While setting up Blogger and pulling over my 50+ Development updates of old, I realized how powerful it is to keep track of all of this. From my old days of Developing for Mech Warrior: Living Legends and heading that project, I already knew how important keeping up with those monthly news letters were for the fan base. However, Solar Warden is a completely different beast. Since I’m currently doing 100% of the work, it’s really easy to just lose myself in just creating and developing without the need to document or chronicle the work being done, or write down about the lessons learned. Alot of times I felt myself digging deep into developing a feature and not really getting anywhere and it gets hard to come back to the same problem every day to see that problem that once defeat you waiting for you… watching you… However, I’m super glad I kept a small journal alive and made sure to write up the progress of each long work session (even if they turned out to be 2-3am). It really helped to remind myself of the progress I’ve made and a little bit of a confidence boost to push through the current problem and move onto the next.

Much like a hiker reaching lookout points and being able to see back down the mountain from which they came, I feel a huge sense of a accomplishment seeing just how much the project has changed and improved since my first builds in Unreal and also how much I’ve learned just by figuring all this stuff out on my own. I feel more encouraged than ever to spur on and reach the top of this mountain and bring Solar Warden to it’s gold standard.

As a fun aside, I took the very first screenshot of development and made a comparative screenshot with my recent build just to see the difference between March and October. After standing back and seeing the difference, I must admit I giggled a little bit. But see for yourself.

I’d also like to take this time to tell anyone looking at doing game development to remind them that these journals are super important. Maybe you don’t want to share them publicly, and that’s totally fine, but build on and keep the discipline of writing development journals for yourself. Why? The reason is simple. It’s always great to look back and remind yourself how far you’ve come and what you did. We Game Developers craft experiences, and an Experience is the sum of it’s parts. It’s a great pick-me-up and reminder of what these parts once were and where you’ve taken it from there. Also who knows, you may one day pass this knowledge onto other people that will greatly appreciate it and apply it  to their projects in the future.