judgement.” I want to make a game, that is fun, addicting, and honestly, the best accomplishment I can do.

I have created many “games” the passed couple years, some that were for practice, some that I wanted to publish online and get a sponsorship for. But when it gets that point where you want that sponsorship, where you want to put it online, you get minimum, none, or negative feedback(which is okay). I have noticed the passed year, that what I need to do, is get better graphics, and cleaner animation. I am HORRIBLE at drawing anything, for example, my circle looks like an egg….

What do you do if you want help, you go to some “collaborations” forum and look for it. But how many times, have you seen, a good-looking, grade A game come out of these collaborations? If you ask me, I haven’t seen one(maybe I’m on at the wrong times?!). Several times, I have posted “Looking for Artist”. And luckily. I always get a reply. When I first tried posting in the Collabs, and someone posted almost instantly, I was very excited! I was like “WaHOOO! I’m going to make a game!!!” But then… It fails or it doesn’t come to that point… Because many reasons:
1) They suck, they were just another troll.
2) You hear from them once then it is over.
3) Nobody replies to your thread.
4) They think you are not going to actually do it, because of the fakers proposing BS.
5) They have never heard of you, or seen anything great from you yet.

I get a lot of trolls, a lot of one replies then quit, or nobody replies. I believe the nobody replying part is because I don’t have a high reputation. Well how do you gain a reputation, if you can’t show that you can do the stuff, if you don’t hav anyone helping. Everybody has to start somewhere, one problem… Where do you start?

So the hardest part for me, is the help, the team, the reputation. If nobody is willing to work with you, what are you to do?

I, personally, got super lucky. If you’ve read Falling Debris successful collab sticky then that is the start of my luck. I initially ended up ‘mentoring’ the programmer and artist to make a game (despite not knowing much about it myself). The game turned out really really good for a first collab. They enjoyed making games (both DavidArcila and Kreg) and offered me a spot on the team, which I accepted. I was to be a backup/secondary programmer writing a lot of the effects and special stuff for the game while Kreg did the main brute work. Eventually Kreg had life and I got promoted to the main programmer on the team. (This is when the team became Profusion). We invited BraydenBlack onto the team for a short bit but life called as well for him.

A team isn’t everything. It is very restricting in some senses and very allowing in others. I can’t make any game I want to, or make games at my own pace. My team, as a group, regulates what games we want to make and when we have to have them done by. A lot of our ideas didn’t start off well at all. They were OK games but not great. But I did now have an amazing artist. So in return for his services, he got 50% of all revenue and he got the first say in the game idea.

If you have a hard time getting into a team, build up your reputation. Write code that people use besides yourself. Write great games. (Great doesn’t mean big or hard) Make yourself noticed. Then you can contact other people yourself to get into a collaboration. Contacting people yourself will let you choose who you want to collab with and let you know a good estimation of their skill. After a collab maybe you can ask if they want to start a team up. Go from there.

You have to take in account that most people that post here are players. Some NOT all are people that post are just people that have been told they are good from family so then they decide to take on a game but then fail afterwards. I am currently am working on a collab here with a couple of guys. If you want to view the pictures or follow the development of the game you can go here https://www.facebook.com/Austrania
I would agree I dont see many things from the collab section be of great quality. On the other hand the GDR has alot of collabs that people pickup and meet others in the chat for GiTD (think its Game In Three Days) .

I have read many posts in collabs that had completely unrealistic expectations. I’m not just talking about the ideas guys and the “Let’s make a MMO” threads (or worse, the idea guys who want to make a MMO!), but also people with a barely sketched idea who are looking for a group to take them by the hand and guide them along. Programmers who don’t have a working prototype, artists without a portfolio, that kind of stuff. The forum is called ‘collaborations’, not ‘tutorials’, ‘mentoring’, or ‘teat to suckle on’. For this reason, I have never asked for help in collabs. I will, one day, because I cannot make professional-looking graphics and I know it. But when I do post a thread, it will contain the following sentence: “The game is entirely coded and functional, and only needs your art to be complete.” And while the artist is re-making my crappy graphics into something worthwhile, I’ll be working on my next game.

You need to put forward whatever it is you are bringing to the table and, if what you’re bringing is of no value, refrain from speaking until you are ready. Otherwise you’re just wasting everyone’s time, yours included.