Where to seek motivation?

Where to seek motivation?

Postby eugeneloza » 03 Dec 2015, 10:03

Today on my way to work I've been calculating my new game project schedule (part of it you might find in Mazer viewtopic.php?f=46&t=6517). Yes, the project in question is absolutely huge.
And... at present efficiency level (less than 20% of my free time) I ended up with 10 years estimate :shock: And having a 'usual' 2x for time schedules it's 20 years from now... :shock: If I only could upload myself at 75%-100% those would come down to affordable 3-5 years.

So... Might there be ways to increase efficiency? At present I see the following problems (together I call them laziness :D ):
* Fear to start large amounts of work in chunks of ~2 hours and more.
* Overuse of Internet. I really don't need to know all the news and jokes out there :)
* Lack of interest from others. I often don't feel like working because I don't really feel like anybody needs that :) And when I do things just for fun, well... programming is not the only one way to have fun.
* Lack of feedback. Well, many things and bugs are really easier to see "from the other point of view". Lot's of stuff seems obvious to me, but end up 'strange' for users. And sometimes I do bitter errors where other's advice could have saved me from dozens of hours of re-making something I've already hardcoded.
* Lack of feedback #2. I spend a lot of time testing my programs and hunting for bugs. Yes, it's fun :) But still it would be better if I had the external issues proposals and bugs reports.
* Low yeild. Some chunks of code don't result in 'awesome' results. Sometimes the results are even invisible.
* Stubs. I often come up with lack of X3D standard and CGE knowledge and understanding, ending up in a waste of time with no results.
* Lack of oxygen. Well, this is solvable only in Summer...
* Understanding that I'll do some things at low quality. I can't draw. I'm not a designer. So I often just do things I do in a bad way. And when I do something bad, I feel bad :) And it's really hard to motivate myself to do them bad versus not to do them at all :)
* Urgent&important stuff... There are tons of stuff I have to do but I don't want to... ending up in simply wasting time. I still have to do them, but meanwhile I just don't do anything particular 'running away from problems'.

This year I've made some progress on efficiency increase (5% to 20%) with aid of pomodoro technique and thanks to some progress on CGE theory (output increase). Plus some external feedback.
But obviously that is not enough.

So, any ideas on how to increase the motivation/efficiency?

I have an idea to partially cover those problems. I.e. I have to make tons of assets (3d models, mucis, sounds, images, photos, etc,etc,etc) for my project which I plan to release as free game art after betta (i.e. in 7-9 years at present efficiency rate). Or... release them 'realtime' in exchange for interest in my project or even some collaboration :)
WDYT?
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Last edited by eugeneloza on 03 Dec 2015, 11:06, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Where to seek motivation?

Postby Akien » 03 Dec 2015, 10:42

What helps me for motivation is to have a group of buddies I can talk to about what I'm working on, my joys and frustrations when I manage or don't manage to use an API :)
For OpenDungeons most other devs don't hang out on IRC, so it mostly goes through comments in pull requests or issues.

On the other hand I'm working on Godot Engine (both engine development and my own game https://github.com/akien-mga/dynadungeons, so I haven't worked much on it lately). For this I hang out on #godotengine and especially #godotengine-devel where I can talk directly with fellow developers about what goes through my mind when triaging issues or trying to hunt down a bug even though I'm a C++ noob. I also hang around on #kobuge which is a very small team of FLOSS lovers making games with Godot, we have a lot of fun there. That's of course not enough to get motivated to work on a project, but I think being able to communicate about what one does is a good plus.

Then I think you should definitely upload the art you're making on OpenGameArt, even if it's not part of a finished game yet. Especially if you plan to have your game finished in 10 years, by then you art will most likely be so low poly that only old school devs like us will find it interesting :P So better upload it earlier so that you can get feedback and it could be useful to other devs already (for example STK might need some cobwebs, books or art pictures for its mansion track).


Regarding getting feedback, it's always difficult with such projects. Having a group of buddies like I mentioned is a good way to get feedback, if they like you they will feel more compelled to actually have a look at what you did and give constructive feedback ;)

Then I'd say that there is some huge potential in huge a "trendy" platform like GitHub from where interested users could update their git clone regularly and see your progress, even if they're not willing to really take part in the development currently. For example I really like Project Helena when you posted about it a few months ago, but I see it's still on SourceForge (which my ad blocker now blacklists), and also last time I looked at it it was not so easy to build out of the box. A well ordered repo with regular atomic commits and good instructions on how to build the game might help.


Just some random thoughts :) Of course I'd like to give you more feedback personally, but free time to test stuff is hard to find when I'm already so involved in various other projects. Testing Mazer and playing Project Helena a bit more are really high on my todo list though :D But I'd really like Project Helena to be moved to GitHub or similar where I could open issues, etc. if I have feedback to give on precise points.
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Re: Where to seek motivation?

Postby eugeneloza » 03 Dec 2015, 10:53

Thanks for the ideas!

And thanks for reminding about GitHub for Project Helena... I'll move on there this week :) Maybe even today evening.
About Project Helena - main problem now is the need of a complete GUI re-make to make it more easy-to-understand and to port it to Android. I still think, maybe I should leave it 2D (I wanted to port it to 3D, but it ends up in tons of 'remaking' without any specific improvement)?
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Re: Where to seek motivation?

Postby andrewj » 03 Dec 2015, 12:51

I think it really helps to limit yourself to a *single* major project, the thing you are most interested and passionate about making, and dedicate yourself to finishing it. Keep visualizing the final result (or at least the next big milestone), for me that helps me to grasp the nettle and do the drudgery (but necessary) stuff.

Setting deadlines with a few major goals can help too, e.g. "get the new GUI in a usable state by Christmas". One the project becomes usable by other people, set a rough deadline for the next release (with some goals) and try hard to reach it -- but keep the deadlines to yourself as you don't want the added pressure of people expecting a release by a certain date.
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Re: Where to seek motivation?

Postby eugeneloza » 04 Dec 2015, 10:58

Thank you, andrewj!
limit yourself to a *single* major project

Well, I'm afraid that is completely impossible. I.e. I have many major projects at work and of my own, most of which I can't abandon. Many of them I'm not passionate about making but it's important/urgent :)
So it's just about efficiently using my spare time. That'd be completely enough.
Setting deadlines with a few major goals

And here goes the problem. Yes, I can't set a deadline because I can't plan my future (it strongly depends on external factors). E.g. sometimes I have tons of work I have to do urgently and I work 16 hours/day at some deadline. Sometimes I have 16 spare hours a day, but I don't have access to a computer. And most often I have 5-8 spare hours I can dedicate to game-making and etc.
So, if I set a deadline to 'finish GUI till 31st December' but December is the month of yearly reports and finalizing projects at my work... so I just may end up failing the deadline. That'll make me feel bad&ashamed. And that's the least thing I want to feel from my hobby. Of course I can ignore the deadline if I failed it... but it's not a deadline then.

So, I just want to keep the game development as my hobby. Not as obligation (even to myself).
If I feel like playing a game, I may play a game or two. If I feel like going hiking/biking, I go hiking/biking. If I feel like doing some creative scientific work, I sit down and do it, not worrying about deadlines, I'll fail because of that. And if a friend of mine asks me to help him/her with English/math/etc, I gladly go and help him/her with no back-thoughts.
But parallel, I want to upload myself at max. Not wasting time (which is around 80% at present), but being completely loaded by the sort of work I feel like doing today.
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Re: Where to seek motivation?

Postby eugeneloza » 05 Dec 2015, 03:42

>Project Helena... I'll move on there this week
He-he... it doesn't compile in new CGE version :D That was something unexpected, but CastleControl lacks onmousemove and onmousedown. I'll need to move on to native castle GUI then... It's not very good idea to post code that does compile only in a single version of CGE.
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Re: Where to seek motivation?

Postby Egberto » 05 Dec 2015, 05:35

Mmh, simplicity is key ... I think. High levels of stress are bad, be careful :?
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Re: Where to seek motivation?

Postby charlie » 05 Dec 2015, 13:53

Just work on it. Doing something beats doing nothing. I had many plans fall away because I did nothing. Doing nothing sucks!
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Re: Where to seek motivation?

Postby Andrettin » 05 Dec 2015, 14:36

charlie {l Wrote}:Just work on it. Doing something beats doing nothing. I had many plans fall away because I did nothing. Doing nothing sucks!


Well said.
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Re: Where to seek motivation?

Postby eugeneloza » 05 Dec 2015, 18:29

Absolutely agreed.
How?
:D

E.g. today... just 2 models (less than an hour of work) and 6 pages of written translation correction (~30 minutes) for 10 hours of spare time.
O.k. I feel dizzy, because I'm still not completely healthy... but really, I'd better went to sleep than just sitting in the internet/playing Wizardry8 mod.
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Re: Where to seek motivation?

Postby Andrettin » 05 Dec 2015, 19:28

eugeneloza {l Wrote}:Absolutely agreed.
How?
:D

E.g. today... just 2 models (less than an hour of work) and 6 pages of written translation correction (~30 minutes) for 10 hours of spare time.
O.k. I feel dizzy, because I'm still not completely healthy... but really, I'd better went to sleep than just sitting in the internet/playing Wizardry8 mod.


You don't need to make a lot of stuff every day, you are doing this in your free time after all. IMO it is more important to do a little bit (almost) every day than getting a lot done on a single day, so that you're in constant contact with your project, and don't later on come back to it and feel somewhat lost.
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