Hey guys, game developers, artist, programmers, hobbyist and all others who make a living in the gaming industry or spend a lot of your spare time making games just for the fun of it!

Before you start reading this: if you have not actually made any game that have sold at least some copies nor shipped, please let me know that when you reply. I do like all feedback, but I do like to know that those who respond actually have experience from the industry, and aren’t just people like me who are taking their first baby steps into it like myself (but unlike me are the types of people who think they actually know what they talk about, despite actually having no real experience – You know, like the people who think they are fully capable doctors when they JUST enrolled into medical school or spend 1 year there). 

// You can skip the first half of this read if you don't care about my personal info, but I feel like it might be important for you to answer the following questions later in the best possible way.

First of all, I want to let you know that I have absolutely NO experience in any aspect of gaming industry other than I have spent more than half my life in front of a computer playing what the industry has produced (since 2004 it has mainly been Blizzard games though: Overwatch, Hearthstone, WoW, Diablo, HotS (Heroes of Newerth a lot as well, though it is 2-3 years back).
However, in my childhood before WoW I played A LOT of other titles on multiple devices like:

• Gameboy
• PS1, 2 and 3
• Xbox & X360
• N64

And titles like:

•  Pokémon, Wario Land
• Age of Empires, RollerCoaster Tycoon, Heroes of Might and Magic, CS:Source
• Tekken, Ratchet and Clank, Spyro, Rayman
• Halo 1 - 4, Dead or Alive, Spider-man
• Super Mario, Golden Eye, Snowboard Kids

Just to name a few examples!

I always known (or at least I known since the ending of my teenage year) that I fare best in front of a computer (not that I don’t know how to socialize, I do). I have spent all my life from I attended gymnasium (the step before University in Denmark) to find a way to make a living doing something that I actually like and would make me happy (instead of making me miserable like my current job). I already struggle with mental illness, and therefor my life truly depends on a job that makes me happy. Being honest I lack motivation in everything, and I do mean everything (especially if it is hard, because I just feel like I am too dumb to learn it if I don’t understand it rather fast and it’s easier to just sit down and play a videogame and get to feel you accomplish something, while being challenging), but I also know if I don’t pull my shit together now I will either: Live my entire life in misery because I never put any effort into it or actually TRIED (like really tried and not just open up a book up for one day and then give up after that if I don’t get it all), or I will take my own life because I continue to live a life that makes me miserable.

//Sorry for being gloomy, but at least I am being honest.

Until now I have thoughts of a way to find a way to earn a living by working in front of a computer in any way (since I love using my brain rather than my body for work, and since I was 16 years old I have worked in a supermarket and hate it from the bottom of my heart and found out I generally just don't like physical work). That being said, I have always had a lot of ideas for gadgets, apps, webpages and games and everything that basically requires code in it to work as intended. Therefor I have enrolled at one of Denmark's Universities to learn programming (never had any experience with it before) – since it seems as the best thing to learn to end up working with one of those things, since they all have code in common (and math have always been the subject I have fared best in during school). Furthermore, it seems as the best tool to learn, to bring any of my ideas to life if I would have to do it alone (hopefully I won’t have to do it alone).

Truth be told I would probably rather want to learn to make art, modeling, concept art and such for games, but I also have to be realistic - there is a shit ton of people that wants that as well, and the competition is fierce. Some have drawn and improved artistically since they were 10 or younger, I have never truly done anything. It will be too risky to try and compete with people like those, especially when I know programmers are in a way higher demand in almost any field in today’s world than artist are, since almost ALL businesses needs a programmer in one way or another (at least in Denmark).So the chance for me landing a job working at a computer is way higher if I master coding rather than master 3d modelling and art, if I won’t make it into the gaming industry.
To put it like this, if I have to roll the dice on getting a foot inside the gaming industry or any other tech company (at least as an entry point) it would be in programming. I can always work on improving on the art and other stuff in my spare time. And I wouldn’t be able to make games as a solo indie if I can barely code but do a lot of art, but it seems possible the other way around. Furthermore, it sounds as if it is harder to get inside the industry, than to move into other areas of the industry once you are already inside, again therefor programming first.

Therefor I have JUST enrolled at University anno 2018. We will learn C the 1st semester and Java the 2nd semester, and then we will have to learn programming from there on out our self, while we instead will learn a lot of math instead, programming technics, how the to find out what the users wants, testing, design and so on through the rest of the bachelor. I have chosen to learn C# in my spare time because it is what Unity uses and as far as I can read up on it is very close to Java as well, which I will eventually have to learn anyways as part of my education. Since I want to start learning how to make videogames, starting in Unity or UE4 seems like a very good choice, if you are completely new to anything related to creating videogames according to the internet.

//The real questions start here

If you have read the entire post so far, thank you! Hopefully it wasn’t a complete waste of your time reading? So, the thing is, as of now I work on 3 projects (purely on paper and writing down every idea I have in any aspect of the process). The games I work on are as following:

1. A teambased game the size over Overwatch (5 maps as a start with mapssize of Overwatch maps, being able to handle 25 players online - will have different modes and a competitive mode as well)
2. A teambased game the size of Fortnite (one big map the size of Fortnites BR map, handling around 100 online players – will have different modes and a competitive mode as well)
3. MMORPG the size of Vanilla WoW (don’t take this into your consideration I won’t even bother with this title unless I can make a living of one of the two above– but it is the game I want to make the most, but that would never happen unless I got my own independent company and able to hire people – this is just to let you know I want to make a game like this)

When I say size I do both mean in the actual area of the maps, but also in amount of characters and abilities, weapons and so on. I don’t want to reveal anything, therefor please don’t misunderstand. I won’t make games that resemble the games in any way, but it is the best way for me to explain what I have in mind in sheer size of the game I have in mind to make. So no, I don’t want to make a new variant of a Battleroyal, nor a new WoW (or WoW-killer as people often say) or a new Overwatch/Paladin/Battleborn. I don’t want to actually give my idea away, since one of the key element in making my games a success is being first to the market without any competition in the same category (so I don’t end up being the Battleborn of Overwatch) I don’t want to make anyone get the same idea. Just telling you so you know why it is, I use other games as reference instead of just telling you what it is I ACTUALLY want to make directly instead. Hope you understand  

However, when I say I work on them it has purely been on paper (currently counting 55 written pages in word) - writing down every idea I have for the game: sketches of maps and characters, GUI, ability ideas, lore and story, webpages, business strategy and so on (basically every aspect of the game from start to finish – and in a way, so if I am able to someday hire someone to help (or get someone else along on the project), they can just read the entire document to see exactly what we are trying to build in every aspect). Though I have also found a lot of references from other games, movies, music and so on as to what art, style, world, character design and everything I can use to better describe what it is I want and where I want to go with it.

What I want to know is the following:

1. How long would it take for one person to make a game of those sizes mentioned above (when already using a commercial engine (Unity), if we take out all the artistic of the game? No voices, music, art (other than representations of what is supposed to be in the game) no things other than the necessary parts (like e.g. if it was the most simple of race game, just 3 cars (represented by 3 differents forms: a triangle, cube, ball e.g.) and just a simple plane road of the track on the map I wanted ----- however but with a full fledge game like Fortnite/Overwatch with all mechanics, characters and maps fully functional, basically just a fully fledge 110% pure prototype model that works (e.g. like this: 
   with only the BARE minimum but necessary to showcase my game that is playable: (perhaps the best way to fully get what I am trying to say: if the game was meant to look like the game superHOT as a prototype: 
   
    
2. If it is even possible to make a prototype like described in question 1 by one person, how long would it take to go from the fully functional prototype to the complete and ready game with everything in it, once you have the fully playable and ready prototype with everything implemented except all the actual art and so on we neglected to make in the first question. Here I think both as if it was the same person or if it was a person who was actually experienced in this area (but also an indie and fresh starter like myself) aka going from prototype –> to final product?
    
3. If it needed to be finished in a span of 3 – 4 years (of let’s say people who are fresh out of university)? From the prototype – to final product, how many people would it probably require, if we assume I already have a fully runnable and capable prototype (as described in question 1 and 2)?
    
4. How much will it cost to make (in terms of software and for one PC only, not wages, assets from assets stores and other things)? If I had to make animation, models and assets myself and not just rely on Unity’s asset store. It sounds as though people use a lot of different expensive software (PS, Maya, Zbrush, 3ds) to make (and practice) in making my own assets. (If they are yearly license programs, please take into consideration how many years you think I need to finish my prototype in the cost to give me a more precise cost).
   What all my games have in common is they have a realistic but cartoonish style like Overwatch/Fortnite, but also being heavily luminescent games like in Ori and the Blind Forest meets Tron: Legacy movie style of mind (if you know what I mean). However I already know now that for what I want in my final product, I will need someone who actually have skills in this, and nothing of what I made myself. What I make myself will purely be a low or high fidelity prototype, but they would have to make the finished product.
    
5. Are there any rookie mistakes you can already say from having read all of this, that I should avoid doing? Pits you might have fallen into yourself you can share your experience with, so I won’t fall in them as well? (aside from the classic one: don’t make such big games as a start – I know it might not be the smartest thing to start with this scale of a game, and people would probably tell me to start with making very small games first). I have no motivation for that, so in truth, I will never get anything done then. If I don’t actually work on something I feel for and believe in I won’t have motivation to finish or make it in the first place.
    
6. Though I would love to work with some with this project I won’t do it before I actually have made some decent work and can start to see my creation take form. However I would be very skeptical or reluctant to show my idea, to anyone I wouldn’t be 110% sure on they would stay till the finish, or at least not leave and use/tell about my idea, nor come back to claim profit if it became as success if they already left the project. Mainly because I have heard so many scare stories of people who have done one or the other after leaving a project.
   So the question is: are there any good way for me to make sure there is no way if first anyone are let into the project they can’t leave and then claim anything after they left? Or deny me the right to use what they made on the game if they leave during the project, or make me unable to claim royalties/copyright and so on if they leave and take/use my idea?

Do bear in mind, you have to take into consideration I would start completely from scratch and on my own and with no experience and skills at all in neither code, art or anything (but learning as of now to code and use Unity and so on). Yes I do realize many of the questions is the sort of: it depends on peoples experience, skills, talent and how fast people can work etc. So therefor just assume that all working on the project have no experience other than self-taught or are just fresh out from the University like me.

I know I can’t make a game like Overwatch, Fortnite all on my own (atleast not if it needs to ship before I die of old age and especially not a MMORPG). If anyone could do that it wouldn’t take a huge company like Blizzard or Epic games a team of 50+ experienced people, who each have a specialized role in making the game, half a decade to make those games and then there probably would be some stories about solo indies who made hundreds of millions of dollars from a game he/she had made himself/herself on level with those games (which as far as I know there exist none of). So I do merely have a fully fledge working prototype of the game where everything work as intended in mind – and NOT a fully complete finished ready to ship game in mind.

Just so you know, I have already done a lot of research regarding my questions and searched the web far and wide, but I am yet to find any real answers to those questions because it’s all very short and abstract answers.

// this is just bonus info what I have in mind and why and what I hope to accomplish

If you read through all of this, thank you (I know it was a bit long – longer than even I intended) and I do hope you will care to respond! By now you probably know that I’m very serious about these projects – hence the long rant. What I have in mind with all of this is to hopefully make a company and go the same road as Blizzard (a few guys who made games they wanted to play themselves, went their own way, made quality content and made a few IPs but kept improving on them over the years and build on top of them (like WoW, Warcraft, SC, Diablo) instead of having a lot of titles like Ubisoft or just spew out a reskin of the same game going from quality game to straight up cash grab (yes assassin’s creed I look at you).

The reason I want to be my own boss is I want to make games I want to play myself, but also make a company were everyone loves to go to work, everyone is heard and all are paid a good living wage and can have a life outside work without having to get stress or work insane hours to ship a product. A workplace where everyone gets to feel they are their own boss and can schedule and manage their own workhours. Have job security and get a feeling that their work is their second home. Money doesn’t interest me, so I am not trying to get rich, I’m trying to get happiness and share it with others in more than one way. That is also the reason I want to make a company which I can never lose or be pushed out of it, so others can take over and make it a workplace like all others – or become like Blizzard when they merged with Activision. I know it might sound utopia like, and probably not going to work, but for now I just focus on actually making the game, then I will take this more when I might actually be close to having a working prototype for one of my game. Until then all other than that isn’t going to be relevant if I can’t make that to begin with. And if I can’t make a ship a very successful game, it will all just be a pure pipedream anyways.

To all who have read and responded: THANK YOU A BUNCH for the reply in advance! I do hope this thread and the responses can help others in the future who have visions like me, but are taking their first step into the gaming industry who has similar questions like me.

Hello, I'm Eck. I'm a professional Game Developer at Harebrained Schemes. We just shipped BattleTech this year. \o/ Before that I was a professional business developer and hobbyist game dev for about 20-25 years. I've also been an active member of the GameDev community off an on since the mid-90's. I read the title and the first couple of paragraphs of your post.

Is it possible to make a game like WoW with 1-5 people? Short answer, no. Take a moment to watch the credits and just count the number of people that worked on that game. I'm going to pull a number out of thin air and say 500. Now let's say it took them 2 years to make it giving us 1,000 person-years. Let's also assume that they are reasonably skilled individuals and decent at their individual specialized jobs. You have a proposed team of 5 so we'll divide 1,000 by 5 giving us an estimated timeline of 200 years to produce the game. Assuming your 5 people are just as skilled as the team at Blizzard.

Start a little smaller than one of the biggest games in the world.  

- Eck

I am currently working on a small game for Android that I plan to release on the Google Play store.  I have been programming since 2000( not professionally ) and have obtained a Degree in that time.

Anyway.  It sounds like you are still quite young and definitely expecting far too much of yourself...

If you are working on your own, then you should expect to make a game as complex an an old 8-bit or 16-bit home computer game.  Space Invaders, Mayhem in Monsterland, Capcom's 1943.

With a team of 5 people, you can expect to make something as complex as a 1990s game - you know, CD-ROM era stuff such as the Playstation 1, SNES or Gameboy Advance.  Possibly, thanks to Unity and GameMaker, you could go as far as the PS2 era.  Sonic The Hedgehog, Ultima, Doom, Lands of Lore or even Quake 2.

About 10 or more people...you can start to consider more modern influences. 

...programming wise you have chosen well.  C is the most fundamental language you can learn( well, theres Assembly, but thats for the serious engineers out there.  )  as it is a structured language with systems software in mind.  C# or Java are excellent choices for a work-horse language and will complement C with OOP.   You'll hear that you need to learn many languages, but one structured language and one OOP language will position you well for anything else that comes along.

The problem with the games you mention is that they are server-based games.  The real work will be in internet development and maintenance of the servers and dealing with subscriber issues.  Then you have the challenge of constantly adding more content...you get the picture.

To be fair, its easy to see why many young developers would expect to make a modern game from today - you pretty much started out in the early textured-3D era of the first playstation and who can blame you for thinking that is the level at which to start at. I personally blame the Udemy adverts "Making a game is easier than you think!" when its actually an outright lie. You need skills across programming, sound and art, and that aint going to come overnight!

So please, relax and take this games development thing as you find it.  Make Space Invaders or Tetris with Unity.  Spend 15-30 minutes daily programming and just keep the ball rolling. Even when you hit that brick wall,  take comfort in the fact that we all share the two states of every programmer...

1) "I am a GOD." ?

2) "I have no idea what I am doing." ?

On 9/28/2018 at 1:58 AM, bilbo92 said:

MMORPG the size of Vanilla WoW

I have no experience in MMORPG or game development so my answer is only a conclusion I came to after thinking for a bit.

The answer is yes and no. The base mechanics are not particularly complex and can be created even in a small team - walking, leveling, combat, etc. However RPG and especially MMORPG games need much more than mechanics - large and beautiful world, lots of items, skills, locations, monsters, quests, each of those has to be balanced and many of them are going to have unique features which might take a week or a month each. Individually none of these features is complex, there's just so many of them that it will take years to create everything, and these small details is the difference between a good and bad game.

4 hours ago, Zaoshi Kaba said:

I have no experience in MMORPG or game development so my answer is only a conclusion I came to after thinking for a bit.

The answer is yes and no. The base mechanics are not particularly complex and can be created even in a small team - walking, leveling, combat, etc. However RPG and especially MMORPG games need much more than mechanics - large and beautiful world, lots of items, skills, locations, monsters, quests, each of those has to be balanced and many of them are going to have unique features which might take a week or a month each. Individually none of these features is complex, there's just so many of them that it will take years to create everything, and these small details is the difference between a good and bad game.

Thanks for the answer, however it's not really an useful answer considering I don't ask the question you are giving an answer to  and I mentioned that I already know it isn't possible to make fully complete game like wow with just 5 people - if it was it it wouldn't have taken the likes of blizzard 100+ people and betting their entire company on WoW vanilla to make it. Furthermore, as I also mentioned in the my original post, I wouldn't even try to produce a game like wow without a company and a lot of people involved, it's the game sizes as Overwatch and Fortnite I have in mind, the WoW is just the game I would actually like to make as I also said inside the "()" right after your quote
- But thanks anyways  but then again I did write a lot, and I can see so far that non have actually read the entire thing before answering

7 hours ago, Zaoshi Kaba said:

The answer is yes and no. The base mechanics are not particularly complex and can be created even in a small team - walking, leveling, combat, etc. However RPG and especially MMORPG games need much more than mechanics - large and beautiful world, lots of items, skills, locations, monsters, quests, each of those has to be balanced and many of them are going to have unique features which might take a week or a month each. Individually none of these features is complex, there's just so many of them that it will take years to create everything, and these small details is the difference between a good and bad game.

I agree with this.  Depending on the game the amount of time that will go into programming and the amount of time that will go into art will differ.  But for a large MMO, thinking classic MMO's, the art is the part that's going to suck up most of the time spent.

@bilbo92, I'm making a game that I've been wanting to create for decades now.  I started 4 years ago and have plugged in 1000's of hours.  I don't have a degree in programming and do it as a hobby.  Check out my blog

You can see the progress in visuals and functionality I've made over the years ( look at the pictures from the first few entries )  But now that I'm four years in ( and don't even have the framework finished ), I can tell you I will never have the time to finish the game 100%.  But I do have the time to make a prototype to demonstrate.  I figure at least 4 more years.   I've had to come up with a visual look for the game that is simple because I don't have time to do much art and am also working with webGL.  

To give you a good taste of what you're in for ( and by all means you got the right kind of inspiration ) join the 'Group' on GameDev that participates in gaming challenges.  

Professionals / Beginners / hobbyists have participated and its a hoot.  I think participating in challenge ( assuming you'd be interested in the theme ) would be the perfect way for you to become more aware of what it will take.

@Eck  @Awoken  @Anri Thanks a bunch for your responses! However I kinda wish I hadn't mentioned WoW at all nor mentioned it in the 3 games I want to make, because you all kinda fail to, well, answer any of the real questions I ask about, so I don't think any of you actually read the part that started from 

On 9/28/2018 at 12:58 AM, bilbo92 said:

//The real questions start here

and down to // this is just bonus info what I have in mind and why and what I hope to accomplish.

Because, while it is true I want to make a game the size of WoW as I also mention in the 3 types of games I want to make, I do say from the start that you should not even take this game into consideration, which is basicly the only title all of you talk about while completely neglecting the two other titles.
 

On 9/28/2018 at 12:58 AM, bilbo92 said:

MMORPG the size of Vanilla WoW (don’t take this into your consideration I won’t even bother with this title unless I can make a living of one of the two above– but it is the game I want to make the most, but that would never happen unless I got my own independent company and able to hire people – this is just to let you know I want to make a game like this)

Those are the titles I actually need the feedback on  it's the two other titles that are the main focuspoint for the 7 questions I ask and not WoW (because I know this is by far the biggest project and therefor, as I said, I wouldn't start with this project but one of the two others). Futhermore  I have several times mention that I am not trying to make a full and complete game (cause as I also mention a few times, I know I wouldn't be able to pull that off with a mere team of 5 people - else Blizzard and Bethesda would probably just have done it with 10 or less themselves aswell). I want to make the prototype of the game, to showcase, but fully playable and with every part of the game in it (the way I showed in the picture and youtube video I used for an example), but without any art, music, sound, real models or anything and then I won't have to make the engine myself as I use Unity (while blizzard e.g. had to make the entire engine, which also took a lot of the time aswell). In other words the game must only have the mechanics (but ALL the mechanics the game will need to have, in order for it to work as intended) and only the core features it would require (so if it was a race game: only the roads,1 type of car and finish line and the UI with the stats that are important) that is the game I need answers to in the 7 questions I asked, but with the two titles of Fortnite and Overwatch.

e.g. like this, but even with Spiderman just being a white squre cube without any animations, just moving and swiging around in a like a cube - everything being just the most basic of basic and simplest of the simple.

 

so e.g. in Overwatch I would just make 1 character and duplicate it with 21 (to get the same amount of heroes OW started with) give them all the abilities and then just recolour them to differentiate them, while in the finial product I would make 27 unique characters. Same with the weapons and so forth. Even the one characters and guns would just be the lowest amount of polygons I would have to use to make anything that resembles what I want it to represent.

Please don't take this the wrong way or get offended, I very much appreciate you guys to take the time to respond and I really do hope you will respond again!!! but I need a repond to the question I actually ask (with the consideration to what you have to look away from that I don't want to do in the first stage) and not an answer to what I have already answered myself in the post  Cause I know won't be able to make a WoW myself, nor a full fledge ready to ship 3D game myself and I'm not trying to either. I try to make a fundament of the 2 games I want to make (again not the MMORPG), so that I can showcase to a very few people who might want to help me if they can both try and see what it is I want to create, and can see I made the fundament of the game  I hope to hear from you again

@bilbo92, first let me welcome you to GameDev,

Second, you'll have to forgive everyone for not being able to answer your questions.  You even mention in your post that the vast majority of people aren't going to read your whole post, myself included.  So I'll have to apologise but on the outset my impression is that you're a motivated individual who has little experience programming.  As such you have little, dare I say zero ability to answer you're own question.

Now to carry on with my read of your situation.  You're excited to jump into programming and you want to take is seriously.  You genuinely, at this moment, want to program the kind of game you've got envisioned.  You provide a lot of background info and a read to convince yourself and others that you're going to do it and you would really like someone around here to say 'Yeah bilbo92, totally doable in a short amount of time ( 6 months ), just take a look see here.  And there were three of us".

Now if I'm off then forgive me, but If I'm actually on to this then I'll say you're probably not going to get the kind of answer your looking for for a whole host of reasons.  There are so, so, so, so many extenuating factors to consider which we have no idea about.

Anybody with beginner programming skills has many unique hurdles which they will have to overcome and I don't know who you are, maybe you're a brilliant savant who can program for hours and hours on end without losing motivation ( like so many of us are not ).

To answer your questions honestly:
- I don't know 

And I don't think anybody else does either.

But, start and you will learn and then you can answer your question for all of us.

p.s, I'm writing this because you seem to have spirit for this programming stuff.

I did read this entire thread yesterday but wanted to refrain from answering because I've seen these threads time and time again. I didn't want to come across as someone being rude or discouraging so I opted not to respond. I find that if someone doesn't take even the entry level steps to get a feel for game development, why should anyone break down such a long thread considering what you're asking for isn't likely to happen with the information provided. I'm also referring to the fact you stated you have zero experience and you're referring games built upon millions of dollars, and developed with veterans in their respective fields (programming, graphics, business, marketing, ect...)

What I will add to this discussion as you're not satisfied with the above replies is that it's impossible for anyone here or anywhere else to give you the answers you're looking for in terms of time and cost. If the game you're trying to make in a non polished state will be possible depends on your skill and ability. The time it will take also depends on your skill in ability. Spending money can reduce time as well. The reason why nobody can give you a time frame is because two people with equal years invested in the craft doesn't automatically equal the same skill, ability, and work ethic. Cost will also depend on your ability to negotiate contracts, and your understanding of what is required and not required based on industry experience for pre, current, and post development which you don't have at this point.

My suggestion is to pick up something like C# and Unity, and put your own skills to the test to help answer your own question about 'time'. The same applies to the other 4 people if you have a 1-5 man team. Nobody here can predict how you will develop within the next 5 years as you're starting from zero.