Lately I’ve been having a go at making a video game, and it is really fun!  I have had a few attempts in the past, but I’ve always fallen down because of the sheer scale of every project I attempt, or the realisation that I’m really bad at graphics, but every time I get a little bit further, and I’m really pleased with how Spacegame is going so far.

What’s nice about this project is that I’ve decided to make it, at least initially, just for me.  I know that games are hard to make, and even harder to make fun, so I’ve decided to just work on the bits that I enjoy and leave the rest for later.  For example, I can’t draw, so the graphics are all 2-minute efforts, and I started out writing a multiplayer game, to learn about it, but now I’m focussing on making it a fun single player game, so I can play it on my own.  By only working on things I like, it’s kept the project interesting, and I haven’t given up on it yet.  It’s actually my longest running project on Github now, clocking in at 15 weeks in total.

Games as indie projects have gone through a bit of a revival lately, which has been fantastic: before Quake, a game mod was a feasible one-man project, but the advent of Quake’s quality 3D modelling and sound effects meant that it was very time-consuming to create a good-looking, playable extension to an existing game.  Around that time, I gave up on the idea of ever being able to write games, but lately, indie development is coming back and 2D is becoming popular again.  The tools are also improving, and suddenly it seems like making a small game is achievable, and that’s really good for the industry.  These days, I spend more time playing budget games than I do triple-A titles, because I get a lot more hours of gameplay for my money.  It feels, now, like if I were to put enough time into it, I could come up with something that could at least get some players, and that’s encouraging to know.  The distribution channels are there, too, for people who are willing to put the marketing time in - the one-man game studio is a possibility.

Spacegame is not yet very playable, but if you know how to run ruby source code and feel like giving it a go, the source is available here.