Introduction
Many developers start a game or project only to quit it when there is a problem or don’t feel motivated. In this tutorial, I will be going over EI, overestimating, and mindsets while developing. These are 3 key things to creating and finishing a successful project.
EI
What is EI? EI stands for emotional intelligence, which is the ability to recognize, manage, and understand our emotions. Good EI may include working on a team easily and being able to handle stress.
Stress
When you are developing, you are put into some sort of stress when you are doing too much. Stress during development may also come from projects that are too hard for you.
To handle levels of stress and avoid burnout/lack of motivation, make sure to plan yourself a schedule with what you will be working on that day. Give yourself reasonable amounts of tasks and work. Make sure you can finish it within one day. If not, try giving yourself less.
Teams
A lot of developers work on teams, duos, or trios. Connections with teammates are not always clear and close.
Make sure you have close connections with teammates. Practice teamwork through working on a project with a teammate. A lot of times, games fall apart when the team stops contacting each other.
Motivation
Motivation plays a big role in development. If you are not motivated, you may end up taking long term breaks or even quit working on the game.
Dunning-Kruger Effect
The Dunning-Kruger Effect is when one person with low ability at something overestimates their skill. Sometimes, beginners go right to making Adopt Me 2.0. right after they learn how to place a brick.
Overestimating can sometimes lead to a lack of motivation because you do not know how to do things. People going through the Dunning-Kruger Effect usually end up quitting their projects and start learning to do simpler things.
On the chart shown below, the person overestimates their skill, then learns that they’re not that good, then gets better. Make games on your level, nothing higher. If you’re not so advanced, try a simple obby, tycoon, or simulator. After that, you can move on to roleplay games, FPS games, etc.
Instead of thinking “I am terrible at this”, maybe think to yourself “I’m not the best at this, but there is always room to improve.”
Lack of Support
A lot of people get support and motivation from their friends and family.But what if your friends are not supportive of your development work? This can lead to you thinking your project is “dumb” or “bad”.
To avoid negative feelings from other people, I recommend installing this plugin. It’s your Roblox friends with words of encouragement in a chat bubble on top of their heads.
Lack of Interest
A game being interesting to develop is important. If you don’t like working on it, it’s probably time to move on.
Boring Game
Is your game too boring for you to work on? Do you have trouble thinking about updates? Do you ever want to stop and start something new? If your game seems boring to develop on, you’ll perhaps start losing motivation and looking at negative sides of your game, such as low player amounts and heavy dislikes. If this is the case for you, it’s time to start a new game.
No Plans for Your Game’s Future
A lot of games are well-focused on income and pre-plan each update. If you’ve started feeling a lack of interest in your game, you may have started to forget future update plans, and not care about revenue anymore. Players want updates, and if you’re unable to provide them, players will stop playing. A low amount of players will decrease your motivation and eventually, your game might even “die”.
Workspace
This section is filled with ideal workspace guides and other general workspace info.
Gathering Ideas
The ideal workspace for gathering ideas is different for everybody, but here is what I recommend:
- A quiet place, outside or near a window
- A pad of paper and a pencil
- Objects to look at to gather ideas
Point of Views
This is a section filled with relatable, unmotivated moments you may have gone through, and how to avoid them.
Distracted
POV: It’s Friday evening, and you’ve finished all your schoolwork. You are relaxing in a comfortable seat with your laptop, checking your social media, watching videos, and in general, just having a good time. You look at the bottom of your screen and see the Roblox Studio tab of your unfinished game that you have been working on for some time. You decide to work on it again. Just 10 minutes in, you check the clock. It’s 8:00 pm. Your favorite TV show’s new episode premiere happens now. You close your laptop, watch the show, and forget that you were developing.
Distraction is common among developers who usually end up quitting their project. Getting distracted by things can make it hard to develop and get work done.
How to avoid it
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Turn off your phone notifications and put it to silent. No, you won’t need to know that your favorite mobile game has a new update.
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Go distraction-free. Find a quiet room without many people or a TV.
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Close all excess tabs and apps except for Roblox Studio, Developer Hub, Develop Page, Developer Forum, and Blender.
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Find a good spot to sit that you know you can concentrate in. (This may not be that super comfy bean bag.)
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Create a calendar. Not only will it keep you organized, but it will also keep you on track and focused.
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Set a timer anywhere between 10 minutes - 1 hour for development. Now there are no excuses why you shouldn’t be developing. The small amount of time also prevents a lot of stress.
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Listen to something. Put on your earbuds and listen to music for concentrating, podcasts, or just nature sounds to help you keep focused.
Poll
You’ve probably never thought about EI, motivation, and stress while you developed. Take this poll as a way to think and review motivation as you develop.
- Very focused
- Focused
- Mostly Focused
- Sometimes Focused
- Kind of Focused
- Barely Focused
- Not Very Focused
0 voters
- Very Good. We chat and discuss very often.
- Quite good. We chat every other day.
- Good. We chat every week or so.
- It’s okay. We chat sometimes.
- It’s not so good. We chat very few times a month.
- It’s bad. We haven’t talked in a while.
- It’s terrible. We barely work on the project anymore.
0 voters
- I’m excellent at it. I never go too advanced and give myself the right amount of work.
- I’m very good at it. I mostly work at my level.
- I’m good at it. I can work at my level but sometimes I need improvement on staying there.
- I’m okay with it. I try to work at my level and give myself a good amount of work.
- I’m not that good at it. A lot of times I cannot handle the stress.
- I’m bad at it. Stress is everywhere as I develop.
- I need a lot of improvement. I always overestimate and give myself too much work to do.
0 voters
Conclusion
New tips will always be added to this post. I hope it helps you with motivation and stress when developing. Remember to keep at it!
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