Hey everyone!

I have been programming for quite some time since I was about 15 (just as a hobby, not really releasing anything just seeing how things work and making stuff for fun). I'm now 24 and I have not really done a whole lot. I have a bunch of started projects and even more design documentation on so many things and only two bits of software I really got anywhere with. The first is a file sync program that I am happy with but it is not very feature rich and the other is a game that is about half done, anything else is really just started. The problem I have is motivation. When I am programming I have a great time and I am smashing though it and really just enjoying the mechanics and how all the code interacts and watching something I build come to life. But then I get stuck on something and the times I can't figure it out or I can't get help with it, I lose interest, or I start working on something else while waiting for a reply or some insight and either start something else or I forget completely and go play games or something else. On top of my apparent Attention Deficit Disorder I work two jobs, one is sales and the other as an after hours call out undertaker that ruins any sleep pattern I may have had, and working on my fitness to get into the Army Reserve (to replace the undertaking, I'm not going to do three jobs at once, bugger that) I find I have less time to work on what I want to and I'm so exhausted that I end up getting home and I don't have the capacity to think so I play some games, eat dinner, exercise (usually going to the fiance's place and running the dog for 40 mins) and sleep.

I have tried a whole bunch of different ways to keep my self motivated but saying I will do 30 - 60 mins of work on a work day and 2 - 3 hours every other day, I have tried to organise my work space to make me feel like I am more efficient, I have tried making a profile on my computer with bland backgrounds and now games so I can't get distracted. But that is hard when I live with two boys who's hobbies are games and drinking.

What I want to know is how does everyone else deal with distraction, and lethargy and time management?

I have known a great many people who had this problem. For about 9 months I have been working--on and off--on a voxel game, and thus watch Youtube and other sources for people working on similar stuff. I see that many people make it [this far] (rendering blocks), fewer [that far], still fewer [farther]... I'm not sure if it is what you describe, or just the realization that a full game is technically much harder than they thought.

Personally, I know when I get onto a project that I can stay on. It consumes me. I find it hard to focus on my paying job, spend less time with family, and don't care one iota about recreation--I just want to get back to my code. I think about it as I drift off to sleep, solve problems for it during my commute, and often find my wife has said a lot to me that I did not hear because my mind has gone back to my latest problems with "it."

Because of work and family illnesses in the older generation, I have taken as much as a month at a time off this project, but I am eager every day to return to it.

Those are my 1.5 cents.

I have seen the 'games are bigger than most think' think quite a bit. It had even hit me when I was really young. And while I have ideas and concepts for big huge games, I have not started them because of that exact reason, it is to big for me alone. Where as the games that I do work on are small and I section them up and complete a section at a time and I have gotten to a point where I need just a few more things in it to become beta release worthy I just got bored of it. Which sucks because it came so far. It was a cut down version of a slightly bigger game than I wanted to make it basically played on 2 dimensions (while still being 3D) and I suppose that is part of the reason I lost interest, because it wasn't the one I wanted to make.

Maybe you should prototype your ideas first in some rapid prototype language or editor (Unity springs to mind). Try out different ideas every week or two. When you find a prototype game that hooks you, then start thinking about implementing it proper, either continuing in Unity (or whatever rapid proto thing you choose) or starting from scratch.

I think the biggest problem for losing motivation is when you don't have a clear vision of what you want to make, and all the implications that brings. You need to know how the game will play out from start to finish, what all the mechanics are and what systems you need to make it possible (and you know that by making a prototype first). Also, keeping the code as simplest as possible that does ONLY the things you need to complete the game helps. Creating complex systems and code will only detract you from the goal, by making you forget why you were making it in the first place.

I am currently having the same exact problem. I am working on a game and my motivation just keeps going up and down: when I start thinking and programming a new part of the game, I get very excited and motivated. The problem is that I then usually get stuck with lots of bugs everywhere and my motivation goes down very fast. The problem is that I do 99% coding and 1% analysing so my code is not clear and has no real structure. I knew that it's important to structure your code, think about it, make diagrams, before coding anything but I felt too confident so I went directly into the code and this is what happened. Some how, this has been an experience that has been benefit to me because now I truly know and understand why it's so important to structure your code, make everything as clear as possible, make diagrams... I decided to code some debugging tools (logs, memory leak detection...) and some intelligent classes (renderer...), kind of like a graphics engine, to make things easier and spend the less time possible on debugging (because coding is fun and cool, but debugging, not really...) . Then, once that I have these classes finished, I will restart my game but having thought a lot about it and used tons of paper for diagrams.... I didn't test this "technique" but I hope it will work (I am still working on the debugging tools) and I hope that it will help you.

I have known a great many people who had this problem. For about 9 months I have been working--on and off--on a voxel game, and thus watch Youtube and other sources for people working on similar stuff. I see that many people make it [this far] (rendering blocks), fewer [that far], still fewer [farther]... I'm not sure if it is what you describe, or just the realization that a full game is technically much harder than they thought.

Personally, I know when I get onto a project that I can stay on. It consumes me. I find it hard to focus on my paying job, spend less time with family, and don't care one iota about recreation--I just want to get back to my code. I think about it as I drift off to sleep, solve problems for it during my commute, and often find my wife has said a lot to me that I did not hear because my mind has gone back to my latest problems with "it."

Because of work and family illnesses in the older generation, I have taken as much as a month at a time off this project, but I am eager every day to return to it.

Those are my 1.5 cents.

That is unfortunately the only way to solo-create any complicated games, much like voxel-block-based games.

Any other route is going to fail miserably. It's just too much work. If you don't have to 250k changes on your github repo, your voxel world likely isn't doing anything. Or it isn't scaleable at all. Or it doesn't have multiplayer (which is the point of sandbox collaboration games) and so on. Or, hopefully you specialized the engine in such a way that some of the most complex parts went away. Eg. simple voxel/distance-based lighting maybe. I had ray-based lighting, which was a blessing and a curse.

There are fun and unfun parts of everything. If you stop working on projects just because it's not fun anymore, everyone will understand, we've all been there, but you're never going to finish anything. I don't know how to make the unfun parts fun, at least, but I just grit my teeth and do it.

https://github.com/fwsGonzo/cppcraft/graphs/contributors

That's how far I got before I got tired of the whole voxel thing. It was fun and well worth it. All the engine needs is some more gameplay, but to me that's the least fun part, I guess. I did all the fancy stuff like modern graphics (minus SSAO, because there's better ways with voxels). I actually had several SSAO implementations, they just won't work because you have too much detail in the distance.

Now I'm making 2D engine, which feels like vacation. I don't have to profile every little thing. Nothing has to be in a parallell threads with deep planning and 10+ test-cases.

Unrelated:

I'm using libTCC (C-compiler) to generate machine code on the fly as my script API to the engine, because it can generate directly to memory.

To me, the main point is to get a project that motivates you and keep up a good pace so you see improvements. Especially if its just a hobby, this seems the sensible.

Now, if you have little time (which you make it sound like), make sure you start something where you can get little achievements even after 30-60 min sessions. Like "get character A moving" or "program little function B".

Funny you should ask

I wrote an article a while back (see above) which had a suggestion to get one going.

Worked for me, hopefully it can work for you too.

Work ethic, commitment, wage packet, competitiveness, professional pride and enjoyment in your work. People need a purpose and a motivation, without that your like a boat drifting in the ocean, how do you find purpose though....?

Maybe get involved in a group of like minded people....

First of all, you should realize that staying motivated is a pretty common problem. You're not alone. There was a really good post that lots of good advice on how to stay motivated. Here's a link to my post.

http://www.gamedev.net/topic/653198-how-to-overcome-biggest-hurdle-motivation/#entry5130107

Watch the movie Collateral! :)

Focus on smaller games at first. There's a great article on which game you should code first and why.

http://www.gamedev.net/page/resources/_/technical/game-programming/your-first-step-to-game-development-starts-here-r2976

If you go straight to your dream-game of awesomeness, you'll quickly get overwhelmed. But if you take baby steps of small reasonable goals you'll be rewarded with a sense of accomplishment and be equipped with tools and code to tackle bigger projects.

If you can stay motivated to get into shape, I'm pretty sure you can stay motivated to work on game development. It sounds like you have a pretty busy life right now so the time simply might not be there.

The only "trick" is, that there isn't a trick. You have to prioritize it or it just won't happen. You have to want to lose weight more than you want to eat donuts. You have to want to complete a game more than you want to play a game. :)

Good luck man,

- Eck