SC2 editor, as well as other blizz games' editors, are a great and welcomish gate to the world of game developing. It lured to game making many people who, otherwise, would never even think about making games. Editor made the start very easy, because Editor is pretty high level in terms of programming, includes tons of assets. But it also teaches many things: how to code, how to organize a big project, and how to work for months on a project and still be organized and motivated. It teaches game design, art generating skills, building a team. It improves one's imagination, and opens horizons.
But it also has limits. And some people after years of mapmaking can feel those limits. Galaxy language isn't a full object oriented language. Also, triggers/galaxy are slow due to bnet latency. High level organization of the editor makes some genres hard to create. And again, latency makes arcade/action ganre unplayeable online.
Another thing is playerbase. We can count on... dunno... 100K players? Not that much.
And another thing is... poor monetization. Yea, most of us are enthusiasts and love mapmaking, do it as a hobby, but it consumes alot of time, and some people create amazing games, and sometimes think about a reward other than good rating and good popularity.
So, editor gave us alot, made us good game designer and coders. And some of us may feel that they have grown up for something more.
But for what? For taking raw Cpp and openGL to spam real games? Well, the gap is too big between super high level Editor and rather low level Cpp.
So, maybe there are other game engines exist, that have no SC2 Editor limits, but still pretty high level and convenient for not hardcore professional coders?
Glad you asked. Because it's the subject of this thread. There are Unity3D engine, and Unreal Engine.
Both can be a perfect platform to move to, to keep growing as a game designer.
I, myself, learned Unity3D, and can tell you about my experience. Maybe one day (or right now) you decide to try it too.
Let me start with the numbers. I spent one week to learn Unity engine from scratch. Then I spent another three weeks to create this game:
I can build this game for any platform (PC, IOS, Android, etc).
How have I been feeling while working with unity after SC2? I felt like I'm in heaven. So much freedom, so much possibilities! Yes, it requires better coding skills, and more intellectual efforts, because you have to build systems you want to use. For example, in SC2 we have "units", while in unity you create an object (on C#), add properties like hp, speed, etc, then add functions to move, interact with objects, use weapons, who are also objects. Just normal object oriented coding. Pretty fun.
But still, Unity has tons of premade things, just the entire engine. You can build terrains, place objects, add scripts to objects, add physics, meshes, particles, all that stuff. It's all easy as it is, and easily learnable.
Oh, by the way. Unity3D has COMPREHENSIVE documentation. Every little feature, every object's function/property are explained greatly with examples and tricks and anything one need to use it. It makes learning super fast, once you lean basics, you just can check API, and keep moving. Also, there's Questions thing on their site, where you can ask the Unity team and recieve your answer. And, for sure, a big Forum. The entire unity user-friendliness just can't be compared to Blizz and Editor. Just one simple example: at May I found out that there's a big 2 days Unity related event in my city with lots of speaks, including Unity Ceo. And also Unity opens their office in my city. None of these is possible for Blizzard.
So, the idea is that it's a pretty smooth move from SC2 Editor to Unity3D. And it opens perspectives, that you wouldn't even dream about while using SC2 Editor.
And those platforms you can build your game for. It's more than a billion of potential players. I saw a game on Google Play with more than 100 fucking millions of downloads! And there are different ways of monetization: you can sell your game, you can have it free, but show ads with incoming revenue. You can even sell in-game stuff, like swords or spells or upgrades or anything you create in your games.
But all this doesn't mean that you have to leave sc2 mapmaking. For example, I'm waiting for heroes to see how mapmaking would work there, and how much players will be there. I still support and update my old maps. So, it doesn't contradict to your sc2 mapmaking hobby. It just greatly expand your game design possibilities.
Ok, if you curious, how would it work for you, there are two links:
Pretty simple and useful tutorial. Just do all of its 28 lessons, and you will become familiar with Unity and know where to go next.
And the Unity3D.com site, where you can download the free version of Unity, which can let you create and release games for all platforms.
I moved to Unreal Engine 4 several months ago, still can't create any game T_T. But UE 4 is still under development and has a lot of new features with each update.
I myself have been eyeing unity for a while now, but I am personally having difficulty getting past a really annoying error that wont let me start the program.
The main draw of sc2 mapping is playing online with others via their player matching system. Granted, that system isn't working due to the popularity system, still that's the main reason why people came to sc2 to map.
Does other editors, including Unity3d, have some sort of online matching system? What about other games? I was excited with Dota2 tools for awhile until I realized they didn't have any kind of custom mapping public lobby, at least right now.
I tried Unity as a hobby when being a student, also 3dsmax, Zbrush, XSI, rly wanted to create something. This tools are great for dev teams, but don't get too excited. Without high quality assets you can build only such primitive games like this hover tank and shootem-ups. Because you have to deal with hemorrhoid with Model's Attachments, UI, Collisions, Camera Movement, basicaly fucking everything by yourself including object organization and coding itself. You think you spending too much time in sc2 editor? Multiply it by 2-4 and here you go with unity. Oh you have no assets for your game, here, grab the 3dsmax/XSI/Maya/ (Blender for masochists) and forget about eating/sleeping/shitting/being human. Just think twice if youre non programmer/future game developer before dive into this shit.Fucking timewaste. For terrainers and level designers Unity just can't offer ANYTHING unless you are in team with modelers which already created billion doodads/rooms for you. (There are some Dungeon/Environment packs but they are not large, you can create probably one-two dungeon levels for some stupid mobile game (just being realistic) with it and it costs $$-$$$.)
I don't know what exactly you mean, but most of those Engines do support Online multiplayer. (Programming with that in mind can be pretty stressfull though, optimizing netcode even more)
If you mean the online Subsystem (Battle.Net, Steamworks, etc). You can expect steam support from them. So advertizing open games to the Steam Master Server is possible. Unreal Engine 4 makes it also possible for you to implement your own, because you have full source code access.
I also moved to UDK and now to Unreal Engine 4. Creating Assets is the biggest problem though, but Unreal Engine 4 has enough for me to work on a prototype. I'm also able to make my own 3d Models and animations. On top of that I'm working together with Gorandor (Xaragoth), who is also able to make assets. We'll need one or two additional artists though if we enter a phase where we need more polish.
I do agree that Unity is more open and flexible since it is a generic engine with no platform assumptions. That being said, as others have noted, the engine is a minor part of the game development. In programming, you quickly learn coding is but fraction of the actual development time, and so in game development, the game mechanics and such are but a fraction of the game. Game assets are far the most costly, in any terms (time, money, expertise, problems) part of building a game.
Also as noted by Tomura, these engines do support networking out of the box usually, but require enomourous work to make them suitable to whatever game you are building, since each game makes different tradeoffs. Also that adds an entire separate branch of programming you must learn and understand.
Unity, for an individual, is very good for prototyping, but that can be said of most game engines. Most of these tools are built with a team in mind. That frankly should be a massive upfront warning to anyone using these tools, since they are a tool KIT, not a magic bullet that makes game making easy. Any tool that makes things easy, usually does so by assuming a ton of stuff for you, which is nice, until you must go beyond that, then it tends to come apart pretty quickly.
After months, I am back here to say that I pretty much moved to Unity too. After about 1 week noobing around, I started making my own simple 2D single player game and I am almost faster than if I would do it with sc2 editor.
@sandround: Go
Yeah, I would say thats the main advantage of SC2 that there is multiplayer code in it and its free to host games. Unity 3d have free code assets thats let you create multiplayer games pretty easily using x company server, but you have to pay for using the server....
2- Try making your first game with Unity 2d settings so that you can easily make for yourself all the 2d sprites/models you need.
3- Your first game you make should be very simple....
4- Use google search for all the things you dont understand and you want to do.... (I usually always find an answer for my problems.... (unlike in sc2 editor))
5- Also Unity far better documented than Sc2 editor, I suggest you read things you are interested in the editors doc.: http://docs.unity3d.com/Manual and scripting api: http://docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/index.html (api is really useful! You should look up functions from it when you dont understand code in the example projects I linked)
Btw Heartstone made by Unity (many seem to not know that).
And even Blizz guys leave Blizz and work on their indie Unity projects like this guy:
Wow! That Unity stuff looks really cool. I've been dabbling in the editor for the last 8 months and so have some concept of what all that is on Unity. However, I think as a newbie to modding it looks really overwhelming. I really enjoy all the assets(terrain and models) that Blizzard provides for us. It would be very overwhelming for a a casual modder, like myself, to move over to Unity, but I understand why folks are making the move. Sad to see people moving on from Sc2Mapster.
Perhaps this is why they are doing Arcade Contest to stem the tide of advanced modders switching to Unity.
Oh...silver lining...folks switching to Unity might encourage Blizzard to make the Editor more user-friendly, have more contests and listen to those who are making popular games .
There are really cool features with Unity like really rapid offline testing inside the editor. Blizzard really needs to step up their game if they want to compete with such an accessible, flexible, and free engine such as Unity.
Overall I agree with you and this line is the crux of the matter. Does Blizzard want to get in the game engine business or not? Unity is basically a company selling a tool, which is a great thing, but Blizzard is not, they make games and happen to habitually provide their tools. So it seems Blizzard needs to choose, either start making a more open/useful tool and sell it or make it available and monetize it like Unity (free to use, pay us for the good parts that you need to go pro), or drop support for editor and stuff all together. Since it appears going halfway is not work or does not appeal to people.
I read this post yesterday and couldn't get it out of my head, hence the reply.
In June 2010 I sat down and took a look at all my options for making games. In a nutshell I narrowed it down to; Unity, Source, UDK, Spring and Sc2Editor. Each had its pros and cons and the Indi Game Market was a very, very different scene. With the upselling that was done on the Sc2Editor, and the promise of being able to sell your projects, my loyalty to Blizzard sealed the deal and I chose Sc2. In hindsight it is very easy for people to laugh at that choice, but back then, it actually looked like a viable option.
The issue is that if you want to make a career out of this, or simply be able to do what you love full time you need to be making money. There is no better way than to say that if you do not make money, then you will starve. I personally dislike money, but I understand that in order to have a 'better' life, you need money - and especially in order to have a family, you need to be able to support them. This is where Sc2 stops becoming a viable option.
It is very hard for me to say that I regret the choices I made, because in my heart I feel like I don't. I got to meet Dryeyece and together we created something that even though with a lack of player base, was really polished and showed off what could be done with the editor. We got Blizzard to notice us, just two crazy guys from opposite ends of the planet wanting to push the Moba genre, which now has been similarly done with Heroes of the Storm.
But at the same time, I regret the impact this one choice has had on my life. The time I didn't spend with my family, heck I was working on Tofu right up until the minute before I had a shower to go to my own wedding. This project consumed my life for three years, as it did to Dryeyece's - and we have nothing to show for it. Both of us are in a worse position financially than when we first started the project - yes we have a really good project for our portfolio, but it that fails to get us a job in the industry, which for me it has numerous times, then it was all a waste of time.
Staying positive is one thing, being realistic and saying; alright, I gave it a shot, in hindsight I could have picked a platform that would have allowed me to monetize my time (Unity+Steam) ... leaves you to feel like ... take me out to the pasture and shoot me. I was forced back into the workforce for _a lot_ less pay than when I worked for myself (10% of my previous income) and everyday is a struggle because I am torn between earning money whilst getting really depressed, and that urge, that overwhelming urge to make games. I recently found the majority of my sketch books, and all those ideas, all those amazing ideas just waiting to see the light of day ... it sucks knowing that I cannot show people, I cannot touch peoples lives through gaming because I have to eat, and I have to support my family. I know I can make more money by leaving my current job and doing my own thing, but at the same time, it is not going to put food on the table unless I can generate around $50,000 per year through donations (Kickstarter/Indigogo etc) per person of the development team - which let's be realistic, is not going to happen.
Some people get lucky; see: Castle Story, a project that was funded on KickStarter and they have enough funds for say 3-4 years of development. BUT. if they fail to secure additional income during that time, like regularly turning over a profit, that money will be used and the studio will close. This is where MicroTransactions are your best friend, because the easiest way to make a million dollars is to take a dollar from a million people. We as developers should be supporting monetization efforts that are ethical because _we need to eat_. King with Candy Crush Saga is the absolute worse example of an abuse of a Game Developing because it was specifically targeted to turn over a huge excess of cash with minimal effort by using some would say; illegal tactics of manipulation of the mind.
The amount of people who told me to walk away from Sc2 in the early days and to go to Unity, the amount of people from this community who did, god, even people in the games industry told me to do that - but I didn't. I wanted to believe that if I stuck it out with Sc2 that Blizzard would come true with their promises of monetization and that I would live happily every after. This did not happen. Nor was I able to secure a position within Blizzard, because for as much as Dryeyece and I achieved, it still was not good enough to get into Blizzard - why? Because "Real Games" made with Unity and sold on Steam have "Real Reviews" and are held a lot higher than those made on the Sc2 Editor - and I am Australian, don't forget that - it costs a lot to migrate me to the US - even though numerous times I said I would pay for myself to go there to put myself on an equal playing field - no dice. The people at Blizzard are amazing, it is too easy to get caught up on the bandwagon to blame Blizzard for everything that goes wrong in your life or career - but the truth is that it was I and I alone that made my decisions, and I and those around me have to life with the consequences.
As numerous people have mentioned, Unity is more of a team working environment, and without great assets, chances are your game will fail to attract players (Minecraft is a one in a million game that will not be repeated any time soon IMO). Without players playing your game you will not earn money, and without money you will not be able to support yourself. If you still live with your parents, yeah go nuts, work your ass off while you have a shitload of time and don't need to earn money to live, experiment, try new stuff - cherish every second of that time and make something amazing - but at the same time, think about your future, choose the right platform that will allow you to earn an income so that when the day comes and you are on your own, you can still make games and you can still support a family. Oh, and HYPE from one of the major YouTubers can make a project and change your life, for all the years spent trying to get Husky or HD or someone out there to give us a shoutout, it never happened. When it does; Flappy Birdddddddddddd...........
Oh, and HYPE from one of the major YouTubers can make a project and change your life, for all the years spent trying to get Husky or HD or someone out there to give us a shoutout, it never happened. When it does; Flappy Birdddddddddddd...........
Would it? I mean, Husky promotes Nexus Wars pretty heavily, and as far as I'm aware, the dev(s) of that still aren't rolling in the monies. His mapmaker friend (Zetal?) produced a bunker wars type map that, despite again being promoted heavily, was resigned to the depths of the arcade. Star Strikers, promoted by Total Biscuit of all people, and even had a Blizzard-backed tournament, wasn't really a life-changing event for it's makers. Indeed, it's not quite as resigned as the bunker wars map mentioned before, but it certainly isn't that popular.
I don't think youtuber hype can really do much beyond grant your project a surge of new players. I'll be honest, I think it's extremely easy to get a surge of new players as it is. For all the bashing that the arcade gets, the playerbase is still huge. It takes me about a minute to get a 10v10 battleground on the less populated faction of World of Warcraft. It takes me about 5 seconds to get a rank 1-4 popularity game going, even at obscure times like 5am. Furthermore, people on the arcade are just desperate for new content. A fresh map will be dived upon and rush up the rankings if it has the basic qualities of being an enjoyable game.
Lastly, as far as monetization is concerned, yeah. It's an issue. I'm not saying that maps should have DLC or something bizarre, but something like the twitch subscriber function where you can opt to "subscribe" to a map and get cosmetic enhancements in-game seems just obvious. People get really weird when money is involved, but the fact of the matter is that money attracts quality. If such enhancements were restricted to cosmetic-only (something that Blizzard have shown that they are willing to police), then I really don't see the downside.
Still, wishful thinking. We'll see what LotV brings. Unless StarCraft and Heroes of the Storm share the arcade, then I think that'll be the last time Blizzard pays attention to the arcade. I do have hope, though. The mapmaking tournament, the arcade website, Blizzard have at least shown that they care.
damn, thats heartbreaking story. Full of hope and dreams to fall into abyss.. Sorry to see that all this sc2 development came to this conclusion..
I myself just dropped Starcraft 2 map making for my own maps, while to this day still helping other guy with making map triggers and such. Stopped updating my own maps almost half year ago when was making content for my map called Age of Knights. All those custom Assets turned out not worth much of my time just to be used by other sc2 mapper from my map by those that I did not gave permission to use them and didnt had intentions in a long run to release to everyone.. Tried to surround myself with my own created content for map and have something special among other projects that people make on Bnet.. Maybe I wouldnt be so butthurt about it if people that took away assets for their own use wherent such a dicks overall. Map on which my assets appeared on called - Eraz Test. A map that evolved from Eras Zombie Invasion map with community being so shit and creators themselves are same level of retardness as community for it that it just instantly killed any motivation to continue making anything for the Age of Knights map or making new projects that I would enjoy playing, experiencing..
while its great to have SC2 engine as RTS engine that has a lot of core mechanics to make RTS games that I'm interested in. Limits and lack of flexability to make something more than just WC3 remake or SC core gameplay tweaks, isnt plausable to make/remake Other type Strategy games that has much more of management (SimCity, Anno, Stronghold).. And as we see in the end it's dead end..
Currently casually look over engines, gathering thoughts where to go next. Need to get that source code for RTS games that I may want to make to experience..
This response isnt just for you, but its sort of a general thing as well. Im kind of surprised to be reading some of this stuff. I never viewed making games in SC2 to be anything other than a hobby that you could not and should not expect any monetary compensation for. To hear that there are people out there that actually expected to make a living off of SC2 mods to the point of being able to support a family is pretty outrageous.
Husky did do a video on the first game i ever made (I didnt ask him to he just did it cause he liked it), the video really helped to make my game popular for a short period of time but that was all, I obviously did not make money nor did i expect to:
Getting a good job in video game development I think has always been seen as a bit of a pipe dream, not to say it cant be done but its difficult and you shouldn't really expect for that to ever happen to you. You can spend all the time you want trying to achieve that but i wouldn't be surprised or upset that it hasn't happened for you, because its not something you would expect to happen.
If you want to go into the video game industry the easiest way to do it, is to do it yourself and make an indie game. Starcraft 2 in regaurds to modding is really just a toy for fun, considering they own the rights to everything you make, which is clear, im not sure how you could think anything different or how anyone serious about getting into games professionally would chose SC2 over, well, anything unity or otherwise.I knew a guy who got his PhD in computer science, did an internship as a programmer at Blizzard, did a good job, and was offered some sort of job in testing making very little money.
Getting into the gameing industry by just being hired is hard, even if your clearly a really intelligent person. Even then in the case of blizzard there are so many really smart, capable people who want to work for them that in some cases they can pay them like shit, he would not of been able to support a family on the salary blizzard offered him, especially not were he would be working. The guy turned down the job for monetary reasons, got a job at an IT company, makes a salary in the 100-125k range last i knew.
Not trying to be mean or anything, just somewhat confused at the unreasonable expectations some people seem to have. Its like coming onto a forum about music and having people angry that they aren't rock stars yet. You can take this path and sure do what makes you happy, but understand that it may not be easy, in fact it probably wont be.
I don't really feel like I want to dedicate too long a post to all this, but here's a couple of things I would say.
Dogmai; you say a number of times in your post "people now can laugh at that decision" or "in hindsight it seems stupid", and I'm having trouble responding to that. I hate to be an asshole, but I will 'laugh' at those decisions, and yes, in hindsight they do seem stupid. I think some of them were stupid at the time you made them as well. It's not that I'm trying to bring you down, but sucky as it may be, you did bring a lot of this on yourself. You do seem to acknowledge that, but outside of that... what is there left to say? And what is your point? It's not that I don't feel sorry for the fact that all this has brought you down so harshly, but I can't sit around and care for it the way you do, knowing how everything went.
That said, Lemmy is completely right. Landing that one job at your favourite developer is a one in a million opportunity, and with crowdfunding becoming bigger and bigger anybody interested in game creation should simply go the indie route right now. As long as you'll realize that bad projects will fail and only the really good ones will flourish (though decent ones have a tendency of breaking even, I feel), you're free to take your shot. Getting into game development has only become easier over the past years. Making an actual good game is still as hard as it will ever be, but at this point people who really feel the strong urge to try have very real options - even ones where they'll be able to sustain themselves while working for free (or through donations) for a time while holding a regular job simply to put food on the table.
This doesn't make any of the points people raise less valid, but even if it's easier to make games in Unity or other such engines, its not always easy to get that game played or make it profitable. For every successful indie game, there are dozens of failed ones.
You can read about some of them on Gamasutra, and you may find the developers insight on their failed projects to help you if you are looking to get into making indie games yourself.
"StarLicker was entirely self-funded by the development team. This meant basically no one got paid and the plan was that we would each get a slice of the profits after the game was released and the dough started rolling in. But then we released the game and money did not start rolling in. It barely even trickled in. And this created a very strange and unexpected set of feelings beyond the obvious disappointment and frustration. I felt really strongly that I just completely let everyone on the team down. It was like I assembled a team of some of my most talented friends whom I had the utmost respect for, only to have them waste a huge chunk of their creative lives. This feeling still hasn’t worn off, and I don’t know if it ever will."
"To top it all off, I sent an email to Steam, Desura, and Big Fish Games and got rejected three times. At this point, I should have started feeling bad about myself. The problem was not in IndieCity, not in the Mac App Store, not in the press. Nobody wanted to hear about a year old iPhone game coming to PC. The game world today is fueled by novelty. It was time to quit.
I may have learned the hard way, but I didn't feel bad about it. I believe as long as you put love into what you're doing, while you have fun doing it; results don't matter that much. Yes, you'll feel shitty for some time, and once or twice you'll want to throw something at the wall and call it quits. But your happiness really shouldn't rest in the outcome."
"Fifty-seven percent of indie game developers (including both solo indies and members of indie teams across all pay ranges) made under $500 in game sales."
Just some quick examples, though you'll see stuff like that on there all the time.
To be clear though, I'm absolutely not trying too discourage anyone. The majority of those articles the authors do not express regret about trying to make indie games even if they were complete flops that put them in bad financial situations.
I guess I'm just trying to give a little perspective and say the same thing that happened to Dogmia with SC2 can happen with Indie devs on other platforms too. Lots of Indie devs using Unity or other platforms have their projects fail with no profit or popularity and force them to get some other job to pay the bills instead.
I think ultimately you just have to have a realistic view and realize that making games isn't necessarily stable career so you should be going into it because you love it and you're passionate about it not necessarily because you think it will work out monetarily, regardless of the platform you choose.
All that said; I kind of agree with lemmy. SC2 mapping should only ever be seen as a hobby, not ever as something with a chance of paying off.
One last thing:
@Trieva: "There are really cool features with Unity like really rapid offline testing inside the editor. Blizzard really needs to step up their game if they want to compete with such an accessible, flexible, and free engine such as Unity."
Blizzard isn't trying to compete with Unity. They aren't trying to make a viable game engine platform. They're just trying to make awesome *modding* tools and opportunities for their game. As much as they might brand it as the "Arcade" and make it free, its still just the Starcraft editor and mods - if they wanted it to be something more, it would have its own development team, it would be its own engine, and it would actually be supported by their customer service department.
Would it? I mean, Husky promotes Nexus Wars pretty heavily, and as far
as I'm aware, the dev(s) of that still aren't rolling in the monies. His
mapmaker friend (Zetal?) produced a bunker wars type map that, despite
again being promoted heavily, was resigned to the depths of the arcade.
Star Strikers, promoted by Total Biscuit of all people, and even had a
Blizzard-backed tournament, wasn't really a life-changing event for it's
makers. Indeed, it's not quite as resigned as the bunker wars map
mentioned before, but it certainly isn't that popular.
I was referring to someone of the likes of PewDiePie with Flappy Bird; but point taken I wrote it the wrong way. Would a shout out from Husky or HD actually made our game popular? Probably not. Would it have given it a surge of players to the point where over coming our biggest feedback issue - there isn't enough people to get a game going - would have been a possibility? Probably. With a multiplayer game you need an active community or else the game will usually perish, at least to the point where you can get the "standard" game mode going with minimal effort. Hence, if a new player joined the community he should be able to play a game within a few minutes, not having to spend hours over skype arranging times etc.
This is where the arcade was the wrong platform for a Moba genre game, especially one that was innovating past a Dota Clone - unlike SoTiS, and don't get me started on Ecko/RNG.
But you see the issue that here-within lies with the Arcade? "It takes about 5 seconds to get a Rank 1-4 pop game going", make it a second page game and see how hard it is. At least with iOS you will usually have the Popularity list moving weekly, yes this can also be given to the fact that the games do not really require a cult following, they are mainly single player games which are easy to developer and at a cheap price point - whilst also being extremely overpopulated with good quality games; but it moves never the less. The Arcade barely does.
I said for years to the few Blizzard Devs I am in contact with that the Arcade needs to be moved to the launcher much like Steam. It needs to be taken out of Starcraft II and pushed to allow the general Battle.net population quick access to it. I believe one day it will move away from being "in-game"; maybe nearing the time Warcraft IV comes along, but as for LOTV I highly doubt it.
Traysent cares a shitload, as does Villers and a huge group of people at Blizzard. It is just the issues when dealing with a company as large as Blizzard and the bureaucracy involved in getting anything "big" done. I hate myself everytime I send an email to Traysent because I know how busy he is, I know how much work he puts into the Arcade and supporting us, and I just fucken hate myself even more everytime I request something from him or Blizzard. For everything they do, we, as a community, have a pretty shitty way of showing our thanks. The majority of us whinge, cry and complain, but very few of us ever show our thanks.
damn, thats heartbreaking story. Full of hope and dreams to fall into
abyss.. Sorry to see that all this sc2 development came to this
conclusion..
This is life. Compared to other things that have happened, neither the amount of money nor the effect it has had on my life comes anywhere close to other things that are better left unsaid. I made my choices and I accept the consequences. But I am Australian, we were born fighting, we live in a country where nearly everything wants to kill us, especially the kiwis, this is who we are. Our whole culture revolves around rooting for the underdog, and the 'Aussie Battler getting a fair go', I will succeed one day.
Btw, you made your custom content, you own it, file a DMCA with [email protected] and get it removed.
You at least know what your passion(s) is which is game development or
something creative. Some people, I think, go through their whole lives
not knowing what they want or what to do and do nothing but work
non-stop or just ride the wave of life and float around.
I was recently asked by a Blizzard Dev what would I do if Blizzard suddenly ceased to exist tomorrow ... what would you do? To be honest I never thought about this question until I was asked and the answer is simple.
I would keep making games. I would go Indi, fight my ass off for grants and government funding, use every legal avenue to reduce my tax and get other expenses back; such as getting a large percentage return for all the money invested into R&D. A lot of this shit exists but people don't know how to access it. But the big one - government funding - was removed thanks to a super-conservative catholic PM who thinks games are the devil. Who is also sexist and racist and homophobic, but you can research him on your own. This has all happened this year.
This response isnt just for you, but its sort of a general thing as
well. Im kind of surprised to be reading some of this stuff. I never
viewed making games in SC2 to be anything other than a hobby that you
could not and should not expect any monetary compensation for. To hear
that there are people out there that actually expected to make a living
off of SC2 mods to the point of being able to support a family is pretty
outrageous.
Each of us viewed the scenario presented to us back then in different ways. There were numerous 'large' development teams at the start, all of them have folded except for SCU. And Ryan got lucky, super lucky. He can sit on his high perch all he wants and preach that you can do the same as him and succeed etc, but the truth is he is lying out his ass, at least to the point where he doesn't admit the whole story.
Alright, the "idea" of a Starcraft MMO is a much wanted game, but he was only successful in his kickstarter because he had those media contacts who were able to publish his game on the front page of the major gaming websites such as Kotaku _because_ of the original story - Blizzard made a mistake. That is it, that is all. I wish that Blizzard DCMA'd our videos because that is where the value of his project lies, in his story - that Blizzard made a mistake. Think of anytime Blizzard makes a mistake, it is usually huge ones which are very debatable depending on which side of the fence you sit on; such as Diablo III - but this was a simple mistake, Blizzard never makes simple mistakes. And by saying that comment I expect a shitload of people telling me I am wrong >_<.
As with any venture, if there is a story then it helps you immensely. Especially if it is a David vs Goliath scenario; which is what happened there.
I was sad to see all the big teams fold, and all of them told me to get out in the early stages, some even before the end of 2010 because they knew what was coming. I kept my faith.
As for getting into the industry, yep, nearly impossible from my standpoint. There are 20 year olds finishing college in degrees that didn't exist 10 years ago. As the industry gets more and more populated the bench gets set forever higher, those that chose the right platform like Unity and Steam definitely have an advantage over us that chose Starcraft II - this is where those broken promises have to come into play because whilst I accept responsibility for my choices, they were based on certain information we had at the time that we now know were well, ideas that were oversold.
Getting into the gameing industry by just being hired is hard, even if
your clearly a really intelligent person. Even then in the case of
blizzard there are so many really smart, capable people who want to work
for them that in some cases they can pay them like shit, he would not of
been able to support a family on the salary blizzard offered him,
especially not were he would be working. The guy turned down the job for
monetary reasons, got a job at an IT company, makes a salary in the
100-125k range last i knew.
The job I have at the moment is for a company larger than Blizzard, and I was promised things (career pathways) that having now been with the company for six months and meeting those people in corporate who make the decisions (especially the HR manager who does the hiring), I can say that I was lied to. I was lied out the ass to. HR says I was lied out the ass to as well and they are not happy about the situation but nothing is going to change for the rest of the financial year (which is 10 months away). The one who made the promises to me when he hired me has left, those that have promised things since then have nothing to say for themselves because I was simply making them too much money on an extremely low wage. If I walked tomorrow they wouldn't care because the changes I implemented would stay. They learnt my ways, they can train up new people to be like me you know. It is a shitty situation but this is what big business is. And to have this happen straight after what happened whilst developing Tofu is a kick in the guts, but this is life.
Whenever you are a publicly listed company you have to do everything in your shareholder's best interests (at least by law here in Australia) which means the larger the company the more *likely* they are going to screw people over and pay a substandard wage. Hence, working for start-ups is usually a better idea if it is purely about the money.
Dogmai; you say a number of times in your post "people now can laugh at
that decision" or "in hindsight it seems stupid", and I'm having trouble
responding to that. I hate to be an asshole, but I will 'laugh' at those
decisions, and yes, in hindsight they do seem stupid. I think some of
them were stupid at the time you made them as well.
Never for a moment think I was ignorant when I made my decisions, I just had faith in Blizzard. It is hard for me to explain, whether it is a cultural thing or just me being me, but I do trust a lot and yes, as a result, in my life I do get screwed over a lot but we are still comfortable financially. I do not feel sorry for myself, and I never expect a reply to my posts. I merely share as much information as I can so that somewhere some kid or person who is in my shoes, or sees themselves going down a similar path can learn from my experience and make a better informed decision.
I know by posting messages like these that I am digging myself into a deeper hole for getting a job in the industry, but I don't really care because the truth is, I will be just fine if nothing ever happens. Landing a job at Blizzard won't make or break my life, I will keep fighting like I always do but not everyone is in my position and were lucky enough to have made I dare say, better investment decisions in the past so that when this did happen, alright it sucks, but I didn't lose everything and I didn't put a bullet through my brain because of it. There will be those in life who are tinkering on a life and death decision on any number of factors, and a positive post here and there might be the catalyst for change in that person's life. That is why I post, not to seek pity, not to be oh look at me, but to provide inspiration, in perhaps a more truthful way than being ignorant and thinking positive.
SC2 editor, as well as other blizz games' editors, are a great and welcomish gate to the world of game developing. It lured to game making many people who, otherwise, would never even think about making games. Editor made the start very easy, because Editor is pretty high level in terms of programming, includes tons of assets. But it also teaches many things: how to code, how to organize a big project, and how to work for months on a project and still be organized and motivated. It teaches game design, art generating skills, building a team. It improves one's imagination, and opens horizons.
But it also has limits. And some people after years of mapmaking can feel those limits. Galaxy language isn't a full object oriented language. Also, triggers/galaxy are slow due to bnet latency. High level organization of the editor makes some genres hard to create. And again, latency makes arcade/action ganre unplayeable online.
Another thing is playerbase. We can count on... dunno... 100K players? Not that much.
And another thing is... poor monetization. Yea, most of us are enthusiasts and love mapmaking, do it as a hobby, but it consumes alot of time, and some people create amazing games, and sometimes think about a reward other than good rating and good popularity.
So, editor gave us alot, made us good game designer and coders. And some of us may feel that they have grown up for something more.
But for what? For taking raw Cpp and openGL to spam real games? Well, the gap is too big between super high level Editor and rather low level Cpp.
So, maybe there are other game engines exist, that have no SC2 Editor limits, but still pretty high level and convenient for not hardcore professional coders?
Glad you asked. Because it's the subject of this thread. There are Unity3D engine, and Unreal Engine.
Both can be a perfect platform to move to, to keep growing as a game designer.
I, myself, learned Unity3D, and can tell you about my experience. Maybe one day (or right now) you decide to try it too.
Let me start with the numbers. I spent one week to learn Unity engine from scratch. Then I spent another three weeks to create this game:
I can build this game for any platform (PC, IOS, Android, etc).
How have I been feeling while working with unity after SC2? I felt like I'm in heaven. So much freedom, so much possibilities! Yes, it requires better coding skills, and more intellectual efforts, because you have to build systems you want to use. For example, in SC2 we have "units", while in unity you create an object (on C#), add properties like hp, speed, etc, then add functions to move, interact with objects, use weapons, who are also objects. Just normal object oriented coding. Pretty fun.
But still, Unity has tons of premade things, just the entire engine. You can build terrains, place objects, add scripts to objects, add physics, meshes, particles, all that stuff. It's all easy as it is, and easily learnable.
Oh, by the way. Unity3D has COMPREHENSIVE documentation. Every little feature, every object's function/property are explained greatly with examples and tricks and anything one need to use it. It makes learning super fast, once you lean basics, you just can check API, and keep moving. Also, there's Questions thing on their site, where you can ask the Unity team and recieve your answer. And, for sure, a big Forum. The entire unity user-friendliness just can't be compared to Blizz and Editor. Just one simple example: at May I found out that there's a big 2 days Unity related event in my city with lots of speaks, including Unity Ceo. And also Unity opens their office in my city. None of these is possible for Blizzard.
So, the idea is that it's a pretty smooth move from SC2 Editor to Unity3D. And it opens perspectives, that you wouldn't even dream about while using SC2 Editor.
And those platforms you can build your game for. It's more than a billion of potential players. I saw a game on Google Play with more than 100 fucking millions of downloads! And there are different ways of monetization: you can sell your game, you can have it free, but show ads with incoming revenue. You can even sell in-game stuff, like swords or spells or upgrades or anything you create in your games.
But all this doesn't mean that you have to leave sc2 mapmaking. For example, I'm waiting for heroes to see how mapmaking would work there, and how much players will be there. I still support and update my old maps. So, it doesn't contradict to your sc2 mapmaking hobby. It just greatly expand your game design possibilities.
Ok, if you curious, how would it work for you, there are two links:
Pretty simple and useful tutorial. Just do all of its 28 lessons, and you will become familiar with Unity and know where to go next.
And the Unity3D.com site, where you can download the free version of Unity, which can let you create and release games for all platforms.
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Curse Premiuminteresting P. maybe i should run away to unity too...
Marie T. Freeman If you're too busy to give your neighbor a helping hand, then you're just too darned busy. https://www.facebook.com/wargirlmaps.maps
Spread the love join DISCORD
https://discord.gg/Jtzt8Su
Their looking for team (collaboration) subforum looks really active and friendly towards new users of Unity.
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Curse PremiumI moved to Unreal Engine 4 several months ago, still can't create any game T_T. But UE 4 is still under development and has a lot of new features with each update.
http://www.youtube.com/user/RussianMapster
I myself have been eyeing unity for a while now, but I am personally having difficulty getting past a really annoying error that wont let me start the program.
@Zolden: Go
The main draw of sc2 mapping is playing online with others via their player matching system. Granted, that system isn't working due to the popularity system, still that's the main reason why people came to sc2 to map.
Does other editors, including Unity3d, have some sort of online matching system? What about other games? I was excited with Dota2 tools for awhile until I realized they didn't have any kind of custom mapping public lobby, at least right now.
I tried Unity as a hobby when being a student, also 3dsmax, Zbrush, XSI, rly wanted to create something. This tools are great for dev teams, but don't get too excited. Without high quality assets you can build only such primitive games like this hover tank and shootem-ups. Because you have to deal with hemorrhoid with Model's Attachments, UI, Collisions, Camera Movement, basicaly fucking everything by yourself including object organization and coding itself. You think you spending too much time in sc2 editor? Multiply it by 2-4 and here you go with unity. Oh you have no assets for your game, here, grab the 3dsmax/XSI/Maya/ (Blender for masochists) and forget about eating/sleeping/shitting/being human. Just think twice if youre non programmer/future game developer before dive into this shit.Fucking timewaste. For terrainers and level designers Unity just can't offer ANYTHING unless you are in team with modelers which already created billion doodads/rooms for you. (There are some Dungeon/Environment packs but they are not large, you can create probably one-two dungeon levels for some stupid mobile game (just being realistic) with it and it costs $$-$$$.)
@sandround: Go
I don't know what exactly you mean, but most of those Engines do support Online multiplayer. (Programming with that in mind can be pretty stressfull though, optimizing netcode even more) If you mean the online Subsystem (Battle.Net, Steamworks, etc). You can expect steam support from them. So advertizing open games to the Steam Master Server is possible. Unreal Engine 4 makes it also possible for you to implement your own, because you have full source code access.
I also moved to UDK and now to Unreal Engine 4. Creating Assets is the biggest problem though, but Unreal Engine 4 has enough for me to work on a prototype. I'm also able to make my own 3d Models and animations. On top of that I'm working together with Gorandor (Xaragoth), who is also able to make assets. We'll need one or two additional artists though if we enter a phase where we need more polish.
I do agree that Unity is more open and flexible since it is a generic engine with no platform assumptions. That being said, as others have noted, the engine is a minor part of the game development. In programming, you quickly learn coding is but fraction of the actual development time, and so in game development, the game mechanics and such are but a fraction of the game. Game assets are far the most costly, in any terms (time, money, expertise, problems) part of building a game.
Also as noted by Tomura, these engines do support networking out of the box usually, but require enomourous work to make them suitable to whatever game you are building, since each game makes different tradeoffs. Also that adds an entire separate branch of programming you must learn and understand.
Unity, for an individual, is very good for prototyping, but that can be said of most game engines. Most of these tools are built with a team in mind. That frankly should be a massive upfront warning to anyone using these tools, since they are a tool KIT, not a magic bullet that makes game making easy. Any tool that makes things easy, usually does so by assuming a ton of stuff for you, which is nice, until you must go beyond that, then it tends to come apart pretty quickly.
After months, I am back here to say that I pretty much moved to Unity too. After about 1 week noobing around, I started making my own simple 2D single player game and I am almost faster than if I would do it with sc2 editor.
@sandround: Go Yeah, I would say thats the main advantage of SC2 that there is multiplayer code in it and its free to host games. Unity 3d have free code assets thats let you create multiplayer games pretty easily using x company server, but you have to pay for using the server....
.
Some tips for guys who want to try out Unity:
1- Open simple games and look into how they do it:
I suggest this 2, I learned lot from them at start:
http://u3d.as/content/m2h/c-game-examples/1sG (5 very simple 3d game, you should start with looking into these and modifying them)
https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/11228 (Game made by Unity team to show off 2D settings...)
2- Try making your first game with Unity 2d settings so that you can easily make for yourself all the 2d sprites/models you need.
3- Your first game you make should be very simple....
4- Use google search for all the things you dont understand and you want to do.... (I usually always find an answer for my problems.... (unlike in sc2 editor))
5- Also Unity far better documented than Sc2 editor, I suggest you read things you are interested in the editors doc.: http://docs.unity3d.com/Manual and scripting api: http://docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/index.html (api is really useful! You should look up functions from it when you dont understand code in the example projects I linked)
Btw Heartstone made by Unity (many seem to not know that).
And even Blizz guys leave Blizz and work on their indie Unity projects like this guy:
Wow! That Unity stuff looks really cool. I've been dabbling in the editor for the last 8 months and so have some concept of what all that is on Unity. However, I think as a newbie to modding it looks really overwhelming. I really enjoy all the assets(terrain and models) that Blizzard provides for us. It would be very overwhelming for a a casual modder, like myself, to move over to Unity, but I understand why folks are making the move. Sad to see people moving on from Sc2Mapster.
Perhaps this is why they are doing Arcade Contest to stem the tide of advanced modders switching to Unity.
Oh...silver lining...folks switching to Unity might encourage Blizzard to make the Editor more user-friendly, have more contests and listen to those who are making popular games .
Overall I agree with you and this line is the crux of the matter. Does Blizzard want to get in the game engine business or not? Unity is basically a company selling a tool, which is a great thing, but Blizzard is not, they make games and happen to habitually provide their tools. So it seems Blizzard needs to choose, either start making a more open/useful tool and sell it or make it available and monetize it like Unity (free to use, pay us for the good parts that you need to go pro), or drop support for editor and stuff all together. Since it appears going halfway is not work or does not appeal to people.
I read this post yesterday and couldn't get it out of my head, hence the reply.
In June 2010 I sat down and took a look at all my options for making games. In a nutshell I narrowed it down to; Unity, Source, UDK, Spring and Sc2Editor. Each had its pros and cons and the Indi Game Market was a very, very different scene. With the upselling that was done on the Sc2Editor, and the promise of being able to sell your projects, my loyalty to Blizzard sealed the deal and I chose Sc2. In hindsight it is very easy for people to laugh at that choice, but back then, it actually looked like a viable option.
The issue is that if you want to make a career out of this, or simply be able to do what you love full time you need to be making money. There is no better way than to say that if you do not make money, then you will starve. I personally dislike money, but I understand that in order to have a 'better' life, you need money - and especially in order to have a family, you need to be able to support them. This is where Sc2 stops becoming a viable option.
It is very hard for me to say that I regret the choices I made, because in my heart I feel like I don't. I got to meet Dryeyece and together we created something that even though with a lack of player base, was really polished and showed off what could be done with the editor. We got Blizzard to notice us, just two crazy guys from opposite ends of the planet wanting to push the Moba genre, which now has been similarly done with Heroes of the Storm.
But at the same time, I regret the impact this one choice has had on my life. The time I didn't spend with my family, heck I was working on Tofu right up until the minute before I had a shower to go to my own wedding. This project consumed my life for three years, as it did to Dryeyece's - and we have nothing to show for it. Both of us are in a worse position financially than when we first started the project - yes we have a really good project for our portfolio, but it that fails to get us a job in the industry, which for me it has numerous times, then it was all a waste of time.
Staying positive is one thing, being realistic and saying; alright, I gave it a shot, in hindsight I could have picked a platform that would have allowed me to monetize my time (Unity+Steam) ... leaves you to feel like ... take me out to the pasture and shoot me. I was forced back into the workforce for _a lot_ less pay than when I worked for myself (10% of my previous income) and everyday is a struggle because I am torn between earning money whilst getting really depressed, and that urge, that overwhelming urge to make games. I recently found the majority of my sketch books, and all those ideas, all those amazing ideas just waiting to see the light of day ... it sucks knowing that I cannot show people, I cannot touch peoples lives through gaming because I have to eat, and I have to support my family. I know I can make more money by leaving my current job and doing my own thing, but at the same time, it is not going to put food on the table unless I can generate around $50,000 per year through donations (Kickstarter/Indigogo etc) per person of the development team - which let's be realistic, is not going to happen.
Some people get lucky; see: Castle Story, a project that was funded on KickStarter and they have enough funds for say 3-4 years of development. BUT. if they fail to secure additional income during that time, like regularly turning over a profit, that money will be used and the studio will close. This is where MicroTransactions are your best friend, because the easiest way to make a million dollars is to take a dollar from a million people. We as developers should be supporting monetization efforts that are ethical because _we need to eat_. King with Candy Crush Saga is the absolute worse example of an abuse of a Game Developing because it was specifically targeted to turn over a huge excess of cash with minimal effort by using some would say; illegal tactics of manipulation of the mind.
The amount of people who told me to walk away from Sc2 in the early days and to go to Unity, the amount of people from this community who did, god, even people in the games industry told me to do that - but I didn't. I wanted to believe that if I stuck it out with Sc2 that Blizzard would come true with their promises of monetization and that I would live happily every after. This did not happen. Nor was I able to secure a position within Blizzard, because for as much as Dryeyece and I achieved, it still was not good enough to get into Blizzard - why? Because "Real Games" made with Unity and sold on Steam have "Real Reviews" and are held a lot higher than those made on the Sc2 Editor - and I am Australian, don't forget that - it costs a lot to migrate me to the US - even though numerous times I said I would pay for myself to go there to put myself on an equal playing field - no dice. The people at Blizzard are amazing, it is too easy to get caught up on the bandwagon to blame Blizzard for everything that goes wrong in your life or career - but the truth is that it was I and I alone that made my decisions, and I and those around me have to life with the consequences.
As numerous people have mentioned, Unity is more of a team working environment, and without great assets, chances are your game will fail to attract players (Minecraft is a one in a million game that will not be repeated any time soon IMO). Without players playing your game you will not earn money, and without money you will not be able to support yourself. If you still live with your parents, yeah go nuts, work your ass off while you have a shitload of time and don't need to earn money to live, experiment, try new stuff - cherish every second of that time and make something amazing - but at the same time, think about your future, choose the right platform that will allow you to earn an income so that when the day comes and you are on your own, you can still make games and you can still support a family. Oh, and HYPE from one of the major YouTubers can make a project and change your life, for all the years spent trying to get Husky or HD or someone out there to give us a shoutout, it never happened. When it does; Flappy Birdddddddddddd...........
Would it? I mean, Husky promotes Nexus Wars pretty heavily, and as far as I'm aware, the dev(s) of that still aren't rolling in the monies. His mapmaker friend (Zetal?) produced a bunker wars type map that, despite again being promoted heavily, was resigned to the depths of the arcade. Star Strikers, promoted by Total Biscuit of all people, and even had a Blizzard-backed tournament, wasn't really a life-changing event for it's makers. Indeed, it's not quite as resigned as the bunker wars map mentioned before, but it certainly isn't that popular.
I don't think youtuber hype can really do much beyond grant your project a surge of new players. I'll be honest, I think it's extremely easy to get a surge of new players as it is. For all the bashing that the arcade gets, the playerbase is still huge. It takes me about a minute to get a 10v10 battleground on the less populated faction of World of Warcraft. It takes me about 5 seconds to get a rank 1-4 popularity game going, even at obscure times like 5am. Furthermore, people on the arcade are just desperate for new content. A fresh map will be dived upon and rush up the rankings if it has the basic qualities of being an enjoyable game.
Lastly, as far as monetization is concerned, yeah. It's an issue. I'm not saying that maps should have DLC or something bizarre, but something like the twitch subscriber function where you can opt to "subscribe" to a map and get cosmetic enhancements in-game seems just obvious. People get really weird when money is involved, but the fact of the matter is that money attracts quality. If such enhancements were restricted to cosmetic-only (something that Blizzard have shown that they are willing to police), then I really don't see the downside.
Still, wishful thinking. We'll see what LotV brings. Unless StarCraft and Heroes of the Storm share the arcade, then I think that'll be the last time Blizzard pays attention to the arcade. I do have hope, though. The mapmaking tournament, the arcade website, Blizzard have at least shown that they care.
@DogmaiSEA: Go
damn, thats heartbreaking story. Full of hope and dreams to fall into abyss.. Sorry to see that all this sc2 development came to this conclusion..
I myself just dropped Starcraft 2 map making for my own maps, while to this day still helping other guy with making map triggers and such. Stopped updating my own maps almost half year ago when was making content for my map called Age of Knights. All those custom Assets turned out not worth much of my time just to be used by other sc2 mapper from my map by those that I did not gave permission to use them and didnt had intentions in a long run to release to everyone.. Tried to surround myself with my own created content for map and have something special among other projects that people make on Bnet.. Maybe I wouldnt be so butthurt about it if people that took away assets for their own use wherent such a dicks overall. Map on which my assets appeared on called - Eraz Test. A map that evolved from Eras Zombie Invasion map with community being so shit and creators themselves are same level of retardness as community for it that it just instantly killed any motivation to continue making anything for the Age of Knights map or making new projects that I would enjoy playing, experiencing..
while its great to have SC2 engine as RTS engine that has a lot of core mechanics to make RTS games that I'm interested in. Limits and lack of flexability to make something more than just WC3 remake or SC core gameplay tweaks, isnt plausable to make/remake Other type Strategy games that has much more of management (SimCity, Anno, Stronghold).. And as we see in the end it's dead end..
Currently casually look over engines, gathering thoughts where to go next. Need to get that source code for RTS games that I may want to make to experience..
@DogmaiSEA: Go
This response isnt just for you, but its sort of a general thing as well. Im kind of surprised to be reading some of this stuff. I never viewed making games in SC2 to be anything other than a hobby that you could not and should not expect any monetary compensation for. To hear that there are people out there that actually expected to make a living off of SC2 mods to the point of being able to support a family is pretty outrageous.
Husky did do a video on the first game i ever made (I didnt ask him to he just did it cause he liked it), the video really helped to make my game popular for a short period of time but that was all, I obviously did not make money nor did i expect to:
Getting a good job in video game development I think has always been seen as a bit of a pipe dream, not to say it cant be done but its difficult and you shouldn't really expect for that to ever happen to you. You can spend all the time you want trying to achieve that but i wouldn't be surprised or upset that it hasn't happened for you, because its not something you would expect to happen.
If you want to go into the video game industry the easiest way to do it, is to do it yourself and make an indie game. Starcraft 2 in regaurds to modding is really just a toy for fun, considering they own the rights to everything you make, which is clear, im not sure how you could think anything different or how anyone serious about getting into games professionally would chose SC2 over, well, anything unity or otherwise.I knew a guy who got his PhD in computer science, did an internship as a programmer at Blizzard, did a good job, and was offered some sort of job in testing making very little money.
Getting into the gameing industry by just being hired is hard, even if your clearly a really intelligent person. Even then in the case of blizzard there are so many really smart, capable people who want to work for them that in some cases they can pay them like shit, he would not of been able to support a family on the salary blizzard offered him, especially not were he would be working. The guy turned down the job for monetary reasons, got a job at an IT company, makes a salary in the 100-125k range last i knew.
Not trying to be mean or anything, just somewhat confused at the unreasonable expectations some people seem to have. Its like coming onto a forum about music and having people angry that they aren't rock stars yet. You can take this path and sure do what makes you happy, but understand that it may not be easy, in fact it probably wont be.
I don't really feel like I want to dedicate too long a post to all this, but here's a couple of things I would say.
Dogmai; you say a number of times in your post "people now can laugh at that decision" or "in hindsight it seems stupid", and I'm having trouble responding to that. I hate to be an asshole, but I will 'laugh' at those decisions, and yes, in hindsight they do seem stupid. I think some of them were stupid at the time you made them as well. It's not that I'm trying to bring you down, but sucky as it may be, you did bring a lot of this on yourself. You do seem to acknowledge that, but outside of that... what is there left to say? And what is your point? It's not that I don't feel sorry for the fact that all this has brought you down so harshly, but I can't sit around and care for it the way you do, knowing how everything went.
That said, Lemmy is completely right. Landing that one job at your favourite developer is a one in a million opportunity, and with crowdfunding becoming bigger and bigger anybody interested in game creation should simply go the indie route right now. As long as you'll realize that bad projects will fail and only the really good ones will flourish (though decent ones have a tendency of breaking even, I feel), you're free to take your shot. Getting into game development has only become easier over the past years. Making an actual good game is still as hard as it will ever be, but at this point people who really feel the strong urge to try have very real options - even ones where they'll be able to sustain themselves while working for free (or through donations) for a time while holding a regular job simply to put food on the table.
This doesn't make any of the points people raise less valid, but even if it's easier to make games in Unity or other such engines, its not always easy to get that game played or make it profitable. For every successful indie game, there are dozens of failed ones.
You can read about some of them on Gamasutra, and you may find the developers insight on their failed projects to help you if you are looking to get into making indie games yourself.
http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/HaydenCacace/20140417/215695/Reflections_on_an_Indie_Failure__StarLicker_Postmortem.php
"StarLicker was entirely self-funded by the development team. This meant basically no one got paid and the plan was that we would each get a slice of the profits after the game was released and the dough started rolling in. But then we released the game and money did not start rolling in. It barely even trickled in. And this created a very strange and unexpected set of feelings beyond the obvious disappointment and frustration. I felt really strongly that I just completely let everyone on the team down. It was like I assembled a team of some of my most talented friends whom I had the utmost respect for, only to have them waste a huge chunk of their creative lives. This feeling still hasn’t worn off, and I don’t know if it ever will."
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/173068/congratulations_your_first_indie_.php
"To top it all off, I sent an email to Steam, Desura, and Big Fish Games and got rejected three times. At this point, I should have started feeling bad about myself. The problem was not in IndieCity, not in the Mac App Store, not in the press. Nobody wanted to hear about a year old iPhone game coming to PC. The game world today is fueled by novelty. It was time to quit.
I may have learned the hard way, but I didn't feel bad about it. I believe as long as you put love into what you're doing, while you have fun doing it; results don't matter that much. Yes, you'll feel shitty for some time, and once or twice you'll want to throw something at the wall and call it quits. But your happiness really shouldn't rest in the outcome."
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/221630/6_key_points_from_the_2014_Indie_Salary_Report.php
"Fifty-seven percent of indie game developers (including both solo indies and members of indie teams across all pay ranges) made under $500 in game sales."
Just some quick examples, though you'll see stuff like that on there all the time.
To be clear though, I'm absolutely not trying too discourage anyone. The majority of those articles the authors do not express regret about trying to make indie games even if they were complete flops that put them in bad financial situations.
I guess I'm just trying to give a little perspective and say the same thing that happened to Dogmia with SC2 can happen with Indie devs on other platforms too. Lots of Indie devs using Unity or other platforms have their projects fail with no profit or popularity and force them to get some other job to pay the bills instead.
I think ultimately you just have to have a realistic view and realize that making games isn't necessarily stable career so you should be going into it because you love it and you're passionate about it not necessarily because you think it will work out monetarily, regardless of the platform you choose.
All that said; I kind of agree with lemmy. SC2 mapping should only ever be seen as a hobby, not ever as something with a chance of paying off.
One last thing:
@Trieva: "There are really cool features with Unity like really rapid offline testing inside the editor. Blizzard really needs to step up their game if they want to compete with such an accessible, flexible, and free engine such as Unity."
Blizzard isn't trying to compete with Unity. They aren't trying to make a viable game engine platform. They're just trying to make awesome *modding* tools and opportunities for their game. As much as they might brand it as the "Arcade" and make it free, its still just the Starcraft editor and mods - if they wanted it to be something more, it would have its own development team, it would be its own engine, and it would actually be supported by their customer service department.
I was referring to someone of the likes of PewDiePie with Flappy Bird; but point taken I wrote it the wrong way. Would a shout out from Husky or HD actually made our game popular? Probably not. Would it have given it a surge of players to the point where over coming our biggest feedback issue - there isn't enough people to get a game going - would have been a possibility? Probably. With a multiplayer game you need an active community or else the game will usually perish, at least to the point where you can get the "standard" game mode going with minimal effort. Hence, if a new player joined the community he should be able to play a game within a few minutes, not having to spend hours over skype arranging times etc.
This is where the arcade was the wrong platform for a Moba genre game, especially one that was innovating past a Dota Clone - unlike SoTiS, and don't get me started on Ecko/RNG.
But you see the issue that here-within lies with the Arcade? "It takes about 5 seconds to get a Rank 1-4 pop game going", make it a second page game and see how hard it is. At least with iOS you will usually have the Popularity list moving weekly, yes this can also be given to the fact that the games do not really require a cult following, they are mainly single player games which are easy to developer and at a cheap price point - whilst also being extremely overpopulated with good quality games; but it moves never the less. The Arcade barely does.
I said for years to the few Blizzard Devs I am in contact with that the Arcade needs to be moved to the launcher much like Steam. It needs to be taken out of Starcraft II and pushed to allow the general Battle.net population quick access to it. I believe one day it will move away from being "in-game"; maybe nearing the time Warcraft IV comes along, but as for LOTV I highly doubt it.
Traysent cares a shitload, as does Villers and a huge group of people at Blizzard. It is just the issues when dealing with a company as large as Blizzard and the bureaucracy involved in getting anything "big" done. I hate myself everytime I send an email to Traysent because I know how busy he is, I know how much work he puts into the Arcade and supporting us, and I just fucken hate myself even more everytime I request something from him or Blizzard. For everything they do, we, as a community, have a pretty shitty way of showing our thanks. The majority of us whinge, cry and complain, but very few of us ever show our thanks.
This is life. Compared to other things that have happened, neither the amount of money nor the effect it has had on my life comes anywhere close to other things that are better left unsaid. I made my choices and I accept the consequences. But I am Australian, we were born fighting, we live in a country where nearly everything wants to kill us, especially the kiwis, this is who we are. Our whole culture revolves around rooting for the underdog, and the 'Aussie Battler getting a fair go', I will succeed one day.
Btw, you made your custom content, you own it, file a DMCA with [email protected] and get it removed.
I was recently asked by a Blizzard Dev what would I do if Blizzard suddenly ceased to exist tomorrow ... what would you do? To be honest I never thought about this question until I was asked and the answer is simple.
I would keep making games. I would go Indi, fight my ass off for grants and government funding, use every legal avenue to reduce my tax and get other expenses back; such as getting a large percentage return for all the money invested into R&D. A lot of this shit exists but people don't know how to access it. But the big one - government funding - was removed thanks to a super-conservative catholic PM who thinks games are the devil. Who is also sexist and racist and homophobic, but you can research him on your own. This has all happened this year.
Each of us viewed the scenario presented to us back then in different ways. There were numerous 'large' development teams at the start, all of them have folded except for SCU. And Ryan got lucky, super lucky. He can sit on his high perch all he wants and preach that you can do the same as him and succeed etc, but the truth is he is lying out his ass, at least to the point where he doesn't admit the whole story.
Alright, the "idea" of a Starcraft MMO is a much wanted game, but he was only successful in his kickstarter because he had those media contacts who were able to publish his game on the front page of the major gaming websites such as Kotaku _because_ of the original story - Blizzard made a mistake. That is it, that is all. I wish that Blizzard DCMA'd our videos because that is where the value of his project lies, in his story - that Blizzard made a mistake. Think of anytime Blizzard makes a mistake, it is usually huge ones which are very debatable depending on which side of the fence you sit on; such as Diablo III - but this was a simple mistake, Blizzard never makes simple mistakes. And by saying that comment I expect a shitload of people telling me I am wrong >_<.
As with any venture, if there is a story then it helps you immensely. Especially if it is a David vs Goliath scenario; which is what happened there.
I was sad to see all the big teams fold, and all of them told me to get out in the early stages, some even before the end of 2010 because they knew what was coming. I kept my faith.
As for getting into the industry, yep, nearly impossible from my standpoint. There are 20 year olds finishing college in degrees that didn't exist 10 years ago. As the industry gets more and more populated the bench gets set forever higher, those that chose the right platform like Unity and Steam definitely have an advantage over us that chose Starcraft II - this is where those broken promises have to come into play because whilst I accept responsibility for my choices, they were based on certain information we had at the time that we now know were well, ideas that were oversold.
The job I have at the moment is for a company larger than Blizzard, and I was promised things (career pathways) that having now been with the company for six months and meeting those people in corporate who make the decisions (especially the HR manager who does the hiring), I can say that I was lied to. I was lied out the ass to. HR says I was lied out the ass to as well and they are not happy about the situation but nothing is going to change for the rest of the financial year (which is 10 months away). The one who made the promises to me when he hired me has left, those that have promised things since then have nothing to say for themselves because I was simply making them too much money on an extremely low wage. If I walked tomorrow they wouldn't care because the changes I implemented would stay. They learnt my ways, they can train up new people to be like me you know. It is a shitty situation but this is what big business is. And to have this happen straight after what happened whilst developing Tofu is a kick in the guts, but this is life.
Whenever you are a publicly listed company you have to do everything in your shareholder's best interests (at least by law here in Australia) which means the larger the company the more *likely* they are going to screw people over and pay a substandard wage. Hence, working for start-ups is usually a better idea if it is purely about the money.
Never for a moment think I was ignorant when I made my decisions, I just had faith in Blizzard. It is hard for me to explain, whether it is a cultural thing or just me being me, but I do trust a lot and yes, as a result, in my life I do get screwed over a lot but we are still comfortable financially. I do not feel sorry for myself, and I never expect a reply to my posts. I merely share as much information as I can so that somewhere some kid or person who is in my shoes, or sees themselves going down a similar path can learn from my experience and make a better informed decision.
I know by posting messages like these that I am digging myself into a deeper hole for getting a job in the industry, but I don't really care because the truth is, I will be just fine if nothing ever happens. Landing a job at Blizzard won't make or break my life, I will keep fighting like I always do but not everyone is in my position and were lucky enough to have made I dare say, better investment decisions in the past so that when this did happen, alright it sucks, but I didn't lose everything and I didn't put a bullet through my brain because of it. There will be those in life who are tinkering on a life and death decision on any number of factors, and a positive post here and there might be the catalyst for change in that person's life. That is why I post, not to seek pity, not to be oh look at me, but to provide inspiration, in perhaps a more truthful way than being ignorant and thinking positive.
if this a debate bout "arcade mod or dev platform?":
answer is obviously moder
if this is about making a fellow gamemakingenthousiast feel better:
i'll quote Trieva:
"your kids will admire you when one day they realise the kind of stress that you went through yet you still came out strong, for you and for them."
if for nothing else, you know your worth and should learn to feel well about it, glhf