For some strange reason almost every project I follow stalled in 2024 to 1-0 updates over the year (and still waiting on many of them), whats up with that? Did anyone notice something similar with what they follow?
What happened in 2024 with scheduling?
- Thread starter Mmind
- Start date
- Jan 21, 2022
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Since you're not naming games - who knows.
In addition, the longer a game is in development, the larger the game gets and therefore in order to release an update appearing substantial enough, it takes longer to create. Also, the longer a game is in development, more things pop up that need tweaked, revised, etc that had already been released.
So, overall, no it isn't a trend, per se - it depends upon the developer and the game.
I didn't really want to put any devs on blast over it but one of them is a project you're pretty on top of Morado whos pace was meant to pick up with the addition of AI tools, I'm sure you can guess which one I'm talking about.
- Jul 4, 2017
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Game developers eventually find themselves in a state of burn out.
Even those making popular or long running games.
Even ones with $1000s of monthly patreon support and steam beta releases.
The fact remains that game dev is a labor of love for 99% of devs, due to the extreme hours of effort they must put in, the income will never be equivalent to the money they could make with the same effort in a "real" job (with the exception of dev in a low-wage country selling games to high-wage-country earners). So those who stick at it after the initial "honeymoon" period of a new project are few... and those who force themselves to keep going (or somehow find that game dev is their one true hobby interest) are a small minority.
Because burnout catches up to most devs eventually, statistically the longer you have been following a dev's game the more likely it is to occur to that dev.
it's a sad fact of life.
The burnout factor is why for commercial projects there is a separation of responsibility and external investors:
- an investor chooses to take a risk, and puts up a few million dollars (of a few hundre million for AAA)
- managers who have the job to "organize other worked to get it done" are given responsibilty. a plan is created, a delivery date decided, a scope is decided.
- the managers hire the creative talent to make the product.
- the investor's money pays everyone to work full time for months or years.
- eventually the money will run out, so the game must be shipped or the investor loses everything.
- if individual managers or creatives drop out part way through the process, the entity that is the company will replace them, and the juggernaut rolls on.
- (the downside is the old "too many cooks spoil the cooking" problem: generic, tasteless and boring product. made "safe" to try to avoid campaigns against the product, all to try and protect the investor's returns.
Even those making popular or long running games.
Even ones with $1000s of monthly patreon support and steam beta releases.
The fact remains that game dev is a labor of love for 99% of devs, due to the extreme hours of effort they must put in, the income will never be equivalent to the money they could make with the same effort in a "real" job (with the exception of dev in a low-wage country selling games to high-wage-country earners). So those who stick at it after the initial "honeymoon" period of a new project are few... and those who force themselves to keep going (or somehow find that game dev is their one true hobby interest) are a small minority.
Because burnout catches up to most devs eventually, statistically the longer you have been following a dev's game the more likely it is to occur to that dev.
it's a sad fact of life.
The burnout factor is why for commercial projects there is a separation of responsibility and external investors:
- an investor chooses to take a risk, and puts up a few million dollars (of a few hundre million for AAA)
- managers who have the job to "organize other worked to get it done" are given responsibilty. a plan is created, a delivery date decided, a scope is decided.
- the managers hire the creative talent to make the product.
- the investor's money pays everyone to work full time for months or years.
- eventually the money will run out, so the game must be shipped or the investor loses everything.
- if individual managers or creatives drop out part way through the process, the entity that is the company will replace them, and the juggernaut rolls on.
- (the downside is the old "too many cooks spoil the cooking" problem: generic, tasteless and boring product. made "safe" to try to avoid campaigns against the product, all to try and protect the investor's returns.
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