Others Where to start as a beginner, creating a simple game?

[oreoandcookies]

Hey, l have been a long time lurker on this forum and other sites and got the hunger for creating my own simple nsfw game. Before going into more details, this not l typical post that l am just looking to make a quick buck, doing this for own fun and excitment. Just a typical 10-20 min game and not like the hottest game on earth. Been wanting to make something such as "Being a DIK" (but more amateur ish ofc) or similiar to a visual novel where you can just do simple clicking and have the story/animations as the core gameplay. Have been using RenPY and Python trough Visual Studio code so l am bit tech savy to put in my own effort. To make my question a bit more simple what do you people recommend for make animations in addition to be able and use the animations/characters in the actual game as well?

Been checking out Blender and Unreal Engine before but in my personal opinion they dont seem like the best choice? So to keep it short, when you started making your own game is there some engine, software which is way superior to others in terms of user friendliness and the availability of online resources/guides?

If you have experience at making games, what are the things you wished did different when starting out?

 

[tooldev]

I start with the last question first:

Keep it small, keep it simple. Your self-estimate will exceed your actual capabilities quickly, as there is so much more in game making than coding or being tech savvy. Game design is an entire different way of putting things together, than one does in any other coding project. User interfaces become so much more important compared to any other application for example.

In a novel anything that doesnt keep a players focus on the actual story has immediate impact, as novels trigger imagination and/or immersion. Animations are basically small movies - so does your story gets better because you use animations? Can it transport the message without them? In most novel cases I dare to say: no to the first, yes to the latter. Which loops with the first answer: keep it simple. The time consumption of an animation will probably not be worth it for your first project.

Learn how a storyboard works and make one for your game, since it is supposed to be novel style.


Tools: Whatever you are most savvy in. The enduser doesnt care about any of it, as long as it is well-made.

Help: Dont think you can do everything yourself and it will be good. Dont be shy to see your personal limitations and ask for others to take care of the parts you are weak in. Just because I can write in English doesnt mean I can write a good novel


Last but probably the most important: Invest approx. 1 hour of your life and

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about one-page-design-documents. There is also similar length video of the original GDC 2010 talk

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[MissFortune]

If you're looking to just make a simple AVN, Daz will do you fine as long as you have a semi-competent Nvidia GPU.

We're starting to see more and more devs move over to Blender though as Daz grows increasingly anti-consumer and shows a clear lack of improving over time. However, Blender is significantly tougher to learn and will require more time getting a grasp on it than you would with Daz.

I'd avoid Unreal unless there's an element of your game that needs an engine like that.

 

[Kuviragames]

I just released my first game in Version 0.1. And i can tell you that the past 3 Month were a real rollercoaster in emotions, haha. There are so many things that you first realize when you get to that point.

If you have experience at making games, what are the things you wished did different when starting out?

I would not call myself experienced yet but i wish that i would have get more into all the Daz functions. Building a room instead of just using Presets and a lot of quality of life funtcions like Figures staying in place while applying a pose or dropping a prop next to the figure instead of miles away.

 

[Citrou]

A fellow beginner here.

Keep it small, keep it simple.

This! VN requires visuals as a must. Making them may be a very time-consuming thing. And I'm not even talking about animations, it can take forever for making a few seconds scene.

My case: started from turn-based combat console app after reading a certain book about C#.
Then decided to add text to it, took a story that I made up from times when I wanted to try to draw a hentai manga.
In the process of coding found out about Spectre.Console, NAudio and Ink dependencies that can help a simple console app have a more of a game-ish appearance.
Made basic functional for handling text, combats, music and pictures in game.

Now struggling writing dialogues in English.

Just making few working scenes feels kind of cool.
Despite of it's just a simple console app and very far from naming it a 'game'.

ask for others to take care of the parts you are weak in.

And this! You can try to make a thread in Recruitment & Services forum section to find fellows to start.
Or collaborate with someone who is looking for a help with programming.

Good luck with your first creation!

 

[Deleted member 3586865]

If you're looking to just make a simple AVN, Daz will do you fine as long as you have a semi-competent Nvidia GPU.

We're starting to see more and more devs move over to Blender though as Daz grows increasingly anti-consumer and shows a clear lack of improving over time. However, Blender is significantly tougher to learn and will require more time getting a grasp on it than you would with Daz.

I'd avoid Unreal unless there's an element of your game that needs an engine like that.

Oh, i am just curious really.
What about the assets like figures and clothing. Is there a store where you can get all that? Or do you make it yourself or rather do they (devs) make it themselves.
I didn't notice the shift but if there is something better maybe i should look in to that.
Whenever i look at the asset page there aren't many Blender assets.

 

[tooldev]

Oh, i am just curious really.
What about the assets like figures and clothing. Is there a store where you can get all that? Or do you make it yourself or rather do they (devs) make it themselves.
I didn't notice the shift but if there is something better maybe i should look in to that.
Whenever i look at the asset page there aren't many Blender assets.

Think of DAZ vs Blender in terms of pimping your car vs buying a brand pimped car. The former you can do with some stuff you buy at the next best autoshop and there is lots of of-the-shelf stuff already measured to fit the car model you drive. The latter is hand made and often by customer specs and requires deeper knowledge of the engine specs or the electronics etc.

DAZ comes with several shops and sources for ready to use base models, poses, clothing assets - you name it. If you can think of it somebody probably already made it at least once. Downside is that you will be limited in what the base model can do, its textures and poses. Blender is your actual tool to make all that yourself from scratch or actually modify down to the last screw and connector, while DAZ allows you to modify only up to a certain limit to ensure consistency between models and assets.

While DAZ allows you to be quicker at an actual result, it also means you will use something someone else used probably as well. Less unique overall. DAZ has specific way of achieving a similar result as something like Blender but uses its own wording and implementation (weight painting comes to mind right away - a feature that decides physics of clothing for example).

 

[Deleted member 3586865]

Think of DAZ vs Blender in terms of pimping your car vs buying a brand pimped car. The former you can do with some stuff you buy at the next best autoshop and there is lots of of-the-shelf stuff already measured to fit the car model you drive. The latter is hand made and often by customer specs and requires deeper knowledge of the engine specs or the electronics etc.

DAZ comes with several shops and sources for ready to use base models, poses, clothing assets - you name it. If you can think of it somebody probably already made it at least once. Downside is that you will be limited in what the base model can do, its textures and poses. Blender is your actual tool to make all that yourself from scratch or actually modify down to the last screw and connector, while DAZ allows you to modify only up to a certain limit to ensure consistency between models and assets.

While DAZ allows you to be quicker at an actual result, it also means you will use something someone else used probably as well. Less unique overall. DAZ has specific way of achieving a similar result as something like Blender but uses its own wording and implementation (weight painting comes to mind right away - a feature that decides physics of clothing for example).

All i can say is, i am not very good with it.
But, i know from experience that it is easy to just make a hole in an object.
DAZ is very... very... complicated.

I am not sure if i am good enough to create a figure. So, very uniquely, i would look for some market place.

In any case, i have to look into it a little more.

Thank you for the response

 

[MissFortune]

Oh, i am just curious really.
What about the assets like figures and clothing. Is there a store where you can get all that? Or do you make it yourself or rather do they (devs) make it themselves.
I didn't notice the shift but if there is something better maybe i should look in to that.
Whenever i look at the asset page there aren't many Blender assets.

While tooldev isn't wrong at all about Blender, most developers using it for AVNs are still using Daz models/assets with Blender, with some sprinkling of other addons/plugins for Blender that make life easier. You'd basically still be using Daz models, cloths, possibly hair (Daz hair isn't really great in Blender), and some environments/props. Alongside that, there's also 3DWarehouse, Sketchfab, and stuff like CGTrader and TurboSquid for smaller free stuff.

You do have the option of making stuff you need if you can't find it elsewhere, but you'll be able to find 99% of things. Modeling things yourself is generally not required, and imo, something you shouldn't be doing all the time if you're making an AVN. It can get time consuming fast, especially if it's more complicated. Even a lot of the Blender-ready models out there are typically based off of Daz figures themselves. The thing is with Blender is that you probably should only be using it if it offers something you need that Daz doesn't. For me, that's the cloth simulation/physics that you get from deform cages. Makes animating all of that fairly easy as opposed to manually doing all of it in Daz. There's also a lot of the camera effects that Blender has, as well.

Daz is a lot faster (generally) to work with, however. If John Doe knows what he's doing with both softwares and using the same assets for each scene in each software, he's going to get a lot better result a lot faster in Daz than he would in Blender as everything in the latter is a bit more manual than the equivalents in Daz would be.

I'd learn as much as you can in Daz first. Lighting, composition, angles/framing, posing, and stuff like that. Much of it will carry over to Blender, and with a little learning of how Blender works, it'll make carrying over quite a bit easier.

 

[Deleted member 3586865]

Just to mention.
Its been a year or two since i had Blender running.
When i did, i found a Blender asset side that had some really nice environments and figures and such. Though, you had to be member and pay a small fee to actually be able to download them.
Not sure what the licensing was.
So my impression is, you have to create it yourself if you want to do anything that involves selling a game.
Then the sex parts, i am not sure but i think i didn't find any then.
Creating is probably not that hard but takes time to refine it. My impression was, it's like clay.
My main objective would be to get away from DAZ entirely and not switch between them. But then again, i would do it just for fun and not for commercial interest.
All this came to late in my life really for learning and getting it. So far, i am happy i can create a 0815 scene and the lights are right. That is in DAZ of course.