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    Let's have a chat about the Dunning-Kruger Effect

    January 20, 2021

    Let's have a chat about the Dunning-Kruger Effect

    Let's have a chat about the Dunning-Kruger Effect

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 01:53 AM PST

    Just to preface this thread; I am a professional software developer with years of experience in the software industry. I have released a game and I have failed many smaller and bigger game projects. With that out of the way...

    So recently a thread was posted that talked about going against sound advise to make a big ambition project that took 4 years. Now normally this would probably not be that big a deal right? Someone posts a post mortem, sometimes disguised as a game ad, and then everyone pats everyone's backs while giving unsound advise or congratulations.

    The post mortem is read, the thread fades away and life goes on. Normally the damage caused by said bad advise is minimal, as far as I can tell. These post mortem write-ups come by so few at a time that most don't even have to be exposed to them.

    But it seems I was wrong. Reading the responses in https://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/l0qh9y/dont_make_your_first_game_a_stupidly_big_project/ have shown that there are far more people in this sub who are looking for confirmation bias than I originally thought. Responses include things such as:

    Honestly, I think people need to realize that going for huge ambitious projects is a good thing.... (this answer had a gold award)

    After being called out for this being unsound advise the same person counters with:

    Oh, my bad. I shoulda said, you should make at least 4 or 5 projects and watch a ton of tutorials otherwise you'll never know what to do and you'll get lost alot. It took me 2 weeks of game designing to actually figure out everything I needed to know to make a basic game that is playable and hypercasual and easy to make, after you do projects that are super easu to do, you can actually get out there and do whatever the hell ya want.

    Showing that clearly they are just throwing ill advise out there without any regard for what this could do to beginners understanding of making games. They just extrapolate some grand "wisdom" and throw it out there, because how hard could it really be to make games huh?

    Lets take another one:

    Right!? I feel like 84% of advice to beginners is to start small simply so you can finish. But in some ways, learning is a little more important than finishing. (emphasis is mine)

    This is from the person who posted the thread, despite the thread having multiple people confirming that learning how to finish something is so valuable in the gamedev industry compared to "just learning how to do things". This can be seen in multiple places throughout the thread. OP making claims about gamedev, despite having this one outlier and trying to dress it up as the "rule" rather than the exception it is.

    Here is another one:

    I feel like as a noobie the 'start small so you can finish' mindset hinders developers from truly improving because the advice you get it is always about 'you're too ambitious, start small.' instead of actual advice. (emphasis is mine)

    This is hugely indicative of the idea that because the person doesn't get to hear what they want to hear, then it's somehow not sound advise. You cannot take shortcuts to improve your skills. You can only learn by doing and being overwhelmed before you even start is never gonna get you to the learning phase at all.

    There are people with two weeks of "experience" giving advise in this thread. People with a few months worth of experience who never finished a single thing giving "advise" in this thread. There are so many examples in this thread of straight up terrible advise and people helplessly fighting the confirmation bias that some people are clearly displaying. Here is another piece of dangerous advise for beginners:

    I'm in the same boat as OP. Just decided to go all out for my first project. I wanted to make a game I want to play, and that happens to be medium scope. 4 years of solo dev in.

    And then a few lines further down in that same reply they write:

    My biggest tip is just make what you want to play, set up your life so you can survive during your first project (part time job or something) and take it one day and one task at a time. Game development is not a business you should be in for the money anyway so you do what you want to do, or do something else. (emphasis is mine)

    This is an absolutely terrible take. Making games is a career and the idea that you shouldn't go into any career expecting to make a profit to support yourself is either a hugely privileged position to be in or one that does not value the work that people do. Terrible take. Do not follow this mantra. If you want to make it a hobby, go for it. Go nuts. But the idea that game development is not something you should go into expecting to make a living, is fucking terrible to write in a GAMEDEV FORUM.

    And the writer of the thread agrees even!!!

    100% this. I sent you a PM, but I wanna say publicly that you should share your insights about your game journey. A rising tide lifts all boats!

    Here is another claim:

    I definitely agree with this. I personally have no interest in making a small mobile game or 2D platform. But i have lots of motivation to work on my "dream game." I focus on pieces at a time and the progress is there and it continues to be motivating! (emphasis is mine)

    This smells like a beginner underestimating how much work it actually takes to make even the smallest of games, clearly showcasing how valuable the skill of finishing game actually is because if they knew then this would not even come up!

    Some other nuggets:

    YES. Go big or go home. Unless it's a game jam. Then go medium. And if it's an hamburger, medium well.

    Or this one:

    I have to agree. Big projects teach so much. The amount of organizational and structuring skills that you learn to keep your projects easy to work on are immensely useful.

    Or how about this one:

    I agree 100%. There is no reason to aim smaller. If you have a goal, go for the goal!! There is no motivation otherwise. All the obstacles in between are things you will have to figure out anyway.

    And so on. You hopefully get the idea at this point. People who are tired of seeing game jam ideas. People who are tired of seeing unfinished small projects, etc. People want to see the cool projects. They want to see success because they have failed so much. It's an expression of frustration of never getting anywhere. Though we also have to acknowledge that because of this, people are full of bad advise, and they seem to be unaware of how big of an impact this leaves on beginners or just how much they don't actually know. Most of this is caused by something in psychology called the Dunning-Kruger Effect which is defined by wikipedia as:

    The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which people with low ability at a task overestimate their ability. It is related to the cognitive bias of illusory superiority and comes from people's inability to recognize their lack of ability.

    This is something that needs to be seriously considered when you want to give advise on anything, not just gamedev. If you actually have no experience to really speak of, then why even try to look knowledgeable on the subject in the first place? What do you gain from that? Some karma? It just contributes to a worse environment overall and a bunch of people who parrots your bad advise in the future if you get enough upvotes (or a gold in this thread's case, jfc...)

    I don't want to come across as gatekeeping, I'm merely trying to make people understand that if we keep parroting terrible advise because "well we just wanna get to the good parts" then perhaps the people giving that advise are simply not knowledgeable enough yet to understand what it takes to work at *anything*.

    To be fair though this is an illusion that's been sold to the indiegame space for years now. The idea that making games is so easy. Just look at the marketing of any commercial game engine. It's so easy! So Eaaassyyyyyy!!!! To make videogames. And sure, when you see professionals with decades of experience making games and cool experiences left and right in a matter of months, then how hard could it REALLY be for beginners??

    Please do some serious self reflection and figure out if what you are about to say is just some kind of hunch based on literally no experience and youtube videos or if you believe your experience have *actually* given you something worthwhile to say in terms of advise.

    I hope some people here, and the mods of this sub, could take this to heart. The people who tried to fight the tsunami of bad advise with actual good advise, thanks for trying! You are fighting the good fight.

    submitted by /u/DynMads
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    Just got the best reject mail from a well-known publisher

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 07:37 AM PST

    Wanted to share it with you guys!

    ​

    Hello ZZ,
    Many thanks for submitting Smithy Wars to XXX for review.
    Unfortunately at this point we're going to politely decline the opportunity to partner with you on Smithy Wars.
    I know this is probably not the outcome you wanted but I can assure you we haven't taken the decision lightly.
    We think you have a really interesting game but at this time Smithy Wars isn't lining up with our product focus which is the primary reason.
    This doesn't mean that the door is closed though, should you still require publishing help when you're further down the line or you have any future projects then you have my email address and we'll always be happy to look at what you're working on.
    Good luck with the rest of development and we look forward to seeing Smithy Wars in stores in the near future.
    Sincerely,
    YY

    ​

    They said it was not a lightly decision! They rejected it just cuz it doesn't align to their values! They let me use their mail in case I have another project!

    The publisher has somes games I played and loved. This really made my day.

    I think I will print it and hug it while i go to sleep.

    submitted by /u/andrianodia
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    I've composed over 150 songs and released them under the CC BY 4.0 license which you can use in any personal and commercial project and they're all free!

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 02:46 AM PST

    How to download the songs separately?

    To download the songs individually, you can visit my website onemansymphony.com. If the songs don't load immediately, it's probably because of the high volume of traffic I'm getting. Please be patient.

    Can I download the full album with one click?

    You can download the full album in one RAR & ZIP file by following this Bandcamp link.

    Is this album updated regularly?

    Yes! Whenever I add a new song or sound effect to the library, I announce it on my Twitter. I also have a YouTube channel where I upload the songs to. I would suggest checking the tweets/videos or the album page regularly if you're in need of new music frequently.

    What's the total size of the library and in which format do they come in?

    Total file size varies in format. You can download the songs in MP3, FLAC, AAC, OGG, ALAC, WAV and AIFF formats on Bandcamp. Official website offers only MP3 files at the moment.

    How can I support this project?

    I'm planning to expand this library's content as much as possible, and doing so takes a great amount of time, and calls for new virtual instruments and tools to create songs in rich and different sound. My current goal is to keep adding more songs in different genres into this library as well as creating environmental sound effects in high quality. Also Bandcamp limits the quantity of free downloads so I need to buy more "free download credits" to make the album even more accessible. More information about the subject can be found ​here. Due to these reasons, I created a Patreon page if you'd like to support this project. I'm using the donations I'm getting through Patreon to buy new virtual instruments at the moment.

    Can I listen to these songs on Spotify?

    Yes! Uploading the songs to Spotify takes longer than uploading them to Bandcamp so not all of the songs are available on Spotify yet, but you can listen to some of them by following this Spotify link.

    What about the license? (CC BY 4.0)

    You can use any song in this library in anyway you want, be it as a sound effect in your game or as a background music in one of your Youtube & Twitch videos, even commercially. If you'd like to find more information about the license, please check this creativecommons.org link. Providing an appropriate credit (Either Composed by onemansymphonycom or patreon.com/onemansymphony) is required.

    How should I credit you?

    You can provide a link to one of the websites above in your project's description section (Youtube, Vimeo, etc). If you're planning to use them in a movie, you can provide one of the links in the rolling credit section.

    Will you make different/alternative versions of the songs?

    I already did this with some songs such as Uncharted Planet and After The Disaster, and I keep planning to do so. I think it's important to be able to evoke different emotions by using different variations of a main theme. Having and using alternative tracks also help with maintaining the musical integrity of the main medium/emotion.

    What DAW do you use to compose these songs?

    Mostly FL Studio.

    If I suggested a theme, would you compose something that in theme?

    I'm definitely open to new ideas! I can't make any promises on if I will definitely compose something in that theme/mood/genre and how long completing it would take, but please feel free to make suggestions if you think there is a lack of resources in a genre/mood/theme/etc.

    Why do you do this?

    A few years ago I was creating my own scenes in a game engine and Blender 3D. Sometimes, I needed some tracks to test the scenes to see how things were getting together. I realized that even though it was relatively easy to find tracks that sound 8-bit, it was pretty difficult to find high quality and various tracks in other genres such as ambient and BGM. So instead of waiting for someone to create such album, I did it myself. (I've been writing music since I was a kid so I thought why not record and share them with people who might be in need of them just like I was.)

    Feel free to ask if you guys have any questions.

    submitted by /u/Imightberobot
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    I'm starting a little game art blog, mostly aimed at people like me who haven't got much money and just want to get into games development. Any feedback is appreciated!

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 05:36 AM PST

    I made a fun Unity shader graph and script that work together to create randomly colored waves wherever you click! Tutorial in the comments

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 09:21 AM PST

    Building A Flappy Bird Clone to Spite my Brother: A Post-Mortem

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 06:07 AM PST

    A bit of background

    I have been making games as a hobby for over 13 years now. I've got no major releases outside of game jams, and it has mostly been a side gig. I don't have the closest relationship with my younger brother, but over the last year or so we've managed to build up a little more of a friendship. We are complete opposites - he is sporty, likes to go out partying, etc, and I don't drink, hate sports (unless you count Beat Saber). He has absolutely zero interest in games. So when he posted a link to a Flappy Bird clone on Facebook, I saw that as an in - I immediately commented to tell him that I didn't realise people still played Flappy Bird, and I could make him something better in a day. He said there's no way I could do that, we had a bit of back and forth and it ended with him saying "then do it".

    WELL.

    Challenge accepted my good sir. This is the only time you've ever taken interest in what is essentially my only hobby, so you can be damn sure I'm going to put my entire heart and soul into this.

    The actual post-mortem bit

    The Idea

    The idea is not a new one, it's a really straightforward game with two mechanics: thing jump and thing hit obstacle. Easy enough, so how can I make that "better"? For a start, the original Flappy Bird and the majority of its clones look like complete garbage, so I imported Shapes by Freya Holmer™️, turned on HDR colours, made the camera background a dark grey, and added bloom. Perfect.

    The Core Mechanics

    Happy with the visual style, I got to programming the core mechanics - which took about 30 minutes or so. There's not much I can say about that to be honest, it really is one of the easiest projects to get started with! I did some fancy bits like implementing a better random number generator (Squirrel3 if you're interested), but none of that is particularly interesting.

    Making it different

    So how do I make it better. It looks better (in my opinion), sure, but that's not enough - I said I'd make a better game so that's what I'm going to do. My strongest asset is my ability to pay for audio (Christian Royle is amazing and works incredibly quickly), so why not make it all sync to the beat? Everything is better with good music, and things that sync to the beat are a cut above that. Incredibly satisfying. I love it when a plan comes together.

    WebGL Sucks Ass

    Two and a half hours later and I've got a fonky track from Christian and an event that fires on every beat, all that's left to do is hook up the obstacle spawning to that and go! So I build for WebGL and all seems to be working fine. I upload to my personal site, test it with a few other game devs from a couple of Discord servers (Game Dev Underground and GD101). Great!

    WebGL says no. The game doesn't work on Safari, and my brother only has an iPhone. It looks like my hopes of a "hey look it's done" post less than half a day after the challenge was issued have been completely dashed. After about an hour of debugging, I decided that it's just one of those WebGL things so I'll just have to build for iOS - luckily I'm an app developer by trade, so that was no issue. Apple's review process can take days, so all that was left to do was wait for them to approve it.

    Conclusion

    So what's the point of all this? Was it all worth it? Well, I set up an indie studio two years ago and up until now had nothing really to show for it. I've bounced between projects (I'm the embodiment of Shiny Object Syndrome), but now I've actually made some money! All the tax stuff has been set up, I can officially make money from games now. Do I care that it's only £10.40? Hell no, that's money that strangers on the internet have given me for a thing I have made. Plus, people have said nice things about the game on the internet - I didn't actually think that was possible!

    But most importantly of all,

    It's good is that 😂 it's well addictive

    - my brother

    submitted by /u/theChief__
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    Do young gamers like pixel art?

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 12:49 PM PST

    I'm in my mid 30s. I LOVE pixel art. Brings back great memories.

    How about the young ins though? Do they like, don't mind, or prefer something else?

    Thanks

    submitted by /u/theRealLOCURO
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    Question about using Apple's and Google Play's Promote forms to get featured

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 11:31 AM PST

    Hi all, in a few weeks, I'll have a new game that I'll be submitting through these designated forms for a chance to get featured. I'm hoping some of you would care to share their knowledge and shed some light on the following:

    1. Does an App Store/Google Play editor have access to and able to play the games submitted through these portals even if the game has not yet been released? Or do I have to set up a link to a beta version and include that in my submission?
    2. If I make revisions (as in upload a new version) after I've submitted the game for consideration, does that effectively invalidate my submission and I have to do it all over again? Would that also reset the 4-8 week waiting period?
    3. If I were to make a small presentation about the game to include in the submission, what format is commonly acceptable?

    Just to be clear, the below links are to the forms in question:

    https://developer.apple.com/contact/app-store/promote/

    https://support.google.com/googleplay/contact/indie_corners

    submitted by /u/francisisfine
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    How do I learn to manipulate third party animations and models?

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 10:23 AM PST

    I want to buy some 3D animations (for now I'm using free ones to practice) and rotoscope them for a top-down 2D game, but I don't know much about Blender or 3D animation- I just want to play the anim from the camera angle I need, record it, split it into frames, and trace over them to turn it into 2D sprite frames. The thing is I don't know how to assign the premade animations to a dummy or a model. All blender tutorials I've seen deal on making your own animations, not using someone else's.

    How can I make the dummy move? And is there a way to quickly switch between animations in a folder to save time? or do I have to import a new animation when I'm done?

    submitted by /u/Bruhposter45
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    What would you consider a reasonable "order of operations" for trying to build your first project/game?

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 07:43 AM PST

    Honestly, I'm not quite sure what my intentions or goals with all this are quite yet. I'm screwing around with Unreal Engine, and just on a whim, went a paid for a domain for a hypothetical "studio" I might want to start, and I've been thinking about what kind of a relatively small-scale game I would like to make.

    I started thinking about paying an artist to do character-designs, but then I thought, "I'm clearly getting way ahead of myself". But then I just got to wondering, "if I'm trying to do most of this myself, and then outsource what I'm not capable of, what makes the most sense for an order-of-operations?"

    For example, should I really start fleshing out the story and overall "vision" for my game now, since some of those details would ideally be integrated with the gameplay and level-design? Or should I just focus squarely on building a sort of "sandbox" to refine the gameplay and mechanics I want to have, and worry about building "the game" sort of last?

    I would assume I can get away with using a lot of placeholders until near the end; generic character-models, generic sounds, no music, levels that are fun to run and jump around, worrying about "environments" last?

    I mean, I know full well I'm not going to be rolling out some kind of masterpiece or anything. But I'm a huge believer that being organized will get things done much quicker, so any feedback on that process is greatly appreciated!

    submitted by /u/Jcorb
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    Does anybody else think people frame questions here just in order to get free marketing for their upcoming release?

    Posted: 19 Jan 2021 02:09 PM PST

    It seems to be happening more often.

    submitted by /u/ptaylor420
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    Physics Engine

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 12:56 PM PST

    I'm trying to figure out which physics engine I should use for my project. I need to simulate 2d balls, that can be deformed, in an enclosed space, that have their own driving force. Any and all help would be really appreciated thank you!

    submitted by /u/Final_Number3935
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    I made the second part of my tutorial on creating Sniper Shooting mechanics, in this part I will show you how to make wind that interacts with the bullet

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 12:34 PM PST

    Gamemaker studio 2 splash screen

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 08:31 AM PST

    does the gamemaker studio 2 creator has a splash screen? if so can I disable it or just change it?

    submitted by /u/_skott_
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    Is enemy predictability important for players to feel a sense of empowerment?

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 08:00 AM PST

    At what point does having NPC enemies become too predictable make the game not fun or too easy?

    submitted by /u/MarcoPoloStudios
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    What is the purpose of this subreddit ?

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 04:12 AM PST

    https://old.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/l165o1/lets_have_a_chat_about_the_dunningkruger_effect/

    https://twitter.com/TylerGlaiel/status/1351673290520084482

    As an amateur it makes me laugh so much. In reality, I have a real job that allows me to live comfortably. So I don't understand this obsession for the dev's community to... well, to take out a finished thing and SELL it. Like... in other creative circles, there is no such obsession. When a guy is painting on Sundays, he's advised to learn the basics of drawing... But you don't get on those high horses if he wants to do the Sistine Chapel in his living room or a little shitty painting. My wife is a writer and has already published (and she had a real profession that brings in the pittance). She is on writer's forums. There are often people who come to say that they want to write an epic novel in 10 volumes with a hundred characters. Here, there are two choices. Either the guy writes these 10 volumes in his corner without any other ambition to write and ... ok, why not. He's part of the community and it's all about things and others about the aspect of writing. Either he tells everyone that he's going to be the next Harry Potter, in which case, yes, he's advised to start with short stories first. But the goal in itself of these creative groups, especially at the amateur level where we do our own work on Sunday afternoons... It's just to exchange on what brings us closer. Among the gamedevs there is really no such thing. It's always about success, failure, finishing a game, the best strategy to become a multimillionaire. Whereas honestly... most of the "pro" who post... well, sometimes they shouldn't have released their game (here, it's the player who speaks).

    So, you know a place where we just "talk" about our hobbies, how proud we are because we implemented a feature and that's it? Because honestly, this subreddit, I wonder what it's for. I have a thousand times more fun reading the subreddit "game design" where the community is top-notch, we're just talking about game design, how to implement this or that game rule and that's all.

    There isn't this aggressiveness of the pros (because their life is hard and all that…), no disguised ads, no artists who want to promote themselves by offering free samples, no youtube tutorials repeating advice already discussed by Brakeys and so on.

    Because as an amateur, I don't care about success. I put money into my project like I could put it in my car or in a tennis racket. And... I hesitate to write it... But really, I don't care if the life of a pro is so difficult. In fact, I know, that's why I didn't take any training related to video games. Just like I know that being a professional photographer is hard. But that's not going to stop me from taking pictures and posting them on my facebook.

    PS : And if I have to go completely against the tide: I even think that the players as a whole should be encouraged to make games, even the most ambitious games possible. Just to teach them how it's hard. No, it's not so easy to add this feature in a game they like. No, a patch is not enough to make a broken game playable.

    I mean... That's kind of what happens in other arts. Fans of a rock band, they'll get a guitar and sing their favorite song. And that's good. Some will stop, some will continue, and make their own song, learn music theory and maybe some of them will become professionals.

    submitted by /u/Molina_Eco
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    UE4 Tutorial: Ragdoll with getting up (free download)

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 10:46 AM PST

    I always wanted to learn how to make a Tilt-Shift effect(in Unity) so when I figured it out, I made a tutorial! ⬇︎

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 10:34 AM PST

    Which engine should I pick for VR gamedev in 2021?

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 10:25 AM PST

    Hello!

    I want to start developing for VR (I can code, but no gamedev experience besides some unity test/college projects), and while doing my research I've seen some WILDLY different claims throughout the last 2 years about the state of those 2 engines in relation to VR.

    I saw some saying that stuff like VRUE makes Unreal better because it's better than the Unity equivalents, that Unity is currently half-broken because of the new rendering types where half the features work on ones, but not on others, and that there are various problems around that, and then I've heard that Unity is much better because of better documentation and it being easier to find help and tutorials online.

    Now these do sounds like pros/cons, and I am kinda leaning towards Unreal because I like how good stuff looks and I like Quixel stuff being free, but I have no bias either way since I've never really got deep into either of them.

    So my question is - is there any reason NOT to go with one or the other regarding VR?

    Does one have much superior learning resources over the other, or can you get around with both?

    Thanks in advance!

    submitted by /u/Stefan474
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    What type of game was your first solo project

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 06:28 AM PST

    Hey all,
    Made a few small games as school projects with deadlines but i want to practice and improve now that im done with school. ive dabbled with a few ambitious projects. Recently im just looking for a solo project what i can finish to practice.
    What type of game was your first solo project that you finished. Im looking for some non ambitious inspiration.

    submitted by /u/CptOconn
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    How to implement auto saving without lag?

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 06:07 AM PST

    I am curious what techniques there are to achieve auto-saving from a general game design perspective. I am building a game in Godot Engine and currently thinking about how to approach auto saving. I want to play the game in the browser, so multi-threading is not an option.

    Someone suggested to save whenever opening the pause menu, others suggested to do partial saves distributed over multiple frames, which might result in corrupted save files.

    submitted by /u/myrealityde
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    Marketing: Is there any point in buying ads for a "Coming Soon" game on Steam?

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 06:06 AM PST

    And if there is, assuming you've worked out your CTR costs and so on, which platform would be the best?

    submitted by /u/Agreeable-Snape
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    "Severe Level Design" is my level design philosophy for creating proper pacing in the games that I make. Please check it out and let me know if you agree, or have more to add!

    Posted: 20 Jan 2021 05:56 AM PST
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