Why You Should Be a Game Developer

You never truly begin to understand a language, no matter how much you are exposed to it, until you try to speak it and write it yourself— until you grapple with it to express your own thoughts and feelings. In the same way, through no amount of just playing games can one really get to the bottom of what they are about, why they exist and where they are going. To play a game is to be forced to come to terms with the game’s limitations, but to design a game is to face the world’s limitations.

When you have been making games for a while, you become acutely aware of what the real triumphs are and where the corners were cut. Features that once seemed like difficult feats of technical trickery to you are exposed as the developmental equivalent of a parlor trick, while the very best games soon become all the more impressive to you, knowing acutely all the hurdles they must have overcome. If you want to appreciate games to their fullest– as everyone who professes to love them should – don’t just play games. Make them.

Comments

[JC Barnett]

This is a bit of a strange post, but I can see the thinking behind it. With an ever growing amount of tools and engines, free or cheap, it's getting easier and easier to bash out that "masterpiece" or, more likely, create that derivative bore of a game that yo think is the bees' knees.

I get tired of the old "I play a LOT of games so I know what makes a great game" mentality that pervades internet forums. It's as funnily misguided as those posts on amateur dev forums along the lines of "I have a great idea for an MMORPG, looking for artists and coders to join my (!) team".

Making games will not appeal to everyone, not as much as playing them. It can, however, expose the many many many obstacles developers have to overcome. I think your conclusion should be "if you think you can make better games than are currently out there, put your money where your mouth is".

[Matthew]

It’s true that making things is much more difficult than consuming them. Although the forums and such irritate me too, I was really motivated to post this because of (once again) too many recent interactions with game journalists, who have never had the experience of trying to make a game but are forced to try to explain the process in the course of their previews and studio visits.

[Scott]

Interesting thought - it's kind of the rebuttle to, "Don't do what you love as a job, you'll end up hating it." I'd have to agree with you, from my experience.