Wait, I'm a gatekeeper now? 

It blows my mind that people wanna learn to make games "without learning to program". They are deeply intertwined. It's fine if you want to enter the industry more from the designer side of things, but you will forever rely on others to make your ideas a reality. You can't even fully take advantage of the big game engines without a fair amount of programming knowledge.

I actually find the complaint pretty childish. Gatekeeping implies that you're putting up some obstacle in their way. You're just telling them what you think is the most effective way of getting things done. If they don't want to do it that way, it's not like you're forcing them.

You "gatekept" me that well that I decided to learn making games in the hard way. Jokes aside, thank you for your inspiration, I like your channel. Those people do not even know what are they talking about, TBH. If a RU-vidr gives you a recommendation/advice/wisdom/whatever_information_regarding_learning != gatekeeping, tho.

great content as always

I'm no youtuber but i quite frequently run into the same attitudes that you share here in indie game dev discords and what not, especially when people ask me what engine I use and I tell them I do my own. I've left a few communities because I didn't feel welcomed, it's pretty nuts that you can get pretty much ridiculed for wanting to build your own stuff. I get that I get some heat if I put forth my opinions on OOP and Uncle Bob, just because the herd/group think dynamic is strong, so I only even engage in those discussions in communities where I know people are fine with different viewpoints.

The way I think about it, that's even good game developers and good games has a bad practices. And when you play a game, you see a facade of it, and you may enjoy the game, but die inside when youn see a code base. For example, I love the idni game "Omori", despite that's they managed to put dow my FPS to 40 on a pixel-style, turn based video game

Gatekeeping is good when applied correctly and by qualified people.

Nice video and thanks for the amazing content you. I feel like the issue is the fact that "making games the hard way" is synonimus with making your own tech or making the game from scrath. First of all, making a game is hard, making a "good game" is even harder and making a "commercially successful game" is extremely hard. The way I see it, it depends on your motivation. I would like to live forever and learn everything about the world because I am just curious about everything. So there is a benefit to learn new languages, learn new frameworks, learn game egines, etc. Using game engines like Unity, Unreal, Godot is hard because you need adaptability and working in a big code base that has a predefined structure. Making games in those engines is not that easy and you still have a lot to learn. I don't think that the folks making GTA are doing it the easy way... I enjoy making games and I am currently making a Sokoban like puzzle game in Odin + Raylib because I was inspired by you and Karl. My main motivation for this game is to learn new things and program in a language that I enjoy working with. I don't expect to be commercially successful or at least that's not the aim of the game. All of that to say that "making games the hard way" is different for everyone and instead of saying that you are gatekeeping, people should just focus on what's important to them and just make games :D

Sometimes someone will say a stupid shit - just ignore it, pal 😉 It is commendable that you try to understand a person who engages with you, but if it does not make sense after the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, Nth time you read it then it may actually be a nonsense disguised as a thoughtful opinion 😂 And, idk, you previously shared your opinion with me that gatekeeping is widened term that depends on the community, but I can’t agree with it. I believe what happened in your case is that a bunch of people who don’t understand the term use it without a thought, which makes you and other people think that the word has “wider” meaning. It is not. “Gatekeeping” means: preventing others from accessing something(usually a knowledge or opportunity).

Tbf to them, it is a little bit gate keeping saying you need to code to make games (wild outlandish statement 😤). On the other hand the amount of youtube indie devs that encourage you to just use a general purpose engine is absurd. The people like me who prefer a code based approach and as you said in another video, like to define our objects, functionality and design in code, not just with little configured blocks on a screen have basically no representation. So for people to come at you for saying the opposite is a bit of a joke.

But I want to be a painter without learning how to use a paintbrush!!!! Democratize art!! AI for the win!! (i'm kidding but people are delusional sometimes. They really don't want to be game developers or artists, they just want the title or something. I liked your comment about wanting to be a musician without learning an instrument and music theory.)

I don't agree with the second highlighted comment's implication that software by itself isn't art. A lot of developers, especially those who are in it as an interest and not a money machine, do consider it or at least subconsciously handle it as art. It's just as artful as something like graphic design - many do it because it pays the bills, but even more do it without any monetary incentive. Really weird line of reasoning imo

It's pretty hyperbolic to consider anything you've said to be in line with gatekeeping. You simply gave a pep talk, not a top-down commandment from the gaming gods. By all means if you're completely brand new I wouldn't even jump into Godot or Unity and start even simpler like GDevelop which has zero code at all and is purely event driven. But in terms of long term game development, which I happen to agree with and have lived through personally, is that you can only get so far without understanding game programming until you start to hit brick walls along in your journey. It's going to keep popping up so after you've gotten your feet wet learn the fundamentals so it's easier in the long run.

We don't really have a big game industry in my country, We mostly ship hypercasual mobile games but im hating it. ( not even our games, 1st world countries move their headquarters to Turkey since our economy leads to cheaper hires for them). I'm 2nd year in University and i haven't shipped a polished game yet while my friends who want to work in game industry are spamming Hypercasual mobile games. It's normal to be seen as a "guy who doesn't even ship shit" from non-technical developers. It's really sad that people call themselves developers with just 2 months of youtube tutorials and clone projects. Tech industry is having an "OMGG!! 100K a year by sitting in a monitor" moment. It's normal for people like you to be called out by those kinds of developers.

Ur just such a gatekeeper Teo :p