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I'm making video games for PC, Mac and Linux (like this one - http://store.steampowered.com/app/386900 http://store.steampowered.com/app/386900), it's a very tr

I'm making video games for PC, Mac and Linux (like this one - http://store.steampowered.com/app/386900 http://store.steampowered.com/app/386900), it's a very traditional release cycle, I work on a project for x months, and then I release it, moving onto the next game after a few weeks of post-launch support. PC games are generally seen as more valuable than mobile games, so I don't need to sell a terribly large volume in order for me, a single developer, to make a living.

ownedthx 10y ago
Mind sharing your stack?
- DizzyDoo 10y ago
  Not at all. Unity is the engine I use, these engines are immensely valuable to developers like me, I can't invest years into building my own stable core right now, and although it has its rough edges and problems, it suits my projects very well. Builds to all sorts of targets, too. For my latest project I'm using the FMOD middleware for positional 3D audio. On the graphical asset side of things, I paint everything in Photoshop, and animate it in the amazing animation software Spine (which has an open source Unity runtime).
  - ownedthx 10y ago
    Thanks!
  - fitzwatermellow 10y ago
    +1 for Spine. Will literally change your perception of what's possible in sprite animation and illustration ;) Check it out: http://esotericsoftware.com/ http://esotericsoftware.com/
    - DizzyDoo 10y ago
      Oh man, Spine is amazing. The latest 3.0 release has some great new scale features, and the fact that you can browse all the runtimes on github and submit patches is just the best. And the community is great too, lots of support on the forums, and bugs I've reported were fixed in days. So yes, Spine is absolutely worth the investment.
  - mintplant 10y ago
    What do you use for modeling?
otoburb 10y ago
>> [...] moving onto the next game after a few weeks of post-launch support [...] How do you handle patches for prior games into your workflow (i.e. long-term maintenance)? Do you build up an issue queue and then work on patches in between major releases?
- DizzyDoo 10y ago
  That's exactly how I do things. I'm very glad that by distributing digitally, it's incredibly easy to roll out small fixes that are applied as incremental patches, so I don't tend to 'save up' for major updates. A benefit that comes with a stable engine is that it's already been tested on a wide variety of hardware, so most of the issues I fix are very rare gameplay bugs.
  - pradipmj 10y ago
    Hi , Can you tell us how you are rolling out patches to your unity client. As far as I know unity doesn't have an inbuilt updater. But there are few plugins on the unity asset store which do that. But they don't cover all scenarios.
    - DizzyDoo 10y ago
      As I sell mainly on Steam, Steam handles the updating, it works out the diff and updates the files that have changed.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
csense 10y ago
This game looks awesome! Thanks for sharing.
bdavisx 10y ago
When you say "make a living" - how does that compare to a "typical" US developer salary/benefits - say around $120K total compensation? (and yes, I know that's far below a SV total compensation, but you wouldn't have to live in SV for this kind of lifestyle business).
- gambiting 10y ago
  Just to keep your expectations in check - I work for a major games company in the UK as a C++ programmer and make 25k pounds/year($36k USD). US salaries are an abnormality.
  - rgovind 10y ago
    $35K is what a decent developer in India would make. So, your UK seems too low.
    - sokoloff 10y ago
      Much of the games industry is incredibly low-paying. I felt fairly fortunate to have worked in my 20s for a good game company (where I was paid OK, learned a ton, and we eventually had an exit to Sierra), but I feel like most of my peers at other companies were working for terribly low pay and often under poor management.
    - lkiernan 10y ago
      GDP per capita in India is $1,498.87 though
  - arisAlexis 10y ago
    As a web developer I frequently get offers for 50k+ in UK you are seriously underpaid
    - gambiting 10y ago
      I only see 50k+ offers in London though, and I have no intentions of moving to London. I also don't think it's entirely fair to be comparing web developers to C++, I would say I'm an advanced C++ programmer but I would need to learn how to do web development from scratch, it's not like I can pick up a web development job and just get on with it.
ElCapitanMarkla 10y ago
Oh wow you're The Cat Machine guy, nice game :D
beamatronic 10y ago
Steam is cross platform right? Would it be insane for me to develop an Enterprise application on the Steam platform?

ownedthx 10y ago

Mind sharing your stack?

DizzyDoo 10y ago
Not at all. Unity is the engine I use, these engines are immensely valuable to developers like me, I can't invest years into building my own stable core right now, and although it has its rough edges and problems, it suits my projects very well. Builds to all sorts of targets, too. For my latest project I'm using the FMOD middleware for positional 3D audio. On the graphical asset side of things, I paint everything in Photoshop, and animate it in the amazing animation software Spine (which has an open source Unity runtime).
- ownedthx 10y ago
  Thanks!
- fitzwatermellow 10y ago
  +1 for Spine. Will literally change your perception of what's possible in sprite animation and illustration ;) Check it out: http://esotericsoftware.com/ http://esotericsoftware.com/
  - DizzyDoo 10y ago
    Oh man, Spine is amazing. The latest 3.0 release has some great new scale features, and the fact that you can browse all the runtimes on github and submit patches is just the best. And the community is great too, lots of support on the forums, and bugs I've reported were fixed in days. So yes, Spine is absolutely worth the investment.
- mintplant 10y ago
  What do you use for modeling?

otoburb 10y ago

>> [...] moving onto the next game after a few weeks of post-launch support [...] How do you handle patches for prior games into your workflow (i.e. long-term maintenance)? Do you build up an issue queue and then work on patches in between major releases?

DizzyDoo 10y ago
That's exactly how I do things. I'm very glad that by distributing digitally, it's incredibly easy to roll out small fixes that are applied as incremental patches, so I don't tend to 'save up' for major updates. A benefit that comes with a stable engine is that it's already been tested on a wide variety of hardware, so most of the issues I fix are very rare gameplay bugs.
- pradipmj 10y ago
  Hi , Can you tell us how you are rolling out patches to your unity client. As far as I know unity doesn't have an inbuilt updater. But there are few plugins on the unity asset store which do that. But they don't cover all scenarios.
  - DizzyDoo 10y ago
    As I sell mainly on Steam, Steam handles the updating, it works out the diff and updates the files that have changed.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

csense 10y ago

This game looks awesome! Thanks for sharing.

bdavisx 10y ago

When you say "make a living" - how does that compare to a "typical" US developer salary/benefits - say around $120K total compensation? (and yes, I know that's far below a SV total compensation, but you wouldn't have to live in SV for this kind of lifestyle business).

gambiting 10y ago
Just to keep your expectations in check - I work for a major games company in the UK as a C++ programmer and make 25k pounds/year($36k USD). US salaries are an abnormality.
- rgovind 10y ago
  $35K is what a decent developer in India would make. So, your UK seems too low.
  - sokoloff 10y ago
    Much of the games industry is incredibly low-paying. I felt fairly fortunate to have worked in my 20s for a good game company (where I was paid OK, learned a ton, and we eventually had an exit to Sierra), but I feel like most of my peers at other companies were working for terribly low pay and often under poor management.
  - lkiernan 10y ago
    GDP per capita in India is $1,498.87 though
- arisAlexis 10y ago
  As a web developer I frequently get offers for 50k+ in UK you are seriously underpaid
  - gambiting 10y ago
    I only see 50k+ offers in London though, and I have no intentions of moving to London. I also don't think it's entirely fair to be comparing web developers to C++, I would say I'm an advanced C++ programmer but I would need to learn how to do web development from scratch, it's not like I can pick up a web development job and just get on with it.

ElCapitanMarkla 10y ago

Oh wow you're The Cat Machine guy, nice game :D

beamatronic 10y ago

Steam is cross platform right? Would it be insane for me to develop an Enterprise application on the Steam platform?