Hello,

So, I've been quietly trying to get this out there.

But now, it's time to share.

For too long now mental health has been a stigma both in our industry and around the world.

Covid has brought all of this to a head.

Mental health support in our industry shouldn't be so hard.

Finding and connecting to help each other as peers in the industry should be expected and supported.

I hope this resource list helps:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/18U-Vm4RH6FGGlkXfwh6b2rQbM2hw-Pq07WA-Ov4AAWA/edit​

If you find any new organizations or websites let me know, so I can add.

best to yall!

If anyone wants to talk to me about mental health struggles and how it relates to game dev , we can audio zoom.

I do this for “free”, with the expectation that the connection will pay off later.

Thanks for your time and attention.

Perhaps another problem with games today is the mentality encouraged of “whoever makes the next big game is hot and the rest is not” instead of “make a game you like to make and if you find people who also like your game that's great”. I think games should be a more inclusive space of many diverse types of games none “better than any other” instead of “blockbusters” v.s. “those who try to be like the blockbusters".

I'm not anti rolemodels, I'm saying that games should be about games, not about “brands”. A game should be an expression of their developer, not “the next invention that the publisher takes credit for to build the brand of their monopolithic company”.

I think the huge amounts of money spent on “developing” some games are recipes for disaster as return on investment then often becomes harder and harder. Good games aren't built using tonnes of money, they are built by people who make games because they like doing so.

Developers are the first testers, if they don't have fun developing the game, no one else is going to.

i agree on that, but let me some appointments:

1. find people for make a game is very hard for dont said impossible (without money payment since beggining) cos most of drawers, graphists etc want commisions for their art mostly (musicians is less hard cos some of them yes agree to collaborate even unpaid at first chance)
2. People that you find for collaborate (in rare case you find them) mostly are unexperienced or very “bad” stuff (in graphics for example) and like you said, not for a blockbuster but a game with good graphics always catch more attention of public (in general) that one with awful or not very good made graphics
3. the “constant” and “producing” the work we expect from them (attitude of the work), at this field, much people fails even they with good intentions they “loosed” on chatting (sometimes of things nothing related to the project) or simply they dont there available on a regular daily basis by some reasons (my girlfriend dont want i be so long with computers, i have a dating with family, i have make studies or exams, i have work in the RL job etc etc) or they simply make 1 or 2 things and you go crazy for they producing more and more fast. (i was in some videogame projects when the graphicians passed 7 months and near nothing done)
4. The Experience and Quality of Code (much people puts to make a videogame thinking is so simple like make a coffee (warm milk and add sugar) but a good videogame requires a lot of knowdledge in some fields and a complete dominion of the languaje used, and have other things in count appart common runtime errors like collateral errors or some other hidden errors that only appearing in some circunstances.
5. How the public accepts the videogame (a videogame can be a complete shit and have sucess on sales and other be a beautiful and well done thing and dont sell a shit or dont like to the people)

and the last thing, is that you comment Wallby, the people seems only thinking in make AAA project, with quality and proffesionality of big studios (that dont forget possibly they have 40 coders, 400 graphic artists and all them very well payed punctually all months working like pure beasts for 2 or more years without stopping neither for go to bath :D) and also they employ a good bunch of hundreds of millions in the development and marketing etc…… then, is like if im a guy of 200 kg fat and try equiparating running to Carl Lewis and try be at his same level……IM PO SSI BLE….at all lights but……

And finnally, develop a videogame in good way (good playgame mode, not very bad errors, fluid in the game etc) requires lot of being constant, be good at your task (programming, graphics, music etc) patience, knowdledge, good attitude (for work all in group for example) and overall work firm and without much rest all days along the project's life and for be sincerely, much people dont know what is all this things and dont do their part of the job in most cases….

@Snaked
Some of the things you said are examples of how to NOT think about game development.. “without stopping neither for go to bath”, “without much rest all days along the project's life".

I think it's like with working safely in a factory, if you can't afford to work safely, you can't afford to work.
If you can't afford to make a game safely, you can't afford to make a game.

1. I never said “without money”. I said “huge amounts of money”.
2. I don't agree, there's a lot of people with some skill (at least where I live) and there's a lot of skill that can be learnt with help. I disagree that “attention from public” should ever be a deciding factor for why you choose to do something. I think there is no such “as putting audience in charge of making your (team's) game” as then it is not “your (team's) game”.
3. “much people fails even they with good intentions”, if you don't expect to fail you should not be doing game development, game development means expecting that you will fail and being ok with it. All you can do is try.
4. I don't see how this adds anything to what I wrote.
5. For that there are publishers who know how to do marketing. Similar to what I said under 3… game development means knowing that you cannot control what the audience chooses in the end and being ok with that.

Wallby said:
Perhaps another problem with games today is the mentality encouraged of “whoever makes the next big game is hot and the rest is not”

This has nothing to do with @generaljist 's topic of mental health support and resources. @wallby , not only did you go way off on a tangent from the original topic, you also necroed an eight-month-old topic.

Thread locked.