Why making a 3d game for your final year project is a bad idea

                “Never bite off more than you can chew”; these words could never be truer. As a game development student at my university, I am expected to come up with a complete prototype of a game which I conceptualized and developed myself at the end of this year, which is my final term here. The problem lies in the fact that I opted to make a 3d game for the assignment. There are a lot of problems that I should have foreseen, but which slipped past me in my moment of pride.

                Firstly, I’ll tell you a bit about my course. My course, for the most part, is only related to programming games, and focuses on making the game mechanics and gameplay, basically the stuff that makes a game, a game. It has little to do with game design, and almost nothing to do with game art and assets. In the last 3 years, we have been taught programming in various languages, fundamentals of game-building, and usage of game engines, if required (or we were supposed to be taught; at any rate, my gripe with my college is not the subject for this post).

                Secondly, the course content of my college is geared towards developing casual games (games like FarmVille, Angry Birds, Zynga Poker, the likes of which litter social networking websites and smartphones). Casual game development in itself is not a bad idea, but I’m just not interested in heading in that direction. For me, making games has always been about seeing my name in the credits (yes, games have credits, but its optional so no one watches them) of a big game, like The Elder Scrolls series, the Battlefield series, the Assassin’s Creed series, the Hitman series. Way too many to list. While we were taught(again, supposed to have been taught) basic 3d math, and some programming in DirectX, it was never stressed upon.

                I know most people must think that I’m just shirking from responsibility, and placing more blame than deserved someplace else, but that is not the case. I am also at fault, equally if not majorly. In retrospect, I knew what I was getting into when I decided to make a 3d game, but I still decided to go ahead with it. Also, I am not extraordinarily intelligent, or overwhelmingly hardworking to warrant making such a decision. I also procrastinate a lot(the fact that I’m writing this post instead of studying says enough about that aspect).  Lets mark that one up to my ego.

                The scope of the game, even whittled down to one level, with a simple level design and a few enemies, is still humongous. Consider this; I have to make all the assets for the whole level, model the enemy, model the player, and any weapons that may be present in a 3d application. After that, they have to be textured, which still takes me a longer time than the modelling itself. Assets which will be animated, or moveable in the game, have to be rigged with a bone structure. After asset construction, the level itself has to be built up from these puzzle pieces which have, and I’m no great level designer.  One might argue that I could use placeholder graphics in my game prototype. For example, basic 3d geometrical shapes instead of actual graphics. In that case, One, I’ll have you know, that the marking conducted by my college is a tad hypocritical. They focus on the game mechaincs and programming of the game, but if the game is presented using bad, or placeholder graphics, they deduct marks because the game doesn’t have the ‘look and feel’ of a game(“Of course it doesn’t! There is a cylinder instead of a battle worn man from the future!” is an unacceptable counter argument).

                That will take care of roughly half of the work, but unfortunately none of it is enough to even get me a pass grade. The game has to be a working prototype, and my supervisor for the project is very particular about the number of bugs left in the game till the end. I have chosen to make the game in the game engine called Unity 3D, as I feel it is the best way to make a game as a single-man team. Some of you programming puritans may consider that I have committed a sin, but it is really the only library I actually foresee myself completing this game in, considering the time I have left. To construct the specific game mechanics that I need in the game, I need to do a lot of experimentation with code, learn new things, dive into the documentation, and see what works and what doesn’t (I have started this part atleast). This is the only part of the project that I’m really comfortable with, and I’m having a lot of fun experimenting with code, and making things move around the screen, and do what I want them to.

                Making a 3d game in itself is not a bad idea, but thinking about making something which relies on polish, like an action/adventure game is. Furthermore, the mechanics I have in mind are quite unconventional (atleast it seems that way to me) and require more than a simple “how to make an action game in Unity3d” Google Search. That being said I’m going to go ahead anyway. Because it would be a shame to have come so far to quit now. Also, the idea for some of my game mechanics kick ass, and I want to see them in a game as soon as possible, preferably before someone else thinks of them and puts it in their game. I’m really strapped for time, but I know I’ll be able to get it done if I put in more effort than what I have been till this date.

                 So, if any of you who are considering solo-tanking a 3d game project as a student, my advice to you is, start slow, but be consistent in your work, even if you just feel like putting in 30 minutes of work and not a second more per day, do the half hour. 12 hours spread over 24 days is much easier than 12 hours spent working in a single day, believe me.

                The work is thankless, and the progress is very obscure when you start, but the results are worth it. Because let’s be honest, who doesn’t want to brag about having made a game all by themselves?


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