how to make video game?

Just posted on the other thread asking for software choice but this question is slightly from a different angle - so I'll answer it that way.

You can pick up some great software like Unreal Engine 4, Unity, Godot, GameMaker, Cry Engine, etc. Those are all engines where you can create your game.

Which software should you use? It depends on your skill level and also what your goal is AND also what computer specs you have.

A safe bet (lower computer specs and no prior knowledge at all) would be something like either GameMaker or Unity. If you have better specs and know that you want to learn to eventually become a indie/aaa dev, then Unity or UE4 would be a good choice.

The learning process is different for everyone. It could look something like this.

Course Route
- Pick up a beginner course like the ones you can find on Udemy, etc. and work through that
- Take notes as you go and review them every day.
- Once you've learned something, try exploring and pushing the boundary. Break the game so you can learn to fix it.
- Utilize search / forums / chats to find solutions to your problems
- After completing the course ask yourself if you understand or not. If you don't, repeat the course. If you do, try recreating it without any aid.
- Once finished, get another course
- After several courses, pull up tutorials on additional things you may need in a game like Inventory system, questing system, etc. and learn from those videos

Youtube Route
- Find a Youtuber that you enjoy their teaching style, and go through all their videos.
- Repeat steps from above.

Book Route
- Pick up a book on coding for games like a C# book specifically on Unity.
- Study the book and work through the examples
- Once your confident switch tracks to either courses or other videos to fill in knowledge gaps.

School (expensive)
- Study pre-reqs and self teach yourself until you can get into a course.
- Find a certificate program or a degree program that suits your needs.
- Understand that even school won't teach you everything and you'll eventually need to repeat the above mentioned steps on your own at some point
- Join some school groups and learn together with your small team, working on projects


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Things to keep in mind. Creating games is a blast, but it's also about being able to sit behind a computer for many hours and solve problems. The common misconception is that you have to be "good" at math, etc. Not true. Creating games can take many forms and be done from many approaches. It's about what do you want to create and how much time and effort are you willing to dedicate to it.

Creating games is similar to programming in that it really is about you being a self starter and self motivated to continue learning and seek out answers to your questions. You will never learn everything you want/need to learn from a tutorial/book. You will stumble onto problems and your task is to seek out the answer or figure it out on your own. That's the fun part.

The great thing though is that you don't have to be alone. There are plenty of discord groups that exist for people into game development. A lot of the discord groups supporting a youtube game dev channel are particularly friendly to newbies.

Either way understand its a marathon, not a sprint. Educate your expectations. Don't expect to make Assassins Creed or World of Warcraft. As a solo dev you have to understand the limitations, but you can still make amazing AAA games if you have a TON of time and put a ton of effort into it.

Enjoy the journey!