Finally finishing your dream project

I finally did it! The greatest feeling existing in the whole universe.

TL;DR; Finishing a project is amazing for your self esteem and personal growth. Therefore: establish a work-kick-off routine, allocate a time-slot for your project and stick to it, move distractions out of your sight and finally "Just do it!"

Just like almost all people in the world, I like to image new exciting projects that I could realise and code or write. It's fun to think about a new idea, which you can iteratively shape into something profound. You're thinking you can make a real impact and bring joy to the player or reader or your project. That's why you keep on pondering about it, tinker on the base idea or just wildly imagine entertaining scenarios.
That's exactly how I feel ~30% of my life. 

I start a lot of projects: A fantasy novel about 75% finished, a dice game inspired by Örlog from Assassins Creed Valhalla, a medival trading simulator, a great 3d low-fantasy RPG in the like of Gothic 2 or a chess-like game with a "hold the area" mechanic. The prior projects are just the most advanced among my ideas. 

BUT, and that's a big BUT(T),  there comes a point in time after starting a project, where you loose faith in the endevours that you've put into the project. And there are a lot of obstacles that will try to stop you from finishing a game, a book or any other creative task. One of them might be: 

• not enough free time (you have to work, do school or university)
• you don't see usefulness of your project to the world
• a brand new game released, that you waited for and the shiny game is way more interesting than actually putting in the work for the current project.
• a vacation, that takes you out of the "work-mode" and interest dwindles afterwards
• ...etc. a lot of others

The thing is, it is hard to finish a project, especially as it becomes more and more work the further you get. After 50% of your Vision is done, the work turns from beeing a creative task to becoming a labourous burden that just devours your free time. The last ~30ish% are the worst. Bugfixing, grammar correction, adjustments for user friendlyness, it's just killing your aspirations. Those tasks aren't fun and nobody wants to spend their free time with these. BUT it's the most crucial part to finishing your project and you have to push yourself through it.

With my latest project (rodent race), I was able to push through it, I forced myself to finish it, even though I lost my motivation in believing the game would be a star hit amoung chess fans and strategy lovers. My goal was to finish the game and to release it on Steam, Play Store and various smaller plattforms. I wanted to gain the experience of the complete release cycle for a game.  I feel that this is important as an aspiring game developer.

One thing that helped me a lot was generative AI for the needed artworks of the game. I am no arts person, was decent at drawing in school, but imagining something and realising it myself is nearly impossible to me. Thankfully I discovered stabledefusionweb.com where you can create excellent artwork by describing it with words. That helped me create all my artwork for rodent race. I can only recommend it.

So now I finally did it! It's the greatest feeling existing in the whole universe.

Rodent race turned out decent and I released my game on Steam and here on itch.io. And the best part is: I feel great, It's so empowering to know that I finished something that I have first imagined in my mind in a computer sience lecture at the university in 2010. It's the greatest feeling in the world, 'self-pride', knowing you can pull through it and publish it.

Indeed it's not the first time I finished a project. The biggest thing I ever finished was a modification for Gothic 2 and that thing was HUGE, 100+ hours of finest RPG game play for any dedicated RPG fan. That project was "Legend of Ahssûn", a total conversion mod for Gothic 2. I took me 5 years of continous work for this big project to get it to a releasable state. But I wasn't alone, I had a team of 6 to 10 people helping me with testing, dialog writing, world decorations and decision making. But in the end I was just as proud of myself as I am now with my lastest project.

Soooo, how did I do it? How did I pull through the hard times listed above? How did I not give up? Well..., first of all:

• make a todo list (most important one) and check it after every day of work, list up what you want to achive for you project. E.g. World with 3 Biomes: Forest, Desert, Swamp etc., character controller and moves on uneven terrain and collides with world...
• allocate a dedicated timeslot for the work. E.g. 3-4 hours in the evening, or 8 hours after waking up if your not fully employed.
• implement a work-kick-off routine: What worked best for me is to have a relaxed breakfast after waking up and making a coffee. The coffee was the trigger for me to start working, before the coffee I browsed the internet, watched videos etc. but as soon as I had my coffee finished, I forced myself to start working, after the coffee, you cannot by any chance pick up your phone to answer Whatsapp messages or start watching a video or check out new games etc.
• move any possible distraction away from you: Whatsapp messages, don't answer or read emails that aren't existential, don't pick up your phone except for work

That's basically it. In the end you have to bring up the will to "Just do it", like a wise dragonborn said it: Fus Ro Dah - "Just Do It!"

If you are a fan of round based strategy games and would like to check out my latest game, feel free to check it out on Steam here: rodent race or on Itch.io

Farewell fellow strugglers