Hello! I'm new here, hope all of you are having a great day.

I'm a 17 years old teenager, I live in a 3rd world country and I've always loved videogames (not just playing them). Some of my other hobbies are: drawing, video making (with focus on narrative and visual effects) and watching anime xD. I have no experience with coding or game development, and I don't have any friends interested in the subject. My idea is to be a coder mainly. I also dream of leaving my country and living outside.

I have a few questions for you guys, and if some of you could share your experiences also, that'd great!

1 - I will have to go to college and choose a degree. In my country there are universities that offer specialized courses for game development specifically. You guys think it's a good idea or should I do something more general like Computer Science, Computer Engineering, etc…?

1.5 - If I do choose a game development specialized course, should I do a bachelor degree or a technologist degree?

2- Did you make a game dev related course, or did you learn it by yourself?

3- What are the positives of making games (being it indie or working for a big company) and the hardships I may find in the way?

4- How did you enter into the job market? How does it work? How is the consistency of the game dev market compared to something like software engineering, web development, and other stuff in the area?

5- With the game dev knowledge you have (programming, designing…), in which other areas can you work at if you decide the payment isn't enough or you just want to quit?

6- Where did the most part of the knowledge you have (being it artistical or technical) come from? A degree? A course? Self-taught?

7- What is the wrong mindset for someone who wants to start developing games? And what would be the correct mindset?

8- Why did you choose to create your own game instead of working at a company? (IF that is the case).
Creative freedom? Didn't have an opportunity?

9- What languages / engines should I learn first? (Besides the ones I'd learn in college).

10 - Why did you decide to make games?

Personally, I always wanted to create, I always wanted to leave my mark in the world and know that something I created affected someone. I've always wanted to be someone. Not anyone. This is why I have a youtube channel, I love when people like stuff I did. This is also why I like games, art and anime; you can clearly see when someone puts passion into it, and I love to appreciate something when the work is good. I also enjoy good writing, but I don't think I could do something like that xD.

I am not a programmer, and I am not able to answer all your questions. Too many questions, too broad - it would take an entire book to answer all your questions fully.

1 - If you want to be a programmer, get a CS degree.

1.5 - Bachelor/baccalaureate.

I've worked as a game designer and producer, and then I went into education. You might find some useful information in my game industry advice articles at https://sloperama.com/advice/​

Fukurou said:
some of my other hobbies are: drawing, video making (with focus on narrative and visual effects

If you enjoy these things, perhaps coding is not the right fit for you?

As tom said above, all of those questions would take books to answer fully, but I'll do what I can.

1. General degree is better, I know a lot of people with specialized degrees, and a few of them are on my team, but they have a hard time finding day jobs in this industry. Those special game degrees are marketed as your golden ticket into the industry, when it is just a stepping stone. If you get a specialized game dev degree employers out of game dev and most recruiters don't know what to do with you. Also, bachelors is always better than whatever tech degrees there are.
2. I think you mean take? and no I never took a game dev course, and did it all with self initiative. But I did go to university to get fundamental knowledge, while at school, I did join the game dev club for a while.
3. To find this out, you should just read dev blogs and do your own research. There are countless pros and cons of indie dev VS. AAA dev. a lot of which are obvious, and some more nuanced. Books have been written on this question alone. So do your own research.
4. To enter into the game job market is the same as any other market, you need a resume, a portfolio, some college degree, it's not that different. It's just incredibly more specialized and competitive. the market for game jobs seems to be comparable to any other tech job. It's also got it's hubs in the world, just like any other job type.
5. If the skill you have is transferable to another industry, then by all means, find something that meets your financial and career needs. But the issue is, if you specialize too much in game dev, your skills and background might not easily transfer over. My core skill is management (production), so it can cross over. But that is not the case for some specialties.
6. Most of my management skills came from just working with people on projects across the internet, but I would not be able to do what I do, without a base foundation of education from university. I studied psychology., and that helped me.
7. The wrong mind set, is thinking your going to make the next WOW, LOL, Mario, or any one of the games you like or grew up with. any of the AAA games you like, your not making that. And having dreams to do something that ambitious is wrong. You should also not go into games wanting to get rich. games is not a get rich quick scheme. There are countless good “correct” mindsets, so listing them is pointless.
8. I chose to start an indie studio because it was a natural evolution of my path, I would still like to work for another company as well, they are not always mutually exclusive. But I also never made it into AAA, interviewed a few times, but that was it. I also like the independence and freedom of working for myself. It's a lot of responsibility. and it doesn't get the same respect as working for someone else, but it is also less stable. and less financially satisfying, which personally doesn't bother me. I also do it because of the connections I've made. and the friendships I have.
9. Unity and or unreal. you will learn one or the other in school.
10. I decided to be in the games industry, because my passion is the intersection between psychology and technology, and this is the perfick way to fulfill that,, I also started with mods, so that can be another area to explore.

Fukurou said:
You guys think it's a good idea or should I do something more general like Computer Science

I have no degree at all, learned programming myself as a kid on home computers.
Now, decades later, my consistent experience is: Math is the hard part (which i have no education beyond the minimum basics either).
I would prefer CS over games from every angle. It's more general, useful, helps with developing and optimizing game related technology much more than scripting some gameplay code or writing tons of shaders.
It may lack in providing background on content creation, but as all game specific things, you'll probably learn them anyway along the way of making some small games.

But maybe that's just me. My passion is more towards the technical aspects like simulation than about specific games, genres or design.

Fukurou said:
7- What is the wrong mindset for someone who wants to start developing games? And what would be the correct mindset?

You need patience. It allays takes twice the time from what you thought or planned. The investment is very very high, for the outcome of a just silly game. It's tedious and requires some discipline to not give up before it's done.

Fukurou said:
9- What languages / engines should I learn first? (Besides the ones I'd learn in college).

C / C++ is king. C is small and easy to learn, and also is the base to most other related languages like C# or Java. So i'd begin with that, but extend to C++ or C# quickly. C++ is more the expert and high performance stuff, C# makes things easier is is good enough to define your game on top of a engine like Unity.
For small projects (clones of early arcade classics like Pong / PacMan) you can also do it all yourself, not using an engine. And there are minimal all in one virtual systems like Pico-8, which bring back the easy entry / low complexity of home computers. Then there is GameMaker, which is easier to get started than Unity / Unreal.

Fukurou said:
Personally, I always wanted to create, I always wanted to leave my mark in the world and know that something I created affected someone. I've always wanted to be someone. Not anyone. This is why I have a youtube channel, I love when people like stuff I did.

I see some eventual issues: You wanted to create, but you didn't? What stops you from programming and making games right now? Why wait on somebody to teach you how to do it?
It's better you already know some basics before you take specialized courses on the matter. You should evaluate your skill and motivation yourself and before that. What if it turns out you don't enjoy programming at all?
And you don't need feedback either. Once the algorithm works, the feeling is more exciting and rewarding than 100 likes on YT. The social aspects are not really relevant for the development process, meaning they won't help.

Just some thoughts from an industry outsider. ; ) Good luck!

You need to do only one thing : download unity , and win!