How to Make Your First Game: A Beginner's Guide
Ready to make your first game? Our step-by-step beginner's guide covers everything from creating a simple prototype and ideation to choosing an engine and publishing your finished project.
So, you want to make a game?
So, you want to make a game? That’s a great idea! Games are fantastic ways to beef up your logic, programming, design, and many other artistic and technical skills. Additionally, making a game is extremely rewarding!
Nothing comes close to the feeling of starting with nothing and watching what you build function in real time. Having someone else put their hands on your creation, watching them interact with it, and feeling their emotional response is one of the greatest feelings in the world.
Making games is also a great way to learn to work collaboratively with other people including friends. The process is much more fun with other involved peers who all have the same drive and passion that you do.
So how do you do it? How do you make a game? That’s what we are going to talk about today!
What do I make?
What do I want to make? If you’re reading this, chances are you don’t have the capacity to make much. Even if you can it doesn’t mean you should.
In this guide I want you to pick a simple game/thing that already exists and copy that.
Like... literally one thing from it. Copy it exactly.
Mario: Make a character that runs and jumps.
Breakout: Make a paddle and a bouncing ball.
Vampire Survivors: A moving character and enemies that get close.
We want to build a skeleton that rescues us from an empty canvas.
How do I make it?
Literally choose whatever you want. I suggest making a physical version before you step into an engine.
I mean literally make it out of index cards, post-it notes, and whatever else you can find. Miro is another great tool for this. Fail faster is the name of the game, and the more you can play the game without putting in a ton of effort the better it will be.
What engine?
I literally don’t care. Use Construct 3, Twine, Unity, Unreal Engine, Game Maker, RPG Maker, Godot, or anything else you can find that feels up your alley. I highly recommend Construct or Game Maker to start, but literally just pick one.
Congrats... you now have a game. How do we make it your game?
Ideation
Ideation is the process of coming up with as many ideas as possible in a short time without a filter. Pull out some post-it notes, set a timer for two minutes, grab some friends, and write out as many ideas as possible until the timer runs out. The goal is to expand on the game you’ve already created in a meaningful, fun, or creative way.
Importantly don’t just focus on ideas from the gaming space. Media grows by incorporating concepts from books, movies, and the real world.
After you finish ideating you go into editing mode. What can you actually accomplish? What theme do you want? Go with the simplest options of course, but any change is a step at making the game your own. Everything is a Remix.
Implementation
At this point you should have a good idea of how to put together basic elements into whatever tool you’re using. If you haven’t already created your skeleton in a basic engine you should focus on doing that.
Now is the time to follow your own path and implement the ideas you have curated for your new experience. This will take time, and is going to be more difficult given you have now entered uncharted territory.
You also now reach the most difficult part of game development: not knowing if what you’re making makes sense and is fun.
Your goal now is to get your game to a playable state as soon as possible, even if it’s missing features, so that other people can try it.
Watch them closely and don’t help them out. Ask them what they are thinking and compare that to what you had hoped for.
Do they like something unexpected?
Does something not make sense?
Are things too hard, or too easy?
After a playtest its your turn to choose to improve, fix, or pivot your experience in a way that is unique to you. The thing you start with may not always be what you end up with.
How do I know when I’m done?
When there’s nothing left. After you’ve implemented your change and it feels like it works its time to finish and polish. Add an ending, add a main menu, and that’s it. Post it to Itch.io and call it a day!
Project Done?
That’s the beauty of the artistic process. Just because I’ve told you to stop here... doesn’t mean you have to. By all means learn to add art, sound, animations, effects, and whatever else you can imagine.
It’s important to remember that each of these is it’s own goal though. Don’t stack your plate too heavily, and keep working.
Since this is your first project you will probably reach a point in which your design no longer fits new elements in your game easily. It’s fine to call it there and work on “Your Game 2.” Or start the process over!
Closing
Congratulations on making your game! I hope you had a great time making it, and you learned a lot along the way.
While working on this article I worked on my own game following my own instructions.
You can play it online here
Please share your projects with me here! I’d love to see what you all are working on!
Why not give you a step-by-step?
Not providing a step by step tutorial on “how to create x game,” was intentional.
There are three main problems with game design:
Problem Solving
Scope
Art
I believe that following a make x game tutorial prevents training all of these skills. Color by numbers tutorials provide no problem solving, a fixed scope, and pre-made art.
I believe in utilizing tutorials for specific mechanics. These help you learn to solve a technical problem without hand-holding you through the rest of the process. Follow art tutorials, follow guides about scope. These give you building blocks while allowing you to practice your own creative process. Skills which you WILL utilize later.
Therefore I believe in starting with your own ideas, and following more specific tutorials like: how to make x mechanic.