Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

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Poly
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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#31 Post by Poly »

I'm turned off by self-deprecating phrases such as "I know it isn't that special" or "I know it kinda sucks", or even what TrickwithaKnife said about "I know this sounds cliche, but".

To reveal a project or a piece of art (especially on the internet) can be nerve-wracking, and I understand that folk don't want to come off as being too cocky, but slagging off your own work is just shooting yourself in the foot. If you're nervous about revealing it, work some more on it until you feel you can show it or answer people's questions. There's no shame in asking for help if you need it, as long as you're polite and respectful. It all boils down to "if you can't believe in your project, other people definitely aren't going to".

Sure, not everyone's going to like your game, but if you make it to the best of your ability and work hard on it, it's something to be proud of. Or at least, that's what I think.
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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#32 Post by Vialixia »

TrickWithAKnife wrote: [*]Japanese names. STOP IT! Unless there is a valid reason for having Japanese names (your game is based on Japanese history and you are not a weeaboo), or you yourself are extremely familiar with Japan, there is no reason for it. If I see a Japanese name in your WiP thread for no valid reason, you can be 100% sure I'm going to ignore that project, and probably your future projects too.
[/list]
Haha, you know what, this is a common complain I've seen A LOT. And I've just called my game a Japanese name (It is set in Japan, and the sprites have a Japanese uniform, so it made sense to me. Moreover I study Japanese and have been to Japan, I'd assume that makes a difference when writing a Japan-based story.) But I did make a little note about the title of it in the description, so I hope that people will give things with Japanese names a chance, I guess.

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#33 Post by TrickWithAKnife »

I'm a huge hypocrite though. My game is set mostly in Japan, has mostly Japanese characters, and has plenty of Japanese words in it.
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The #renpy IRC channel is a great place to chat with other devs. Due to the nature of IRC and timezone differences, people probably won't reply right away.

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#34 Post by Cabriolean »

Making
-When you've coded something wrong, you know you've coded it wrong, you know which section is wrong, but you cannot figure out what is wrong with it and you just keep poking at it and receiving the same error message.
-When you make a piece of music then realise (I live in England) when you try to loop it that the last bar doesn't sound so good coming before the first bar and spend longer editing it than you did composing it.
-When the sprite looks pretty good, and the background looks pretty good, but they're not visually compatible.
-When you realise that 2 characters you've made to be brothers have enough of a family resemblance, that with certain expressions they look similar enough to be slightly confusing.
-When you discover that the different point systems you're running side by side don't actually interact as well as you hoped.....
Playing
-The love interests are cardboard characters and there is no interesting plot to redeem it.
-There is no friend option, relationships are romantic or non-existent.
-Meaningless choices, unless it does something, I really don't care.
-Too much grinding.
-A mini-game you have to play and just can't seem to win which prevents you accessing something else....
-Too much thinking by the main character.
-Characters changing expression constantly to the point where it gets really annoying.

I'm not actually that picky, if the game is really good in most aspects, unless it really goes beyond reason in one of these, I'll still enjoy it.
Last edited by Cabriolean on Sun Mar 17, 2013 5:50 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#35 Post by Rinrinnya »

TrickWithAKnife wrote:I'm a huge hypocrite though. My game is set mostly in Japan, has mostly Japanese characters, and has plenty of Japanese words in it.
I totally understand you when you say it's really annoying for a weeaboo to call their characters Uzumaki Ichigo-kun-chan-sama or something, but if you just skim over a WiP thread and see Japanese names, will you automatically just go 'nope, story must suck'? You wouldn't be able to tell if the person is a fangirl/boy who has never heard of any anime besides Naruto, Bleach and One Piece, or if the person has spent years studying the culture of Japan and learning the language. Personally, I like games set in Japan if they're culturally and historically accurate, because that shows the people know what they're doing/they're trying, since they spent time researching it ^^ I don't really like English names very much, just don't match well with the anime style I often see them matched with...

I'm putting Japanese things in my VN I've been working on, because I'm hoping to translate it into Japanese eventually. I really love the Japanese culture and the kinds of emotions one can portray with their language ^A^~

Anyway, game-playing pet peeves:

- Atrocious spelling and grammar. A few mistakes are fine, and it's fine if English is not your first language, but if you were born in America and were learning the ABC's in preschool, you have no excuse but laziness. Honestly, if you can't even write out 'really' fully or tell the difference between you're and your, you shouldn't be trying to write.
- Shallow, pointless stories. Even if I don't enjoy the genre, I will appreciate someone's good story that they worked on. Again, laziness is just not pretty. People even look past bad art if the story's amazing-- you may not like Higurashi or Umineko, but you have to admit Ryukishi07 worked hard on those stories (and in my opinion, did an amazing job OwO)
- Bad art and a bad story, though? Bleck. I really think people need to practice more before they attempt to make visual novels. Looking at how the pros do their thing, and tweaking it just a tad for their own styles. I can't look at a VN that has a shallow plot and bad art, and a creator who goes "omg my vn is rly awsome plz play t"

-OMG AND ALSO, BLAND CHARACTERS. I can't stand when a creator basically creates a character like "There's nothing really special about her and she speaks like a monotone robot and you can't really call her attractive and she kind of looks like a clam actually and she has fewer facial expressions than a brick and less personality than one too and the only time she shows emotion is when she's doing something that would severely annoy any real-life person and I didn't really have time to work on her back story and there's absolutely no reason for the protagonist to be attracted to her in any way but please love her" Tip: Try creating characters that you want people to fangirl/boy over. Katawa Shoujo did it, you can too!

Of course there are more, but who cares about my opinion about this silly stuff lol ^^~<3
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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#36 Post by TrickWithAKnife »

Rinrinnya wrote:
TrickWithAKnife wrote:I'm a huge hypocrite though. My game is set mostly in Japan, has mostly Japanese characters, and has plenty of Japanese words in it.
I totally understand you when you say it's really annoying for a weeaboo to call their characters Uzumaki Ichigo-kun-chan-sama or something, but if you just skim over a WiP thread and see Japanese names, will you automatically just go 'nope, story must suck'? You wouldn't be able to tell if the person is a fangirl/boy who has never heard of any anime besides Naruto, Bleach and One Piece, or if the person has spent years studying the culture of Japan and learning the language. Personally, I like games set in Japan if they're culturally and historically accurate, because that shows the people know what they're doing/they're trying, since they spent time researching it
Yes, I'll skip it if I see anything Japanese is a WiP topic, except in special cases, like the creator is Japanese themselves. Doesn't matter how wonderful the art or writing is, I'm not going to play a game that annoys me. Obviously the creator(s) didn't read this thread.

Seeing people who have never stepped foot in Japan for lomger than three days trying to give history lessons on Japan seems really insulting.

But lets face it, most games with Japanese characters here are just throwing them in because that's what they like, and they don't really care that it annoys some people. Everyone thinks their project is special. Perhaps they are special. I won't know because I just saw one of your characters is Misa Yagami, cute but naive high school student, thought "another damn weeaboo high school dating game" and closed the topic forever.

People always justify it with "I really like anything Japanese". Tell me about YOUR culture. That's the one you know, and that's the one you can talk about in depth, and have it feel real.
"We must teach them through the tools with which they are comfortable."
The #renpy IRC channel is a great place to chat with other devs. Due to the nature of IRC and timezone differences, people probably won't reply right away.

If you'd like to view or use any code from my VN PM me. All code is freely available without restriction, but also without warranty or (much) support.

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#37 Post by Aines445 »

TrickWithAKnife wrote: Yes, I'll skip it if I see anything Japanese is a WiP topic, except in special cases, like the creator is Japanese themselves. Doesn't matter how wonderful the art or writing is, I'm not going to play a game that annoys me. Obviously the creator(s) didn't read this thread.
It kinda reminds me of my friends and family reacting to anime, they don't really care if the story is freaking amazing or if the art is more realistic, it still annoys them. (Like this:
My mother: "Anime? That's high-pitched japanese girls with weird haircolours and samurai dudes with the deepest voices in the world"
My brother: "THAT'S JAPANESE!!! Everything japanese is the same and it sucks!"
My friends: "Anime? Ewww"
Me from 2 years ago: "Anime is annoying, everyone has weird hairstyles and girls have high-pitched and annoying voices and the guys are all serious with deep voices, and weird ability names (Well, I never watched anime at that time, I just listened to my mother XD))
Yeah everyone that I know except one or two friends of mine don't watch anime because they think it's annoying and it's japanese, which is a weird language for them, they never really watched it, but they still say it sucks. I'm not saying it's the same thing(Because you already played those kinds of games (Right?) that's already a difference), but it really reminded me of this.
TrickWithAKnife wrote: Seeing people who have never stepped foot in Japan for lomger than three days trying to give history lessons on Japan seems really insulting.
If the same thing happened here(In my country, but I'm tired of refering it that way), I'd be laughing my ass off , like when a stranger told me that serving shrimps at weddings was traditionally from my country, I was like "Where the hell did you get that from??", while laughing (Wow I'm reminiscing a lot XD).
TrickWithAKnife wrote: But lets face it, most games with Japanese characters here are just throwing them in because that's what they like, and they don't really care that it annoys some people.
Yeah, I agree with that. Like how I put magic because I like it, I wouldn't care if someone wanted spaceships, I DON'T LIKE THEM!! (Ooops, I'm sorry, that was rude XD)Which is why most people start with the "I know this is totally cliché but....", because they kind of know that, but they're taking that risk. I'm actually pretty neutral with japanese high school themes, I don't love them but I don't hate them either, I'm more of a fantasy and comedy person, so I look at them. I normally don't look at works in progress that explicitly say [Drama] and [Tragedy] without [Comedy] on them, since I don't like depressing things.
TrickWithAKnife wrote: Everyone thinks their project is special. Perhaps they are special. I won't know because I just saw one of your characters is Misa Yagami, cute but naive high school student, thought "another damn weeaboo making another damn high school dating game" and closed the topic forever.
Yeah, like how I would think my project is special because I'm attached to it. They think they're special because it's their stories, the stories they made and came-up with that they're proud of (I think, I can't really speak for people, everyone has their reasons). But yeah, unfortunatly, for us players/readers, it's not the same thing, it's just "another story/game", so it never sounds as original. I'd close that dating game if it said "X is the cannon pairing" (Well, I wouldn't plays X's route at least)or "There is only one obtainable", no matter how good it would be too, I just hate that A LOT (It surprises me I haven't put that in this thread, it's the thing I hate the most), if you have more obtainable characters don't make a cannon pairing!!! (Ooops, off-topic again <.<). But really, I say taste that vegetable before saying you don't like it, what sucks about this example is that in your situation, those vegetables are the same as every other vegetable, but your parents are saying that it's a special, delicious vegetable that might look like any other from the outside (Wow, the weirdest example ever XD). But I think about it this way "Ok...I'll eat those vegetables because my parents worked really hard making them, and their cooking can't be the same as everyone else's so if it tastes bad I'll tell them to cook better next time! I might throw some in the trash while they aren't looking though......" (What the hell XD).

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#38 Post by CaseyLoufek »

Seeing people who have never stepped foot in Japan for lomger than three days trying to give history lessons on Japan seems really insulting.
I understand where you are coming from but that seems going a bit far. For a modern day-to-day perspective I'd agree. However I'm totally willing to believe there are people who've never been to America that know more about its history, at least the aspects pertaining to their project, than many Americans. That doesn't seem insulting, that seems like specialized knowledge.

Ask me about American cars... I can probably talk for a bit about the model T and name a few brands but somebody from another country who knows automotive history probably has a way better understanding of the whole thing, even on a cultural level than I do. But on a cross-cultural mythology quiz I'd do much better.

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#39 Post by TrickWithAKnife »

America is different, because it has a massive influence on other countries through media. I know more about American history than the history in my own country because of television and movies.

It doesn't work with Japan because what people know about Japan comes from unreliable sources, like VNs and anime.
"We must teach them through the tools with which they are comfortable."
The #renpy IRC channel is a great place to chat with other devs. Due to the nature of IRC and timezone differences, people probably won't reply right away.

If you'd like to view or use any code from my VN PM me. All code is freely available without restriction, but also without warranty or (much) support.

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#40 Post by latte »

TrickWithAKnife wrote:America is different, because it has a massive influence on other countries through media. I know more about American history than the history in my own country because of television and movies.

It doesn't work with Japan because what people know about Japan comes from unreliable sources, like VNs and anime.
Sorry for barging into the discussion. I get your point, but just as an example, I probably know more about Japan thank I do about America.

That's not something I learned through those unreliable sources (studying Japanese got me into manga in first place, not the opposite), but instead by having long conversations with the native teachers at my school for years, and now browsing various sites and watching some Japanese television. I was specially lucky to be taught by a young woman who spent elementary and some of middle school in Japan before immigrating to Brazil, so maybe I could write an accurate, if slightly outdated school setting.
I hate when people butcher other's cultures as much as the next person, but I always give them a chance to prove they did their research. I see why you'd be tired of people butchering Japan, though.

Also in all honesty, I'd rather write a story set anywhere but here, which is why I almost only do fantasy. That's not only me; as far as I can tell, the national MG/YA sections at the bookstore are massively dominated by fantasy and stories that don't depend on setting. Even the teenage girl love stories don't usually focus a lot on school because it's so dead boring compared to other countries...

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#41 Post by CaseyLoufek »

Well I was mostly referring to people who had done research OUTSIDE of VNs and anime, I suppose this probably doesn't represent the average WIP thread. Like I said I do know mythology and often I see settings embellishing and altering concepts.

It does seem a little to strange to set a game at a modern school in Japan if you aren't from there. The difficulties in getting the setting right aside you'd think the fact there are so many of them already would make people use other areas just to be different.

The nicest part of using my own locale in a setting is the geography I think. It's nice to have locations you know without having to make up or look up a bunch in addition to the all the work of making characters.

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#42 Post by latte »

CaseyLoufek wrote:Well I was mostly referring to people who had done research OUTSIDE of VNs and anime, I suppose this probably doesn't represent the average WIP thread. Like I said I do know mythology and often I see settings embellishing and altering concepts.
I just recalled seeing a VN with a -katana- called Laevateinn and thinking "I rest my case". Knowing a bit of mythology myself I know that feeling -- don't even get me started on the Avengers...
CaseyLoufek wrote:t does seem a little to strange to set a game at a modern school in Japan if you aren't from there. The difficulties in getting the setting right aside you'd think the fact there are so many of them already would make people use other areas just to be different.

The nicest part of using my own locale in a setting is the geography I think. It's nice to have locations you know without having to make up or look up a bunch in addition to the all the work of making characters.
I don't really plan on doing anything in a Japanese setting unless there's a very specific reason, but the point was, if the person wants to try a setting they haven't experienced personally after doing proper research, why not? I don't see why dismiss what can be a solid story because of that.

I'm the type who prefers to make up fictional towns even in modern settings, so guess I'm a masochist? ^ ^; Since I've never lived there, it's nice to have some freedom, after all.

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#43 Post by gekiganwing »

Frustrating player-stuff that I didn't mention before...

1. Characters who can be accurately described with an archetype, because they lack depth or any other traits.

2. A genuinely good game that inspires dozens or even hundreds of others. The original starts to look derivative, usually
because of the many imitations.

3. A genuinely interesting character that gets imitated to the point where the original becomes dull.

4. Flash games that try too hard to incorporate gameplay, including the ability to cheat.

5a. Players and fans that put way too much emphasis on reviews.

5b. "Reviews" that are barely disguised rants or attempts to troll the audience.

6. The official retail version is difficult to purchase or use.
TrickWithAKnife wrote:America is different, because it has a massive influence on other countries through media. I know more about American history than the history in my own country because of television and movies.
I remember history classes prior to college which routinely stopped in the middle of the 20th century, and ignored a lot of nations. This phenomenon is mentioned in the humorous book Dave Barry Slept Here, which was written about twenty five years ago...

Since I don't want to veer any further off-topic, I'll just say that a clever or thoroughly detailed setting is interesting. If you're portraying a real place in a fairly realistic manner, then it will help to do research beyond recent pop culture media. For instance, Top Gear can only tell you so much about life in the UK. Dragon Wars (aka D-War) won't tell you much about Korea, or even southern California.

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#44 Post by LateWhiteRabbit »

CaseyLoufek wrote:However I'm totally willing to believe there are people who've never been to America that know more about its history, at least the aspects pertaining to their project, than many Americans. That doesn't seem insulting, that seems like specialized knowledge.
But that's kind of missing the point. A nation's history isn't its culture. Knowing more about American politics and history than a native citizen doesn't give you the same insight as growing up surrounded and steeped in the culture. All those subtle things we experience in our own cultures from childhood on, things we take for granted, that give authenticity and insight. Writing a story set in small town America by studying history, watching documentaries, and every re-run of the Andy Griffith show still isn't going to give you the ability to write a story that feels as real as one written by someone who grew up in small town America.

I'm not saying you can't write a story set somewhere else from where you live or grew up, but it's always going to feel a bit imitation. And I weep at the possibilities for cool stories when I see someone grew up somewhere fascinating - and they are going to set their story in a Japanese high school rather than one like their own school.

And maybe it's just me, but even when someone really does their research, things still seem off, partly because the author unintentionally, or intentionally draws attention to their research. They seem to go through a checklist of showing all culturally relevant details, almost like "Look! I know about these things!". Or they draw more attention to, or put way more emphasis on something that natives of that culture would ignore.

On-topic and related:
- When game-makers name their game in Japanese. This ticks me off to no end. It makes the game almost impossible to remember (and I speak and write some basic Japanese) because it doesn't give me a "coat-hook" to hang the memories of the game on. It ticks me off even when Japanese game-makers do it if they are releasing the game in English to an English audience. You translated the rest of the game! Translate the freaking title! I end up with two warring titles in my head - I personally translate the title to English and remember it that way, but then I fail to recognize the game is being talked about when the Japanese title is used. :roll:

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Re: Game Makers! I'm curious? What grinds your gears???

#45 Post by Rinrinnya »

TrickWithAKnife wrote:
Rinrinnya wrote:
TrickWithAKnife wrote:I'm a huge hypocrite though. My game is set mostly in Japan, has mostly Japanese characters, and has plenty of Japanese words in it.
I totally understand you when you say it's really annoying for a weeaboo to call their characters Uzumaki Ichigo-kun-chan-sama or something, but if you just skim over a WiP thread and see Japanese names, will you automatically just go 'nope, story must suck'? You wouldn't be able to tell if the person is a fangirl/boy who has never heard of any anime besides Naruto, Bleach and One Piece, or if the person has spent years studying the culture of Japan and learning the language. Personally, I like games set in Japan if they're culturally and historically accurate, because that shows the people know what they're doing/they're trying, since they spent time researching it
Yes, I'll skip it if I see anything Japanese is a WiP topic, except in special cases, like the creator is Japanese themselves. Doesn't matter how wonderful the art or writing is, I'm not going to play a game that annoys me. Obviously the creator(s) didn't read this thread.

Seeing people who have never stepped foot in Japan for lomger than three days trying to give history lessons on Japan seems really insulting.

But lets face it, most games with Japanese characters here are just throwing them in because that's what they like, and they don't really care that it annoys some people. Everyone thinks their project is special. Perhaps they are special. I won't know because I just saw one of your characters is Misa Yagami, cute but naive high school student, thought "another damn weeaboo high school dating game" and closed the topic forever.

People always justify it with "I really like anything Japanese". Tell me about YOUR culture. That's the one you know, and that's the one you can talk about in depth, and have it feel real.
You wouldn't be able to tell if the creator is Japanese themselves by simply skimming a thread...

Seeing if someone likes the culture, I really don't see how it's insulting. Sure, it would be just bad storytelling if they gave a whole history lesson of Japan, but just putting it into their story doesn't affect how good or bad their writing should be. It's just usually the people who do that are weeaboos lol.

And what if, just maybe, someone doesn't like the culture they live in? What if they like Japan so much, they know more about Japanese culture than their own? Then it would be better for them to talk in depth about a culture they have a passion for studying. Ponder that.
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