How I Overcame My Game Dev Burnout...With Game Dev?!? 

Tim is looking way better now that he is out of prison

Thanos: Used the stones to destroy the stones. Tim: used game dev to destroy gamedev burnout.

Good to have you back Tim!! Looking in good spirits, refreshed!!

Thanks a lot for that. I had something similar at some point, but it was for art. I wasn't able to do things, I was really burnt out and I had my own expectation with what I wanted to do with it. Until I decided to just have moment where I sketch anything I want, and not post it anywhere. And I loved it, I never drew more in my life and I discovered that I really like designing characters... I guess what I'm trying to say is sometime we block on something, and the mind shift we need to do may or may not be obvious, but sometime it's just the pressure we set to ourselves because it's something we share, and it has to look good, and that terrify us.

Yay! I'm so happy that you overcame the game dev burnout and I want to say thank you so much for the awesome advice's and tips you're the reason why I returned working on my game project last night I did fixing and deleting stuff that I don't need and I made code much better and clear to read and I added more stuff to the game, And man! I feel so good getting black to my project I respect you so much for that you helped me so much getting back to my project (Sorry for my bad English)

Dude you hit the nail on the head with “social pressure.” That is exactly what I experienced. The idea of, if I don’t post something every day I might lose followers can be motivating, but also really draining. After all, as developers our real passion and motivation is simply in the joy of creation. Once you add in the social element, it can be easy for passion to become burden. Sometimes a brief step away from the social aspect is all it takes to find that passion again. Thanks for this amazing video! Good to see you again! 😺

Tim!! Once again something I relate to right now! Haha...first of all, glad to see you back in a YT vid! I just hit burnout after releasing Mystic Hammer. It was 18 months, but somewhere towards the end, just looking at it gave me anxiety. So for me, game dev fixed the game dev burnout, just a little different. Long story short, I just returned to gamedev tv tutorials (multiplayer atm) and that passion picked right back up for me. I think my issue was the burnout of marketing, being always on, continuing to work on polish, and just adding to the systems I built without touching new ones. The cool stuff for me comes in when you are creating systems - so maybe that's my thing. I will soon find my "inner card game" so to speak, I'm sure. Congrats on this and continue to take as much time as you need!

100% relatable. Switched to board games design recently. It feels so much pleasurable to design. Afterwards, while playing my game with friends, i dont have that shitty feeling of boredness like when Im playing my pc games. Im not gonna leave video games, i just explored new teritories. And this is very helpfull and broadminding. Have a good time deving, Tim!

Thanks Tim! Glad you’re feeling better. Great timing on this video. From what it sounds like, as talented as you are I feel like you should have a team to delegate to. And I feel you. I’m right we’re you were. I have a design, concept art, & the mvp ready to deploy. But art, architecture, code, & sound are sooo fking labor intensive. Context switching between everything each day gets exhausting. I remember the funnest part was designing all the quirky little elements of my game. So you’re spot on. I do it on the side for shit that probably won’t make the final cut but it keeps that sense of joy

Amazing to have you back Tim!

I wanna hug you man, you describe the things I feel rn and your advice really matters.

Tim, thank you so much for this. The idea of looking at a different part of the cube (design vs dev) to reinvigorate the passion really struck a positive chord with me. Thank you for all you do!

All of Tim's games are going to be released around Valentines Day now.

Great to see you making a recovery like this Tim! Your channel inspired me a lot throughout my gamedev journey. Im happy to see you took this time for yourself. A clearer mind, without the pressure of delivering something to others can make much better decisions I think. Wish you all the best going forward!

I love the message here. Doing what you love doing helped you recover from the thing that you love doing. lol. But for real though, I get it. When I'm making games for other people, there's a different level of stress involved than when I'm just making things for the fun of making it.

Look who is back! I hope you are doing well Tim.

Wait your on patreon? Time to support! Glad to see you back man, I was going through burnout too. This perspective is what I really needed, thnx

Hey man, I’m glad to see your in a better place. I can understand how sharing everything you do creates an expectation under the hood that, over time, makes it a all a chore. After awhile, it’s taste aversion. So glad your feeling better and that a spark returned with the tabletop stuff. Thanks for being awesome and thanks for sharing. Again, so glad your healthier...

You look so fucking happy. Can't wait to explore more game design focus with you.

Welcome Back Tim. It's alwyas great to take breaks when needed. Feels great to see ya all well rested and refreshed. missed lurking in your streams on twitch. :)

Glad to see you back. I think anything you do creatively will be incredible! The way I see it, a game is a game, no matter the platform or medium. Look forward to seeing more from you. I'd love to pick your brain about game dev sometime, I'm new to it and I'm still learning, but I have loads of ideas. You seem well, wish you the best and happy to hear the excitement in your voice

Yeah man you are back :D great to hear can't wait to watch the video now.

I resonate so much with this man! Sometimes all the systematic work just starts to feel like a barrier between your ideas and the final product. Paper prototyping can be such a cool way to find your passion for game design again!

That hit close to home, burn out sucks, but it can be overcame!! Big love homie!! :D

proud of you bro, glad that you're doing better!

Hello Tim! It's really nice to have news from you, I'm glad you are doing good! I totally understand you about the game design of boardgames. I am a sofware enginneer and I love making game on my spare time; but I also love boardgames as they offer a fairly big nice and interresting game design mechanics. I feel like both are related in somle way. Can't wait to see you talk about this project, but man, keep it cool, don't burnout again! Cheers from France!

Wow, card games huh? You remind me of my dad, he doesn't use social media, he likes board/card games, and he has a huge beard. I regret not spending more time with him. He used to invite me to play those games with him more but I started refusing more because I've slowly became a workaholic. Then he designed a board game he could play by himself because I never play with him and that broke my heart. From that point I realized how much game dev and art cut me off from relationships, like I don't talk to anyone at all, not even the closest people.

I'm so glad you're back!!! 'Twas a long summer without you...

Happy to see you in good shape and energetic again! A comment: any physical implementation naturally require a design phase - one aspect for example is the time and cost of production of the printed materials for your game, many software devs fall into the trap of jumping into the software implementation without any design (or "something" that feels great, today), because it is fun (immediate feedback) and it can be changed easily later (just rewrite it, again) ... and they don't, because it is not fun any longer to wonder around.

I clicked on this video so fast. Congrats on getting things under wraps! So glad you're back!

I burned out hard in my game development but now since I have made it over the big hurdles I am having a blast again working on my game. I'm gonna be done at the end of December! Then just fun polishing and boring translations. What made me really want to finish my game is the thought of my next game. I'm finally going to have one of my games completed and the biggest I have ever made. Will it be perfect? No...will it sell well? Probably not....what it will be is a product that im 90 percent happy with :) Burnout is so real to me because my job is a network admin so I'm sick of computers by the end of the day.

When I started my channel i was posting daily. It was great to see my sub count increase but it was definitely too hard to maintain. I now post 3 times per week and it's much more manageable 👍❤

Make sense! I make a card and a board game when I was a kid, is nice and all creativity, in game dev sometimes is hard with the programing and frame rate and bad compilations, etc

When I was a kid, I used to make board games on paper and play with my friends. I used to make the rules, draw it all out then cut the pieces out of, yep you guessed, paper. 😂 We had some good times doing that back then.

Thank you Tim! I too felt the same... But maybe now I'll try this and see if I can recover a little faster...

u know I was having burn out from my crap rpg maker game for a while, I just kind of stopped working on it for and just chilled out for a couple of weeks. Then all of a sudden I got these amazing ideas story wise for it and now I feel like I can mess with it all day again. Sometimes I guess you just gotta chill out, so your version of chilling out was doing fun personal projects while mine was fallout 4 haha

Glad you are back

welcome back to the land of the dev-ing. I'm sitting in the same boat as you. Covid got me down on the gamedev scene so I took a break and focused on rekindling my love for programming in other ways. Now with my wife starting to learn c# I'm picking up unity for the first time and gonna take a crack at some jam games with that to help reinforce her c# knowledge and get a little hobby time in with the wife :) I still need to get back to my deckbuilder game eventually but might switch it to a 2d game in unity to help introduce me to the system

I hope Tim you can become successful enough where you can hire a programmer and artist and you can concentrate on design.

I was expecting the beard to have grown. Haha good to have ya back Timbo.

Glad you enjoyed your time off 😁 Hope to see more game design in the future

Great to see your doin okay Tim.

Hey Tim! ^^ "So, I'll see you s-" *cuts* Anyways, I feel that a lot in a dramatic level xD But it rise another problem for me, let me explain. When I've worked on a project (be it gamedev or not), always happens a time when I need to do something else. It's not quite burning out, but still. Then, I do something else for the sake of being sane... but I can't really go back on the previous project anymore and I think it can be a danger for someone fluttering around like me. I'm still searching for solutions to actually do something and commit to it, but... You video helped me a lot, because I realize that doing something else to a point somewhere in the project can be good... and can even profit the project! ... I just wonder what I like the most in gamedev, hahaha 8D

Wow, exactly what I am feeling right now!

The advantages of make a paper prototype is that you can find design flaws early on.

A cut and a shave changes you, even when you think those are just outer layers. Facts! and welcome back Tim. ;-)

Analog comes first. I think making games in the 'physical' realm is VITAL when you are an indie dev whether it's paper cards, board games using office supplies, or in the backyard with your friends. Making games in the real world enables you to make the game before you write a single line of code. It's not just for beginning a project either. When you can't write another line of code, get the whiteboard and draw it out. When you are burnt out with inkscape, blender, photoshop, etc, start painting or play with clay. When you're creatively shot while developing, then STOP and do something else. This is not 'just an exercise'. It's part of the process.

Happy to see you are doing well again! Maybe next project try working with a squad & don't do any programming or art, you got the influence and you seem like a great person to work with. why not use it in your advantage to gather people around you to help out & at the same time you will be helping the others building up a career? :P

I'm experiencing a total burnout for the past 4+ weeks

Pls I need a quick answer I made a game with a game engine called max 2d and I want to upload the game to play store but I need to turn it to a game app before uploading how do I do that

Nice ;D

Hey Tim welcome bck 😉

Can you explain what was bothering you to the point you had to step away?

we like you bud. yea ive burned myself out a bunch. its more work than people realise..

Do you watch Dani

Have you seen how profitable card/board games are? They're huge in Kickstarter. People love card games (I don't. Like chess. I lose my patience in a matter of minutes). Why don't you give it a try?

well I don't even know if I like anything now lol, I may need to take some time off after this project.

Ayyyy

Nice new appartement dude , new girfriend ? Your old dark room was scary.

Why not try out Core, Iv heard you can make prototypes pretty quick with minimal art and programming and you can focus more on game design. I use unity myself but will also be playing around with core for the same reasons you have mentioned.

seems like yt burnout, not gamedev burnout

First