Post Mortem

❤ Valentine's Day! The self-proclaimed day of all enamorated folk, filled with love and hate. In the spirit of the holiday Epic has reminded us that "All's Fair in Love and War" making it the theme of their Winter Game Jam. After all game jams are a small war with something you love.

Going through a creative sprint such as a game jam is both an exhilirating and fulfilling experience. I'd love to paint the full picture by being overly worded and showing you every fleeting moment of the process, but there's a catch. Problem is that you really have to go through it yourself, otherwise it only ends up being a crazy madman talking nonsense.

What I will do for you (and myself) is point out the best learnings and tips while working on "MGNUM-3" 'aka' "Eternally Unfair."

1. Solo work is just as much freeing as tying.

Over the years I've been on and off about colaborating with people. Many heads think up more. More hands do more. Sharing is caring and all that fun. Creativity is a hard work and when going through the process a lot is thrown away. Vast difference between working solo and with someone else comes down to not having to make any internal compromises.

Solo work opens the door to auteurism and putting out yourself and you vision out there. It obviously comes with the grievances of not being able to do everything at the quality or quantity needed. Your vision then needs to be very focused around a singular thing or tie together in the most efficient design possible. If you are "the artist" at heart or generally looking to touch stuff you don't get to touch in your usual life (you know what parts I'm talking about) soloing is pretty good.

When working with other creatives-in-crime it's better to leave the egoistical auteurism outside. Focus should be on moving forward and not bickering over every detail, what's right and wrong. Utilizing everyone's strengths around an agreed upon design, while leaving enough space for everyone to put themselves in their work is the healthy approach.

Be it solo or with a team, you'll be making sacrifices. Solo is the perfect way to explore many paths while team work will let you deepen and focus on just one or two.

2. Scope and prioritize about three times.

Scoping a project is about getting a good detailed overview of the work ahead, usually in form of an itemized to-do list. Creative work is famously difficult to scope out, due to many unforeseen struggles ahead. That feature you thought for two minutes and thought will be done in an hour - takes four. That dialog you alloted an afternoon, took a day. It's the most likely downfall you'll encounter - your expecations and reality will never meet.

BUT! Working without a scope at hand is the equalivalent of throwing buckets of paint on the canvas and hoping it'll make a painting. It can happen, but likely won't. What to do then?

What I do is scope at start very wide (ie. I need a player, movement schema, end game logic, two characters, bunch of trees a rock...), take a look at what is essential and put in a bit of work into making those. After a couple of hours I can tell how long what parts will take and where I'm unsure what to do, but also if it's important for the game to be finished.

Repeat the process above a few times and as you approach the end of the jam, you'll be banging out extremely specific small 5 - 15 minutes tasks, which actually take that much time. If they don't, they don't make it to the game.

3. Composure is absolutely the best life ability.

Taking after my father I had to learn how to keep my calm. To speak the truth I think the best practice was the very first Dark Souls. That moment where your heart is just beating hard as you are near overcoming the boss after hours of struggle? I've learned to take away the beating. Well the hard part anyway.

Lately I put an extra effort to go beyond and become extra composed. I've started playing card games where planning ahead and overcoming random draw is called "overcoming the tilt." Just as well I've been running and managed to do a half-marathon. A healthy paced run of over 2 hours is mostly struggle with the mind than legs or lungs.

All of the above nicely culminated into being able to sit for long hours behind the screen, taking the deep breath when something isn't working (ie. why is that raytracing not casting?! it worked just a minute ago...). Learning to be composed has given me the most time and best creative results so far. Stress is just not healthy, even for your art.

4. Quick school of knowing where your experience gaps lie.

The old adage of the difference between knowing and teaching something. If you cannot teach it, you don't really know it. You might think you are doing fine on the code, art, sound or writting. Game dev is a hard beast to tame since it embodies so many vastly different facets. Truth is there's no shortcut to knowledge and only skips for experience. All of it takes time.

You'll feel your inexperience in every situation, whether working solo or in a team. Whether you are young or old. During critique times after the jam. It's a hard hitting needle, which becomes sharper with time to learn shortening and life duties growing. It doesn't get easier, rather you'll grow a thicker skin.

Acceptance is the simplest cure. Personally I'm enjoying the idea of how deep a personal vision can go and understand that many of the facets I'll have to do on my own. Such wide breath means I'll never be the best at one thing. What I can hope for is to be great at the unique combination of all these disciplines.

If you are more inclined to pursue one interest, then touching all of them first is the best way to find your passion. Game jams are perfect for experimentation and trying out things you wouldn't normally do. Let your programmer self on the side and do a mechanically simple game with some great music (music is math anyway!). Stop being a writer for a day and don't tell a story, rather find what you can do with mechanics.

That's the four takeaways I'll give you still half-tired from the positively charged rush the last few days has been. I purposefuly didn't get into the game itself, what it was supposed to be and how it actually turned out differently than I would have liked. For that we'll need some visuals, such as video. Stay tuned.

Take a look at the comment section below. It's the perfect way to leave your own takeaways from jamming!