Over the past few weeks I’ve been doing some soul searching. I’ve also been dealing with a cold.  My original goal of posting each Thursday has now gone out the window.  My guess is however that it may have been a good thing.  One thing I did not plan to assume with this journey was pressure.  This journey is a hobby more than anything else, albeit a bit more of a serious hobby but a hobby nonetheless.

Time is most likely on my side.

During the week each day I get up and go to work.  I have a full time job that supports me well enough.  There also hasn’t been a lot of money spent outside of learning materials.  The bottom line is I’m not in a need to make money off game development right now.  The learning process has been fast then slow, it ebbs and flows for me.  If I hit a great class and have the right time I blow through it, on the other hand sometimes things come to a grinding halt.

Such as this past week.  My goal was to wrap up my Unity course on Zenva.  Well I got sick and did nothing.  The good thing is that it’s ok.  I did what I could and spent some time on other things.  After a quick reset I’ll be on back on my way.

You can’t do everything.

Not to long ago I realized one thing I couldn’t do was everything.  I wanted to learn not just one game development direction, but all of them!  Unity, Unreal, RPG Maker, GoDot, GameMaker Studio, CORE, and anything else I missed.  But wait there’s more! Art design, 3D design, learn to draw and play the guitar, might as well throw in stand on my head and juggle.  Not to mention my plan to actually PLAY some games for inspiration and “research”.

So I had to do some hard soul searching to decide what I really wanted to do.  For one I realized I was never going to become a rock start so the guitar went back on the shelf.  Then I had to decide where I wanted to focus my game development.  I was most comfortable with Unity and C# so that’s where I focused.  I had my books to read and classes set, everything else went to the side.  One thing I will continue is art development and I hope to soon start with 3D design.  That is one thing I do want to be able to accomplish, my own artwork and style.

But you can do something.

So now I have direction. Soul searching helped me come to terms with the time I have and what I enjoy the most.  I’m still working out ideas in my head.  I’m trying to come up with the next great game and the first little project at the same time.  I have sat down a few times to try and prototype ideas (most were scrapped) or at the very least to practice.  One thing that may happen is a very frankensteined game, maybe all these little ideas need to create a larger monster.

Through all this though I have learned one thing, I’m not alone.  When you think your failing you’re not.  There are plenty of other aspiring developers out there going through the same things.  It’s just something you have to stick with and keep going.  Eventually you’ll be able to post about your game, and if not, at least have fun trying.