Deleted

Personally, I do not have enough creativity nor knowledge to develop my own game. While I can't be too much more help to you, I will say that if you are passionate about something then definitely pursue it. If that is game development, then hopefully that will translate to the quality of your game. Some of my favourite developers are just one guy, see Steve Gal and Anthony Case.

When I was younger... much younger... I wanted to make a game. Because, I liked to make programs, and since than I even started to work as a programmer. But, the more I live, the more I strengthened in opinion that making a good game is more about making a good plot, nice graphics and music, than about programming. And I'm a terrible writer, bad artist and, probably, worst composer ever. And I'm not interested in making an asset flip for the sake of making it, the game must be interesting and meant to be played. Steam is a good example of what happens when everyone make games without required skills. I don't want to be one of those poor lost souls.

I'm in a hurry, have a bump!

I've been a programmer for a very long time, with hopes to work in the industry at some time. But kinda settle with a data management gig (one needs money to eat, right?)
Recently, I've been part of an on-going fan made visual novel like dating game for the game Watch Dogs 2. I did some of the heavy lifting in the engine for the "novel" and "visual", since we've basically started from scratch with whatever tools we had (GameMaker 1.4). It helps that we have some talented artists to draw characters and backgrounds to make it look "nice".

We haven't done much on it since last autumn, but we'Re trying to kick things back in motion with the rumours of Watch Dogs 3. I could probably share a beta of it if you're interested in it..

Bump from a non-developer.

I knew that I wasn't good enough for game development. It's just the truth. I'm not good at programming, art or anything like that. But when I got RPG Maker VX Ace, I thought "What the hell, I'll try and make a game.". So I figured out what I wanted to make and started working on it. It wasn't easy and I never finished it.
It was supposed to be a 5-15 minute long game. I couldn't be bothered to properly finish it. I probably don't even have the skeleton of the game that I was working on.

Surprisingly I don't see an option fitting my situation in the poll,
I am currently learning how to make games

Bit of background, I'm a Java/C#/C++ developer, graduated from software engineering 18 months ago.

I've worked on an indie title for 3 years (2013-2015), it was almost ready to be released, we presented it at multiple events in my city, then decided the version was not good enough, and they decided to make it from scratch, at which point I left the team.
We had translated the game in 7 languages, hired a professional artist to revamp the whole game (which we initially made using photoshopped Google'd images).
I was the developer, and I was working with two designers. What a ride that was.
As much as I appreciated working on the project, I never actually saw it as a sellable product. It was the outcome of a game jam, that we decided to bring to a full-fledged game. But to me it was still a game that you would like to show, but not really to play.
This was the trailer we made for the first version (before we hired the artist haha).
And this is a gameplay video of the version they were working on after I left the project.
My best version was inbetween the two but I have no video of it. Still got the build though ^^

I've also worked more than a year on two other projects with that team (between versions), which we ended up dropping.
All good concepts, but the projects evolved completely out of scope and we lost focus on what we really wanted to make.
We went overboard with the story and effects and upgrade systems before even having a good gameplay. Mistakes were made haha.

I've also done a year and a half of internships at Electronic Arts, working on two AAA titles, that was lots of fun.
NHL15 and Star Wars Battlefront II. Don't hate lol.
I've since moved out to a smaller city and am now just working as a 'regular' software developer. I left the game development world behind but I still look back at it fondly.

Now, I have my personal views on the quality of games and what it means to be an indie. But it doesn't matter what I think. So shut up, me :).

If you want to work on a game, don't let people stop you. It's a lot of challenge and a lot of fun, and no matter if you end up finishing it or not, no matter if you're releasing it or not, no matter if it's good or not, you'll have learned in the process and hopefully enjoyed the experience.
All I suggest is that you evaluate whether you're making a game for you, for others, or for your wallet.
Think of games you like, dislike or despise, and try to figure out in which category they fit.
Decide if your game should be interesting, good, funny, successful, profitable, or a combination of those, and work to achieve that goal.
I'm telling you, the most innovative concepts take root in the indie world, so go crazy and amaze us! <3

There are a number of issues or things in game development that aren't different from non-game software development: Crunch, scope creep, lots of bugs day 1, unoptimized software, etc.
I work daily with software dev teams for years, but I'm not a dev - I manage their projects, and do whatever devs or product people wont do.
I'm under the impression that most game dev companies just task their dev leads, "producers", or management with that.
So I tend to say that formal project management & SDLC such as Agile would address the biggest issues, but I also can imagine the sales pressures of the gaming industry where there's so much competition at a wide range of price points.
I'd love to try doing that for a game or a game company, but right now I'm pretty happy with my job security in the general software industry.

I worked as a QA Tester for 2k games and just recently started another testing position within the gaming industry. (also have a degree in game development)

when i was young (long ago) I made a text based game written in BASIC. It had branching storylines and stuff, like bandersnatch if it was made by a 4th grader

I'm actually in school for game development right now! Granted, I'm not particularly good at it, but I'm trying to get better (even if I can never wrap my head around coding for an operating system)

I've taken a couple C++ and BASIC programming courses back in the day and made a few games but never released them for sale or anything like that. I made a couple text based adventures, a mario bros knock-off, and helped work on a MUD just to name a few.

Newer stuff boggles me though. Online multiplayer with servers in stead of p2p, controller support, polygons? None of it sticks in my brain for some reason.

I have thought about trying to make some games and put 'em on steam just to see what would happen but I'm not very good at sound or graphic stuff and am also lazy.

I've no experience with game development but have some friends in the industry and the key to success is a mixture of things like good balanced team with developers, artists and musicians as well as good manager and marketing team, but this alone is not enough and you'll also need some luck by the time your game hits the shelves.
Sometimes one person can do it all and come up with something good but that's not the norm.

Bump and thank you.

From middle school on for many years, my friend and I would occasionally plop down over a week or so and hash something out that never really went anywhere. Since having kids, I've made two playable 'games' with/for them, plus a few made-up board/card games as well. All of it has been awful, haha.

Been a game developer for a year now, have to say it's a series of ups and downs.

Throughout creating my first legit game The Free Writer: Director’s cut it's out now for free It was different.
Sometimes it's absolutely awesome, fun, and creative others it can be really boring, really frustrating and even tad annoying at a time
but that's how everything works

Now that I'm legitly building my career on it, I have learned to space thing and manage it out more to not get burned out fast.
I'm now working on my 5th game after releasing the past three for mobile, out on Google play
The Free Writer / Discover Planet Unknown / Tunnel To Space
to try and get my career going. I'm not at all good at it but I'm trying to get there.

So yea, that's my story. Hope I didn't annoy anyone with my self advertise 😅