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358 points maloga | 2 comments | | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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deadbabe ◴[] No.45005551[source]
A developer who can build a game by hand in 24 hours could probably build and publish something very polished and professional on Steam within 3 days using LLMs, which leads to some kind of software Fermi paradox: where are all the games??
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1. TechSquidTV ◴[] No.45005714[source]
I've been "able" to make likely decent games for a number of years now. Code and 3D I could potentially have covered. That's no longer what scares me.

Having a good and semi unique idea, is a rare. If I had a great game mechanic idea, the rest would be trivial.

Say you do get a good game loop together that you feel will be successful. You will also now need to loop in art teams for artistic direction, music, character design, etc. A good game loop isnt enough, it needs to be presented in an equally interesting and unique way.

Finally, there is the risk. There is a massive time investment in making games, and you are catering to an audience that is not only accustomed to pirating but finds it morally righteous to steal your work. This is why app developers prefer to make iOS apps. The customers are accustomed to paying and have little interest in pirating.

post-launch and even before that, your job becomes paying and convincing streamers to play your game constantly in the HOPE people start to notice it.

All of this stress and work to hopefully just make an ok amount of money. I have so many excellent games in my steam library by indie devs that gave up after one or two very successful games. And I doubt it's because everything was going so well.

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2. hackable_sand ◴[] No.45009334[source]
I highly recommend making a game and then reviewing your comment.