How to Stay MOTIVATED as an INDIE GAME DEV (& finish your games) - 12 Tips and Tricks

Thank you for making this video. I was grinding out a game for 5 months and then completely lost motivation despite the fact that I made a lot of ground. Starting to regain my motivation though and this video was very inspiring.

"Make a game that YOU want to play!"

A very valid point especially when you are starting out!

what helps me a lot is watching videos of other people making a similar game to what your making, for me its dani.

This is the most wholesome gamedev advice videos. I was shocked you didn't have more subs. I am definetily subbing, I love seeing your passion.

Procrastination is really hard to deal with, but two tricks I learnt watching a DrK video I think, is:
-To set up a 5 minute work on the task that is blocking you or not fun to do. Tell yourself, use your phone to count it, that you will work on it for 5 min. Chances are, if you start doing the task, you will be able to continue on it, far past the initial 5 min. If not, than consider the second thing
-Check if the task is explicit enough and if not cut it and plan for it. Let's say you want to come up with a grid based system for damage or something of the sort. If you try to start that as is, you will fail or procrastinate on it, because it's too vast and most importantly, it's to blurry. You need to right down the little details and larger concepts and you'll often realize that it's actually not one, but several tasks that you were trying to do

Another thing that I made for myself: prepare a board (digital or real) of all the tings to do in the game, and try to alternate tasks you find boring, and task you find fun. I have Miro board, where I have pink for art things, yellow for UI, green for coding and since art is my forte, I try to not tackle every art part up front. If programming and documentation scavenging is your thing, than don't do it all the time, try to throw a couple of animation and art searching/implementation in between the big coding sessions. Or if it's the other way round; tackle one programming goal in between creating fun characters or animating things. That way, you don't end up having to do only the "boring" (to you) stuff.

OMG your game looks amazing, it's exactly the type of game that I would love to make when I good enough at making games (I just started learning a couple of weeks ago) wish you the best

Decades ago in the hand-drawn animation industry there was a saying: "Making an animated film is like eating a mountain with a spoon. The trick is to never stop and step back to see how much is left to eat."

Great video! All the best with your game!

I'm a 16 year old college student who is studying Games, Media and Photography (Minus the Photography part, I'm a level 1). Ever since I started doing the Games part of my course, I've been frustrated, annoyed and completely unmotivated to even do it. Coding is one of the hardest things I've had to do and I don't think I've even got it through my head on how to do it.

However, my tutor put your video on for the class and I thought to myself "Huh, well Games Development isn't so bad after all. I could maybe make a horror game in the future."

The only reason I joined this course was solely for the reason to learn how to do professional cinematography (if you look at my channel, you'll see why. Acting, creating videos and scripting storylines is a huge part of my life right now) and not for the games.

But as I've progressed through this course and seen this video, I've felt a lot better and actually MORE motivated to do it. Picking a new skill alongside film-making could be very helpful to me and I'm grateful your video exists. Every time I saw that I had Games up on my schedule, I'd be so annoyed. It got to a point where I considered leaving the course and doing something else just to escape it.

But again, your video has helped me see that it isn't gonna be easy at first, you just have to keep doing it, eventually get better, and everything else you said in the video. Now, I actually WANT to make games.

I just wanna say thanks for indirectly helping me find my place in Game Development. I'm gonna subscribe to you.

Thanks, man.

Thank you for making this video! I needed a little pick me up! It is cool to see other devs stuff to keep inspired!

Loved the video and thought I'd share what I've been doing to help me make progress on my game (these things aren't very different from what's listed in the video but this is what I do). I'm making a 2D procedurally generated dungeon crawler inspired by the first Legend of Zelda. Some things I'm doing to help me stay motivated and make consistent progress are streaming development on Twitch, using evenings to relax and watch anime, and keeping a checklist containing new feature ideas and tasks that need to be completed. Streaming on Twitch keeps me on task and helps me get feedback in real-time. Relaxing in the evenings is to help my brain recover after working all day (for context I'm currently taking a semester off and working on the game full-time). Finally, keeping the checklist helps me decide what to do next while also showing how much progress I've made.

Man.. I've been down lately for my game cuz i don't know what to add or do in my own game, but your video make me feel motivated again, couldn't come to my mind for me to start small and treat myself part to keep me motivated for my game. Enjoy your motivation, you just gain a sub

the only reason i keep giving up and coming back is that while implementing the simplest concept i need to write a 5000 characters script.

You can make a side game similar to your original game , then join the two games together

Have taken a spooky step into full on game development since graduating this month, this video is exactly what I needed to help keep myself in line.
Huge props to ya!

A great video but the way
for me the best thing was buying white board that fills a whole wall and write every ideait helped me plan and when I finish something and erase it believe me it for some reason feels awesome and it cost me 8$ but it was the single best investment
I heard gametoolkit says you should buy one even if it was small then mrbeast showed his white board room and said the same too but he said you will wasnt it as big as you can

Hey 3 Gnomes thanks for the video.

I absolutely agree with the taking a break advice. Often at times I get so unmotivated to continue especially when I have been grinding at my indie game for days. I find that playing something or even watching a movie or series, gives me that motivation again. I would suggest when taking a break to play or watch something that inspired you to make your indie game in the first place. For me its playing GTA 1 on dos. Just taking a break and playing that motivates me and gives me a reason to jump back into my project and believe that my game is going to be awesome. I also find that if you play test your game and get lost in your own game and marvel at how much you've made you will then know that if you enjoy it others will too. Thanks again for the video

Lost your channel for a bit and was having difficulty finding it again. Like you, I do quite a bit of thinking at work while my body goes through the motions and it dawned on me that I had subscribed under a "generic" account. Good to see that you are still VERY dedicated to not only seeing this project through, but are also very much on a solid path to continued successful deving!

Well.. good to know I'm not lazy.

this can be used for all kinds of projects you want to do. Im personally going to speedrun the game simsons hit and run. It will take alot of practice to get lower times but i think these tips will keep me motivated.

speculative biology project? eeh that sounds awesome

New game 2023

Nice advice

@dani

Where’s is my idea

Epic stuff

Very Inspiring Great job.
🥰

Thank you for the advice, I genuinely needed the “make what you want” tip

how much will the game cost