I'm just wondering if anyone else finds difficulty dividing time between playing games and making them?
I do not work in the industry, I'm more like an afternoon or weekend coder, but find that I'm allways torn. Should I add that enemy or cube it up.
I barely play games except at school. I'm never at a loss for some coding or other development type stuff to do. It helps that my favourite games are multiplayer FPS etc., and having a 56k connection atm turns me off playing those games online. So i'm not THAT torn between coding and playing :)
CYer, Blitz
if you don't have a job, and you are playing games, then in my book you are an idiot. btw, this includes myself.
what you/we need a kick in the pants, how can you _EVER_ expect to get work in the game industry if the quality of your your suxs because instead of working you have been wasting your time playing games.
pardon rant, had a game job interview(s) today, and faced the horrible task of claiming to be a gamer when i don't own a console (do own console game but try to limit myself to 1 or 2 short PC games each year). My art work pays my rent, tends to be pretty good motivation to work and not waste too much time....
I don't think playing games is a waste of time when you want to end up creating assets for them.
As an artist I find its a good way of researching what needs to been done with all sorts of aspects of gaming. Animations, designs, modelling, textures etc bla bla....
I think its a plus to be an avid gamer if you want to work in the industry, hell I play games a few hours every other day and still manage to work, socialise and make my own models.
Its all about balance young padawan. [:)]
btw, I only own a PC and a PS1, does that mean I'm not a gamer? bah foohey me says!
You just need a little self control[:p].
I usually only play my Xbox or PC 2-3hrs every 2 or 3 days. I tend to lose self control whenever i get a new game, for example i got Midtown Madness 3 not long ago and i played it alot until i almost finished it. Before i got my Xbox when i was doing my Qantm Multimedia Diploma i was almost a LAN addict, i used to play alot of Quake, Return to Castle Wolfenstien and Battlefield 1942. In the end my work suffered and my marks dropped but atleast i learned my lesson.
I think i might actually go have a LAN session later today[;)].
haha, I love that excuse, "I'm researching", sometimes it's true, other times not :)
sometimes I try not to worry too much and just go with what I feel and find that that way I still somehow get things done.I feel guilty buying a new game, coz when I'm handing oer the money, I know I will probably get nothing done over the next month :P
BTW, being an avid gamer is NOT a bad thing if you want to get a job in the industry. A lot of the people i've talked to (well, i've only talked to a few) who are involved in the hiring process at game studios are very interested in your gaming. They don't want to hire people who aren't interested in games. I guess the rational is if you love games you're going to put that extra ounce of effort in to make the game the best it can be...
CYer, Blitz
You do need to play some games and see what the current technological and gameplay bars are.
Once you have a job in the industry - it'll be easier to make time for games (in some ways) as you will be fulfilling your creative needs at work and you can be free to spend the rest of your time as you will.
I go through phases of lots of gaming then none. I just make sure that I play the major releases, you know? Of course, the high cost of gaming can make this difficult.
I guess you'd find other ways to entertain yourself then, but I mean you'd always want to play other games than the ones your developing, since they would give you a break or seomthing from work...
Or I mean when you get home after work you could *gasp* have a real life, with a girlfriend or Significant other...
whoa!
Real Life TM ??? Noooooo NEVER!!!!!!
Stay back foul fiend!
But on the subject of playing games for research, i think it is legitimate, BUT you must have your research goals laid out before you start playing the game, otherwise you're just playing a game :)
For instance, recently i played a whole bunch of racing games, because i was implementing the camera for the racing game at school. So i played a level or half of about 10 different racing games to see how they handle it.
I think though, when you are properly researching a game, or games, it is about as much fun as QA work. You're too busy paying attention to tiny little details, you're not really playing the game at all.
CYer, Blitz
quote:Originally posted by tachyon
has anyone gotten into the industry, and is now completely sick to shit of games, because games is now associated with work, rather than relaxation? you come home from work and think "if i see another computer game i'm gonna @#$$$"
Yeah I know a few people who've lost all interest in playing games since working in the industry. I've known some who were never great fans of games before entering the industry but love developing them... then again I've known some who love playing them and hate developing them [:)]
quote:Originally posted by Red 5
Yeah I know a few people who've lost all interest in playing games since working in the industry. I've known some who were never great fans of games before entering the industry but love developing them... then again I've known some who love playing them and hate developing them [:)]
There is a whole variety of strange and wierd people in this world!
i dont play many games anymore-
i keep my 3d computer clean of games. only max and photoshop on it. ive even taken off the microsoft games :)
no im not a game nazi :) i have another crappier computer with games on it i play a couple times a week.
ohh..but i do play minesweeper flags on msn sometimes. [8D]
I wonder how you can not like playing games and still make them?
or is it that you have enough of playing them x hrs a day that when you get home u just wanna do something else? I spoze in this frame of mind not much good,original stuff would get created,or is it that some like to draw, others code, one music and so on, not thinking too much about the whole?? (I'm thinking here of large studios) not knowing what actually goes on behind the scenes of a $100 title.But I'm off topic now.
woops.
When my main interest was mapping for cs i hardly played the game at all, I got the satisfaction out of seeing the game played by others or (when testing) with bots to see how the game flow went etc. Nothing wrong with that, i'd still enjoy a lan game with friends on these maps but 90% of my time was spent making and testing these levels.
People thought it funny that they could beat me on my own maps heh.. my excuse "i was looking at the texture alignment on this wall"
playing and testing are a blurred but definate line... when I was modding q2 i spent alot of time getting the feel for new features i made (eg. more than 10 hours play time on the the controls for a flying character).
but i gotta stop playing so many games... it's just that after writing so much boring code for uni each day, i have no desire left to code afterwards.
Definitely... I generally work around 10 hrs per day, 6-7 days a week which doesn't leave too much time for playing games since I have a family to consider, but I usually manage to get in a couple of hours each week.
I'd love to spend a lot more time playing games but I've had to discipline myself and think of the money... it doesn't help when you work from home and have no one telling you what to do.
Games are great to relax with, but as you'd know you can waste so much otherwise productive time on them.