Hey guys, solo developer here. I wanted to see if a single person could launch a fully functioning puzzle game by using Flutter for the code framework and generative AI to assist with the graphic asset pipeline.

The result is Emoji Kingdom: Merge & Build. You match and merge different emoji tiers to collect resources and unlock buildings.

I’m stuck at 10 downloads right now and some automated filters on other platforms flagged my graphics as spam. I'm a real person just looking for actual players to tell me if the gameplay loop is fun, if the merge pacing feels rewarding, or if it gets boring too quickly.

If you like casual merge games or want to see a solo tech project in action, please check it out. You can find it by searching "Emoji Kingdom TGarai" or looking up the package ID: com.garaitapas2atgmaildotcom.emojikingdom

Direct link is in the comments section below. Let me know what you think!

​

Hi , I'm university student, computer engineering so I'm learning c++ and I'm wondering if I create game ( like small game and pixel game 2D ) by c++ and publish to steam to earn money ( yes I wanted to earn money )

Please let me know if it's worth to create game to earn money.

Im a Phd in marketing and i study behavioral psychology and economics. Game theory is an interesting topic for me.

I had an idea that I dont have time to build (because I left unity 3 years ago and dont have time to come back). Im sharing it here. Feel free to build it for yourself. If you need my help, i can support with money (as much as i can) and business side of it.

The idea is about a moba-style game, for example, 2 teams of 4 thieves or 4 teams of 2 entering a circular city in old Baghdad (inspired from thieves of baghdad). Their goal is to steal as much gold as possible while not being caught or executed. The tension is between risk-taking and being risk averse. Between greedying or being safe. The city has a hierarchy. Players start at one of the city gates and while the city overall hierarchy is the same, it's layout gets randomly generated before match starts. The layout goes from:

1. Farmers (poor - no security in their house - morally wrong to steal)

2. Workers (medium - low security - morally less wrong than farmers)

3. Artisans (good gold - medium security - morally neutral)

4. Traders (high gold - high security - morally right)

5. Nobles (extreme gold - extreme security - morally best to do)

At the center of the noble area is the palace, where guards are more on watch. But palace contains a lot of gold. Guards and people in houses are NPCs, thieves are players.

Stealing takes time increasing with the tier of house. Success rate depends on xp. Players choose characters with different abilities. They enter the city and start stealing at night. Until sunlight they have time to finish what they are doing. By sunlight, any remaining thief in the game will be caught and executed, losing any gain.

Goal: team clash depending on how much gold they could secure and gain players gain lp based on their contribution. Since some players may have different roles and characters, their contribution will be evaluated differently.

Morality: there is a trade off in each game. If players do morally wrong things, they go negative on morality gaining some benefits such as higher chance of stealing but they run the risk of npcs reporting them to guards etc. If they go positive on morality, npcs in lower tier help them in cases such as escaping guards or hiding from patrols.

I have so much more mechanics in mind.

If anyone is interested let me know. Just dm me so I can help you for free in its execution.

Also I would be more than happy if you have any ideas or concerns for mechanics etc.

I'm looking for the Unity PS4 Build Support module, specifically for Unity 2017.2.0p2. The historical download link I found no longer works.

Does anyone know of a working download or an authorized build environment I can access myself? Compatible versions are also welcome.

I don't have PlayStation Partners/DevNet access. Free options are preferred, but affordable alternatives are welcome.

I've been doing UE5 environment art, lighting and level design for about 6 years, and I always wanted to make games for a living. My plan is to do a bachelor's degree in 3D (no i won't do a game specific degree) a master's in Europe and get into the industry after that, so I'm still 5-6 years from working.

But I've read so many layoff stories, studio closures and posts about experienced devs who can't find work, and now I can't even open Blender without my brain going "what's the point, it's a sinking ship." I haven't done real work since July and I'm sick of it. I feel like all the passion I had just got buried under dread. Everything I look at (games, adjacent fields, tech in general) feels doomed, and I can't tell if I'm seeing reality or just panicking.

I don't want fake positivity and I don't want more doom either. I want honest takes from people actually working in the field:

*Is it still realistic to aim for games with a 5-6 year runway, or would you build toward something broader?

*Do environment art / lighting / level design skills actually transfer to other fields in practice?

*What are hiring managers looking for in juniors right now?

*If you've been through layoffs or a long rough patch, how did you come back from it?

Any perspective helps. Thanks for reading my rant 😅

I'm working on a survival game and thinking about how building should feel. What do you like most?

- Snap-to-grid modular building (Rust, Conan Exiles)

- Ghost blueprints that get built piece by piece (Sons of the Forest)

- Free-form with stability physics (Valheim, 7 Days to Die)

- Block-style building (Minecraft)

- Fortifying existing buildings (Project Zomboid, DayZ)

Also: do you prefer quick and simple, or slow and immersive? And what's your biggest pet peeve in building systems?

Thanks for any thoughts!

https://store.steampowered.com/news/group/4145017/view/677385962174549063

I love the new achievement sets, that way, you can avoid losing the 100% completion due to an update that hasn't been released yet or a DLC you don't own.

However, another QOL for developers is the automated grayscale generation for locked achievements, you can still upload a custom one, but when I added mine, it was a surprise that there was no feature to create these default grayscale icons

First and foremost I want to thank anyone that will answer my question(s).

I am planning to make my dream game after years but I couldn't start mainly because of hardware issues(my pc was terrible at running a lot of programs) and I have almost to none knowledge on programming.

Recently the desire to make that game ignited again and I want to actually start on something before I lose it again and I want to ask people about what kind of schedule you used while developing games.

If you used/made/checked tutorials do you have any no brainer recommendations(language tutorials, modeling, tutorials, game engine tutorials, and etc. Anything counts)

I assume people will also ask what kind of game I'm planning to make so I will include here beforehand:

In short I want to make a soulslike game(that's pretty much it)

If anyone can help me with these questions I really would be grateful and I wish everyone a great day/night.

Just walked out of a meeting.

Apart from having my competence questioned, what really got to me was hearing the devs being told they need to start shifting into other roles (like game design) because AI is gradually replacing them. My feelings about it are complicated.

Sad, because back when I was a fresher, I learned so much from devs. I tried to learn programming myself many times, and failed every time. To me, a dev was a kind of craftsman. But now development is just a skill, a "tool," the way we talk about Figma or Photoshop.

Complicated, because I was also bullied by devs. Because of them, I wanted to quit the industry. Then AI came along and helped me with that part, and I kept making games.

There are days like this, when the boundary between work and passion gets shaky, watching the thing you love get industrialized, turned soulless and assembly-line. I wonder: if everyone can easily make a game, who's still going to play them?

Anyway, right now an interactive game I made for an event is running there. Watching strangers, people who rarely touch games, poke around and figure out something I built... honestly, that makes me happier than being immersed in the current game industry. An industry that, not too far in the future, might become a factory full of workers with their brains squeezed dry, until something cheaper and faster comes along to replace them too.

Just for sake of an example, lets say you make a really fun Kangaroo simulator game hosted as a browser app. Is it ok to join random animal/zoology related fb groups and casually try to bring it up?

Not randomly of course, but usually under some given context. Example: Someone posts a silly picture of a real Kangaroo, then someone else comments on it and says "Man it must be so fun to be a kangaroo!", then you chime in and say "Haha yeah. If you're up to it, I built a game that makes you feel like one" and then drop the game in that message.

Is this sort of thing frowned upon? I feel like I'm selling away my dignity when I do this lol

Assuming of course that these groups do not have a explicit "NO ADVERTISEMENTS" sign written in their description.

Reason I ask is because I tried this thing in a chatroom once and got kicked out.

I'm a solo developer who usually makes plain simple visual novels on ren'py which are very easy to play test on my own, or my friends help me scour for spelling mistakes when it's in its most basic form

But I'm taking things a little further by using quick time events and different game modes, I want my friends to test my game in order to help me balance things out and make things fair or just challenging enough

I'm just not sure at what point do I give my friends the game to test? While the art is still just place holders? When I've cleaned it up and finalised it? Should it be public ready before I give it to my friends to test? Or should I do several tests? One at its prototype form, one at its final form?

All advice is appreciated :)

Yes, this is me speaking Japanese and eating bugs (!) This looks to be early, real-time performance capture tech. *The Polar Express* had just come out at the end of 2004, so this was a big deal for video games.

The video was shot using a Sony Cyber-shot P41 digicam at 640x480/12 frames per second.

I am playing this game from Jonathan Blow, and I have two questions.

1) How are the crystals made translucent like that? They almost feel alive. Is this shaders or just assets?

2) The game looks top down, but is 2.5 dimensional. How is this made? Is it just the assets or something more complicated is done in terms of programming.

Thank you very much.

May your game be a success.

Are there any game developers here? I would like to know what kinds of engine plugins can help optimize workflow and improve efficiency. Appreciate any help.

My first ever game Breakkaboom's DEMO is live on Steam. I'm participating in the Steam Next Fest for the first time hoping for some visibility and wishlist.

I have been working on this game for 7, 8 months and it's at a state where I can show people my work. Being an indie, social media is my only hope for some visibility but now a days releasing a Demo is the biggest form of advertisement you can do for your game. So for the last few weeks I have been working on this Demo. Polishing levels I wanted to include, adding new features, adding the freakin Settings menu etc...

This is my first time, so made stupid mistakes while demo release. Like uploading the wrong build. Totally messing up the steam capsule art, they specifically asked me to change it (In my defense, I'm a very bad artist, and I don't have money for hiring a professional artist). My friends played the demo and helped me find out many issues, I immediately fixed those, but couldn't submit the fix because of some security protocols of Valve, after almost 3 days I finally completed the authentication process and submitted an updated build as soon as possible.

Right now the Demo looks fine, to me at least... I know I need to improve a lot of things, I made a separate demo page so that people can review, good or bad I will know a lot of things from those I guess and hopefully make the experience better for the players! I have already got one review, it's positive, but I need a lot more to understand what player are actually thinking about the game... Let's hope for something better, if not the best(surely not with that capsule art)!

Cheers!

I’ve just started my game development adventure. I started with Godot to get a feel for the process. I really like the scripting as it’s pretty straightforward. However, my long term goal is a 3D farming game. I’ve heard that Unity is much better for 3D. I just got through with my first Zenva class in Unity and C# is a lot more complicated to learn.

Can Godot actually handle a 3D farming game or should I put my big girl pants on and learn C#?

This is by pixel in Procreate

Hey if you’re a developer looking for ideas to make games or don’t know how to start, I can help you out with ideas. I finished one of my story and I need developer too recreate it, I feel like this can become a big project and attract players to the game if we do it right. Please tell me if anyone is interested

Discord: Feltahz

I’ve never made a game before but I’ve thought that with my extra time I have, I could try my best to make a game. The game in mind would be 2d pixel art as that is the easiest thing for me so I don’t have to spend money on 3d assets and stuff like that. I thought of a few different ideas but none of them really intrigued me enough. That’s when I made the mistake of playing Elden Ring and now I really want to make an rpg game. This is a trap I’ve heard a lot of newbies fall into but I can’t stop thinking about all the different things I want to add and places to explore. My main problem at the moment is making the art. I’ve never done pixel art before or animation. And now I don’t know what engine to use. Do I use godot or unity etc. anyways, back to the art problem, I want my art to be simplistic for exploration and a Birds Eye view but when you go into a boss fight, I want a side on view with a little more detail. I’m willing to spend a lot of time on this project so the scale and the coding is not too worrying for me. Trial and error. It’s just that art. With the simplistic exploration view I don’t know how I’m going to differentiate armour and weapons because of the shear lack of detail I can put on a 16x16 sprite tile. That is basically all and I don’t even know if I’m going to go through with it. Any help is appreciated.

hello we are new stodio or team its me and ma friend now we gonna start devloping games they will been fun horror 2d 3d on future because we hope a big support from gays and ixactly arabic love you

Hello everybody, I was wondering about the future of game dev with all these new AI tools. It’s awesome that anyone can now bring their dream game to life without a huge budget, but I'm really curious about how this will impact game economics. If a game is mostly made with AI, should it cost less than a hand-crafted one? Will lower production costs push overall game prices down, or will easy creation just flood the market and devalue games in players' eyes? How do you see game pricing and perceived value changing over the next few years?

Just to be clear, this is a completely innoncent question with zero criticism intended, just curious about your thoughts