The Juggling Act

Hello! Welcome to March’s April’s irregularly-scheduled gamedev update. I was originally going to write this thing in March, but I ended up being busier than expected. Sort of. That’s what this post is about.

Is it going to turn into an essay on the struggles of part-time work halfway through?

Maybe.

(Yes.)

In the name of not delaying this any further, let’s begin.

Part 1: Leveled Design

When it comes to Doorways 9‘s development, things have been… fine, actually. Early March was mostly level design time; I built out some of the ideas I’d been kicking around for a while, decided I didn’t really like how they played at all, and repeatedly redid them until I had something better.

Sometimes, you really only find the spirit of your game through actually building it. In Doorways 9‘s case, building out levels has made me realize that I’m not really working on a puzzle game, in the sense I thought I was when I started.

I’m making a spite simulator.

Or, as I’m more naturally inclined to describe it: I’m making a game about beefing with your computer.

In my early designs, I think I tended to conceive of menu navigation as major vector for challenges. Figuring out how to get through screens successfully was to be the challenge – the thing that the player is there to do. However, as time has gone on, my perspective on that has softened a lot – mostly because I find messing with a vindictive little AI assistant to be more entertaining than, uh… using a boot menu?

While menu navigation obstacles are still present, they are (in my mind) here less as standalone challenges than they are as irritants – something to encourage the player to:

1. Think.
2. Resent their opponent just a little bit more 🙂

Level design for the past few months has mostly involved bringing my old ideas more in line with this approach. I’m taking anything that’s a bit too fiddly or convoluted to navigate, and casting it, unceremoniously, into the nearest trash bin.

And then I’m replacing it with more snark.

Part 2: The Sins of My Past and/or Present

The latter half of my gamedev March was, for the most part, dedicated to fixing bugs, and taking the time to undo some past mistakes.

There’s not much about the actual work worth mentioning here. I started doing some bugfixing, and found myself falling down a rabbit hole of project cleanup.

You see, Doorways 9 was originally a way of testing the waters with Godot, and of getting a feel for the engine. It has long since evolved beyond that, but there are clearly still some leftovers from when I was new to the toolset: the placement of folders, inconsistent organization of early files, etc. There’s been nothing dysfunctional, per se – but I keep seeing things and going:

“Huh. I did that. Right…”

I decided it was about time for all of that legacy stuff to go – if for no other reason than my peace of mind. So, away it went.

Not as unceremoniously as the level design stuff, though. Less “cast into the nearest bin“, more “slowly, delicately plucked from the project, to be laid to rest in their own little corners of the repository.”

Y’know… Just in case I need them in the future.

🙂

And… that’s it, as far as the progress report goes! Some level work, bugfixes, and reorganization. It’s simple, but not too shabby for a part-time schedule!

So… why do I feel like crap about it?

Part 3: That Bathroom Sinking Feeling

For context: I’m not a full-time gamedev right now – as nice as that would be. I’m a part-timer, with a day job and an ongoing job hunt, so I work on Doorways 9… basically whenever I have the time and energy to do so.

Is it the most consistent schedule I’ve ever followed? Definitely not. The posting rate on this blog is a testament to that.

However, I’m of the opinion that that’s not a bad thing, necessarily. If I were at an actual studio right now, maybe – but not now. Your workflow always has to adapt to the circumstances of the life around you, and when games aren’t the thing paying your bills… suddenly there are a lot of things that take precedence.

Things like helping your dad reassemble a bathroom.

Hell, even if it does pay some of the bills, independent work can still end up feeling like a juggling act – and a stressful one, at that. You end up spending a lot of energy not just on doing the things you have to do, but on the very act of maintaining a schedule for them. Doubly so for my fellow ADHD brains out there. And associated acts.

Of course, the rub is that, even then, you can’t control everything. Regardless of how good a planner you might be, we’re all subject to the random events of our lives.

Or, as I’ve arbitrarily dubbed them: The Bathroom Sink Factor.

In much the same way that The Bus Factor demands planning around the potential incapacitation of teammates, The Bathroom Sink Factor demands planning around the changing circumstances of a freelance or work-from home lifestyle. On top of considering the amount of time you personally anticipate having, your schedule has to be flexible enough to handle any unrelated time-sinks that the roulette wheel of life tries to throw your way. The sorts of things that wouldn’t really impact a 9-to-5, but can absolutely throw a wrench in your work-from-home plans.

Again, like having to help your dad reassemble a bathroom.

Now, saying “shit happens, be prepared” is neither a remotely new, nor particularly useful observation. It’s on equal footing with “expect the unexpected” as far as I’m concerned – and I’m pretty sure anyone who’s ever worked on anything already knows that intuitively. The real, real rub about all of this – and thing that’s recently been gnawing at me the most – is the way that this stuff really distorts my perception of progress.

Around the the start of every month, I make a vague plan for myself. It’s nothing too rigid – just a list of things I want to get done. I’m usually pretty good about it, but sometimes not. Again: The Bathroom Sink Factor.

At the start of April, the month of March was feeling very much like a not situation for me – and I wasn’t happy about it. I was perpetually tired, and was starting to feel like I was spinning my wheels a bit – not doing much with my time, not being productive when I was, etc. Twas’ a classic ADHD-burnout combo – my mental health propped up by a combination of rabid Balatro and nightly Stardew Valley.

So, I went to start writing this, figuring that I might as well get something done. Then, after about 30 minutes of looking over my schedule, I had a little revelation:

“Oh. I did most of this.”

Yet there I sat, feeling like I had just wasted a month. Why?

Upon reflection, I think that what I ran into here was an illusion – a cruel little trick of the brain, born of one too many days of “broken” routines.

I wake up in the morning with something specific on my mind – part of a project I’ve wanted to get to for a while. After breakfast, I sit down at my computer, and open up my to-do list – only to get call from work, asking me to come in.

Strictly speaking, it’s the right thing to do – it’s my job. But that quick gear-change in the morning still feels like a misstep on my part.

I go into a holiday week with half a mind to work on something – if I can find the time. Ultimately, I don’t, and that’s fine. It’s a holiday, after all.

Yet during the downtime, I still find myself thinking about it – and those moments start to feel like lost opportunities.

I take a day to myself – some time to relax and unwind – only to be struck with sudden motivation. I end up working on something for a few hours, which is good! It’s what I want to do!

But… it was supposed to be time to relax, wasn’t it?

These little, perceived “failures” are great at getting stuck in the ol’ noggin, adding unnecessary, internal pressure to my day-to-day life. They warp the way I think about what I’ve done, until my thoughts go from-

“What should I do today?”

to-

“God, I never did that last weekend, did I? I’d better get on that soon…”

…regardless of how soon I actually have to, or how soon I even can. It’s a thought process that precludes the practical, complicating factors of life, and instead measures your accomplishments in the abstract. It’s an impossible standard – not in terms of my original plans, but in terms of judging how I was living up to them.

Honestly, now that I’m looking back on it… I think I had a pretty decent idea of what I’d be able to do, going into March. It wasn’t my initial grasp on what was possible that was the problem, as much as a case of getting lost in the weeds – getting my emotions turned around by an already-busy month!

So… why include all of this here? In what’s ostensibly a “gamedev update”?

…

I dunno.

The honest answer is that part three really wasn’t supposed to be here. Like I said before, this was originally going to be an update for an update’s sake. The actual update part was written in, like… under an hour. Three days ago. There weren’t even numbers on the sections until about 1a.m. last night.

All the stuff about part-time work (and bathroom sinks, I guess) is here organically – a live series of realizations I had while writing the first two sections. I felt like shit about what I was doing, but the very act of writing and thinking about it turned that around. This post is literally is what did it.

…And, I guess, the hope that someone, somewhere, will benefit from hearing that? That just talking about what you’re doing is important – and that it can change your perspective on things? I don’t know. That’d be nice.

Part 4: To Be Continued?

Yeah. The back half of this post really ambushed me with its existence. Oh well.

There was a time in 2023 when I was trying to do smaller posts semi-regularly, before the holidays screwed that up. Then I started putting more time into them, and they started being fewer and far between. I do like that, but maybe the content of this post is an indicator that I should try and do more small stuff, too. Just something to keep myself moving, and keep perspective on what I’ve done. It’d be nice.

…And, as I type this, I’m just now realizing that every video essayist I’ve ever enjoyed has said something similar at some point. Before moving on to something longer.

This is just going to be how creating stuff goes, isn’t it?

…

Well, regardless: thanks for reading this. See you in the next one.

Also, some of my friends released a game recently. It’s about clowns.

Was the title of this entire blog post just a subtle clown joke, intended to lead into this bit at the end?

Yes.