6 ms·

This is one of the best pieces of advice in the article: > You learn so much as you’re building a system that you will end up iterating into a much better syst

by CM30 4y ago

This is one of the best pieces of advice in the article: > You learn so much as you’re building a system that you will end up iterating into a much better system than you ever could have designed in the first place. This is surprisingly a hard sell to most people. And it's one I wish I'd kept in mind for a lot of personal projects in my life. I love designing stuff up front and implementing things based on that, but often that's led to sticking with ideas that didn't actually pan out the way I expected them to, especially when it comes to game design/development. A lot of the time, a good level or game or boss fight or whatever is completely different to what you initially imagined it would be, and you should be willing to change direction to fit the bill. > Sometimes you have to stop sharpening the saw, and just start cutting shit Also this one for much the same reason. Overplanning for things is a curse, especially when said plan hasn't quite come into contact with reality.

BerislavLopac 4y ago
This is called the second-system effect [0], and has been described by Fred Brooks in his book The Mythical Man-Month, published in 1975. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-system_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-system_effect [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month
MrGilbert 4y ago
> And it's one I wish I'd kept in mind for a lot of personal projects in my life. It's one thing I'm currently doing, and I'm quite happy about it: I always wanted to have a project that could "grow" with me, but never had an idea. Turns out I already have that: My personal website is running on an engine I wrote myself, basically just turning a directory into a website (like Directory Listing from Apache, but more powerful). I'm currently in the process of refactoring it. Eventually, I'd like to host it on GitHub. :)
agumonkey 4y ago
It should be taught how to "size" your planning / iterating balance. Few years ago I made a tiny vue app (to learn that lib) and every time I though adding a feature would go one way, it went another, and made me see things I didn't perceive about the app structure. At first it felt frustrating but if you size features on the smaller side (~agile spirit) and change your spirit it becomes a new kind of pleasurable skill in itself. It also impacts how you write code, because you anticipate a bit the potential refactorings now. So you tend to become very frugal and efficient in how you code and how you abstract. Which another pleasurable skill. Something no moonshot side project ever taught me.
noduerme 4y ago
The fewer people you have to answer to or debate with, the better. If it's just you and an artist making a game, your job is just to convince the artist why you need to change that level boss. It's a lot easier for a few creative people to make a good decision that they're comfortable committing time to than it is for them to have that decision rammed down their throat by a corporate hierarchy that doesn't actually touch any art or code.

by CM30 4y ago

BerislavLopac 4y ago

This is called the second-system effect [0], and has been described by Fred Brooks in his book The Mythical Man-Month, published in 1975. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-system_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-system_effect [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month

MrGilbert 4y ago

> And it's one I wish I'd kept in mind for a lot of personal projects in my life. It's one thing I'm currently doing, and I'm quite happy about it: I always wanted to have a project that could "grow" with me, but never had an idea. Turns out I already have that: My personal website is running on an engine I wrote myself, basically just turning a directory into a website (like Directory Listing from Apache, but more powerful). I'm currently in the process of refactoring it. Eventually, I'd like to host it on GitHub. :)

agumonkey 4y ago

It should be taught how to "size" your planning / iterating balance. Few years ago I made a tiny vue app (to learn that lib) and every time I though adding a feature would go one way, it went another, and made me see things I didn't perceive about the app structure. At first it felt frustrating but if you size features on the smaller side (~agile spirit) and change your spirit it becomes a new kind of pleasurable skill in itself. It also impacts how you write code, because you anticipate a bit the potential refactorings now. So you tend to become very frugal and efficient in how you code and how you abstract. Which another pleasurable skill. Something no moonshot side project ever taught me.

noduerme 4y ago

The fewer people you have to answer to or debate with, the better. If it's just you and an artist making a game, your job is just to convince the artist why you need to change that level boss. It's a lot easier for a few creative people to make a good decision that they're comfortable committing time to than it is for them to have that decision rammed down their throat by a corporate hierarchy that doesn't actually touch any art or code.