Post by vitalia.dev in What are your Wins and Losses of GDTV26

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vitalia.dev11 days ago

my 3d jam too

wins:

didn’t run into any significant issues with builds or planned mechanic compared to previous jams
didn’t waste time on trying something that wouldn’t work
made html5 game despite using Unreal Engine (used old version, but it wasn’t as bad)

loses:

couldn’t use any assets because i need more space on my pc & limits of HTML5 with my chosen engine
time management is as usual a problem, but mainly because health issues.
the level in the game is actually tutorial i did for the player, not planned levels

it was overall quite successful, i have a lot of jamming experience, so many overlooked issues from previous jams were avoided this time. I didn’t plan too much and quickly came up with idea/minimum requirement for the finished game.

crazyhoundgamedesign11 days ago

While I don't use unreal, I have noticed from other jams that the games made in unreal tend to be rather large, to the point where even a small game ends up with a multi GB download.

I know it's a very powerful engine, but I personally don't expect a small game that might only have 10 minutes of content to be multiple GB to download and play. Suffice to say I understand your pain in making a web build that meets Itch's policies in Unreal. Regardless of how you did it, you did do it though.

vitalia.dev11 days ago

web build with Unreal is only possible in Unreal Engine 4.27 and earlier. 2d game is not a big deal to make lightweight, but Unreal isn’t an ideal choice for 2d. if you use itch’ search, you can find browser games made in Unreal and something like retro style horror is fully possible.

large size is surely thanks to realism and heavy assets, but a lot has to do with optimization as well. So the size isn’t exactly a fault of the engine, but more about experience of the developer, if it isn’t highly realistic game.

It was actually fairly easy to do the build for HTML5 in UE4. I just use Unreal Engine 5, so it was more about treading carefully because there’s a lot of differences. Current game has literally nothing outside one jpg that wasn’t a part of engine’s starter assets.

I was tinkering with UE4 before and wasn’t satisfied with how it went, but this jam something magically clicked and I made the game very fast.

crazyhoundgamedesign11 days ago(+1)

Thanks for the info. And progress is progress, when things click it's like another whole chunk of the world just makes sense.

vitalia.dev11 days ago

yep, it’s fun when it clicks, worth studying for. The step between total noob and to understanding things was a steep one with Unreal Engine, probably much easier with other engines.

crazyhoundgamedesign11 days ago(+1)

I'd probably have to agree.

While Unreal and Unity tend to use c#, which isn't too difficult, I found gdscript a bit more natural for me as I was already somewhat experienced with python from a past job that used a lot of unix back end systems.

Unity extends this into prefabs and objects, while Unreal uses blueprints and has a pretty well developed visual scripting system as well as I understand it.

Not suggesting that c# is more difficult than any other language, but that the syntax of gdscript was more aligned to what I already knew. The added benefit with Godot for me is that with it being so lightweight, I can do gamedev on a laptop. And if it works on my laptop, it should work on most systems without much issue.

vitalia.dev10 days ago

Unreal uses C++, I myself only use blueprints. It is quite advanced and you don’t really need to touch code at all even for quite complex games. I am an artist first, not programmer, so working with blueprints is better for my current skillset. I’ve been trying Renpy, it’s python based, yea, completely different experience. Python is so simple, love it.

I actually work fully on my laptop, I don’t have a PC. Unreal Engine 5 works much better than last versions of Unreal engine 4, when working with realistic assets. They did a lot of optimization to make UE5 a more smooth experience. My games have not been too complex, so far I don’t have too much issues, as long as I optimize my assets.

I have been looking at Godot and I’ll probably eventually try it, I know it is a very good option for multiple reasons. But the idea of building from scratch the basics that are already in other engines by default, sounds daunting. It is probably better to learn this way, because you get more insight into how things work together, but I don’t want to jump around engines anymore. I am experienced enough in Unreal by now, so my current goal is to make a proper game with it.

crazyhoundgamedesign10 days ago(+1)

Not a bad plan, it is a drawback of Godot that you sometimes have to 'make' things work.

I'm getting to the stage with my own dev skills that I can build my own systems, nodes and classes in the Godot engine, and have even extended the engine once or twice simple ways to expedite some parts of my projects.

I wouldn't call myself an expert developer or programmer, ir even an expert in Godot, but each jam and each project helps me improve.

vitalia.dev10 days ago

Either route is beneficial and we always can switch to something else. At the end of a day it is not about the engine, so whatever gets the work done.

Yes, jams are quite helpful to understand the scope and how to finish something workable under a deadline. Pet projects can last decades otherwise, if not careful.

Being an expert is not crucial, as long as you can produce something. Unless your goal is to be the expert, not to make games (I mean goal to be hired for the expertise, compared to going indie).

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