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Read through some other posts - author is a game developer who founded his own company. This post feels like one of three things:

1. burnout, as someone else pointed out.

2. a very good troll :)

3. A somewhat poorly guided but honest attempt to dissuade people from joining the games industry (possibly mixed with 1.)

As someone who started their career in games and left - he's not wrong. The games industry is kind of shit. It doesn't pay well, the hours suck, and you might work for months or years on something that either never sees the light of day or nobody ends up playing (not to mention that in the beginning you're somewhat replaceable, there's a dozen young developers who would love to be in your shoes) - and this is just the life of a salaried game dev - the indie life is even harder.

...on the other hand, the projects and problems are interesting/unique and the people in it are some of the most wonderful I've ever met. I miss shipping games, even though I bailed out of my own volition. I don't blame anyone for wanting to join, especially as a young developer.

I remember at the age of 19 or so being asked (paraphrased) "why the hell would you want to do that?" by an ex-Bungie developer (and now good friend, even if we haven't chatted for a while) when I said I wanted to join the games industry. For better or worse I persevered, showed him I had some potential as an engineer and eventually he helped me get some interviews and a job. But I'd ask the same question of any young developer who came my way hoping to get in.

So I guess I agree with what the author is trying to say (the games industry is full-up! are you sure you want to try and squeeze in?), even if I don't agree with words he's using to say it.




I feel like the author has used his games published numbers to hide the fact that the number of gamers is large and growing much larger all the time.

There are 8 billion people in this world, and the Playstation 2 is the highest selling console ever at 155 million[0].

In a world of 3 billion computer and internet users, 12,000 Steam games a year doesn't seem like that much too me.

The real problem is that all the sales are going to go to the top 1% of games.

But here's another truth that dispels the author's main point: I can make one or two games a year, but I can play dozens of them.

Game developers that see this problem should be encouraging people to develop games - and buy as many indie games as they can afford.

In a world where everyone is making art at 1x and buying art at 10x, then many many more people can make a living from their art.

[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_game_cons...




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