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Anyone else lurk and feel like they understand nothing?

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Re: Anyone else lurk and feel like they understand nothing?

#61

Post by fracternal »

Don’t be hard on yourself. Sometimes we all go through that internally. Life is a roller coaster you gotta ride the highs and the thrills that come from it and problem solve when the lows are around. If you think you don’t understand a concept then some self study is a great way to fill the gap. You could read a book, watch some YouTube videos or what I like to do is listen to a few good podcasts

Game development even as a hobbyist is quite impressive. The question is do you enjoy it enough to make a career from it?

Either way keep treking along, you’re not the only one feeling that way. Been there, done that, closed the gap and on to the next problem :)

Re: Anyone else lurk and feel like they understand nothing?

#62

Post by MiguelX413 »

card_zero wrote: post #41
TillE wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no idea if this applies to the OP, but I see a ton of people in game development communities who just jump in with minimal programming experience and try to muddle their way through by watching tutorial videos and stuff. It's particularly terrifying when they're trying to use C++ that way. If you want to take this stuff seriously, absolutely study computer science, and a little computer engineering as well. Wh…

I question why "terrifying" applies given that they're writing games.

Because of the memory unsafety of languages such as C++.

Re: Anyone else lurk and feel like they understand nothing?

#63

Post by card_zero »

MiguelX413 wrote: post #62
card_zero wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I question why "terrifying" applies given that they're writing games.

Because of the memory unsafety of languages such as C++.

"Here's an obscure indie game, let's create a save file that exploits a buffer overflow and socially engineer people into opening it," just barely conceivably.

Re: Anyone else lurk and feel like they understand nothing?

#66

Post by AbstractH24 »

blitzed wrote: post #30

[dead]

I also did the same thing 25+ years ago with computer magazines. And similarly, I built up a little programing business.

There, it felt like I learned a lot by experimenting hands-on. That's probably what I need to do more in this situation too. In a structured fashion.

The line between being a "generalist" and "knowing a little about a lot, but not enough about anything to do anything" is fine.

Re: Anyone else lurk and feel like they understand nothing?

#67

Post by AbstractH24 »

ggm wrote: post #16

There is absolutely nothing wrong with lurking. Consider theatre: do they need an audience to act, or even react? I admire people who unlike myself are sufficiently self contained not to need to post.

> There is absolutely nothing wrong with lurking. Consider theatre: do they need an audience to act, or even react?

I lurk both in this world and in the world of Broadway.

One of the biggest shockers I had (many years ago already) was how little anyone involved in making theater cares about the audience.

Re: Anyone else lurk and feel like they understand nothing?

#68

Post by jpc0 »

anakaine wrote: post #57
wackget wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly it's only frustrating if you approach it with an "all or nothing" mindset. Your site doesn't have to be all-singing, all-dancing. In fact it's probably better off being simple. To wit, you don't need async/AJAX stuff (unless you're making a chat app or something). You definitely don't need a framework and you might actually be able to avoid using JavaScript altogether. I use jQuery only because I like the el…

I would like to have something that looks nice and modern, has a good user experience, and is responsive. Those three requirements take me pretty close to the "too ahrd" rabbit hole most of the time. Not always, just often enough.

Apart from one or two things that are currently not implemented well by the browsers, your requirements can be met without a single line of JS or even a server at that. And you may very well not run into those one or two things.

Re: Anyone else lurk and feel like they understand nothing?

#69

Post by [deleted] »

TillE wrote: post #19
MrVandemar wrote: post #8

"Programming on and off" sounds like you haven't approached the field in a structured way. You can learn and accomplish a great deal that way, but it also means you have some gaps. Ever implemented a linked list? Compared sorting algorithm efficiency? Doing a course in computer science will probably give you a better grounding. Also, people have niches. I'm guessing you're knowledgeable in your particular niche, and…

I have no idea if this applies to the OP, but I see a ton of people in game development communities who just jump in with minimal programming experience and try to muddle their way through by watching tutorial videos and stuff. It's particularly terrifying when they're trying to use C++ that way. If you want to take this stuff seriously, absolutely study computer science, and a little computer engineering as well. Wh…

[deleted]

Re: Anyone else lurk and feel like they understand nothing?

#70

Post by embeng4096 »

UtopiaPunk wrote: post #45
TillE wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no idea if this applies to the OP, but I see a ton of people in game development communities who just jump in with minimal programming experience and try to muddle their way through by watching tutorial videos and stuff. It's particularly terrifying when they're trying to use C++ that way. If you want to take this stuff seriously, absolutely study computer science, and a little computer engineering as well. Wh…

Game development is a lot more than programming. If someone is just making projects on their own, it really doesn't matter much if the code is "good" or not. You just gotta have a game that works. If you want to get hired as programmer in AAA game development, then your job role starts to become more specialized as you move up, but that's true in a lot of environments. And jobs for AAA game development are admittedly…

> Game development is a lot more than programming. If someone is just making projects on their own, it really doesn't matter much if the code is "good" or not. You just gotta have a game that works.

Balatro, a recently-released solo-dev indie game, is a great example of this. I saw two tweets the other day that, together, support your point: "Balatro has a 5000 line if-else chain"[0] and "in the 3 months since Balatro has launched, it has been collectively played for a total of 6200 years"[1].

[0]: https://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/1cbcmr0/how_is_it_... (couldn't find the twitter link directly but summarized it from this reddit post)

[1]: https://x.com/LocalThunk/status/1794876280997036443

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