What smaller projects can I do to work towards my "dream project"?

Hi Bryan!

I don't have a lot of experience in Game Development, I've only taken courses on Treehouse, but I think I can have an answer for you. I don't want to disappoint you, but a game you mentioned in your question requires years of experience and an enormous knowledge. But I don't want to turn you off of your dreams, because it's possible, but only with hard work! First, you should take the Game Development Course here at Treehouse, then read a bunch of books about it, go make other courses, and never stop learning. It's also helpful to contact other game developers, and talk to them, ask questions.

Always believe in yourself!

Hope this helped!

Hey man, that's a good question. I think a lot of people are definitely looking forward while learning a new set of skills, always keeping in mind how they would eventually apply those skills in the future. Even if it seams impossible at the start. With this being said, it's definitely a huge project you've outlined.

The first thing you should really do when you're starting out with something so intimidating is outline exactly what you'd like to accomplish. Keep a living doc with your exact expectations and requirements for the game. What are you using to develop the game? What do the game mechanics look like? What's the gameplay look like? Write everything down.

With a clear scope of your project, break out each section into what you would need to learn to accomplish each section, and group similar tasks together with respect to difficulty and your personal learning pace. By this point, you should have a clear idea on paper of exactly what it'll take to get the job done. Most importantly: a good starting point should naturally come to light.

From here, it's really just a matter of follow through. For instance, looks like one of your main goals would be to design a character and make them playable via mouse and keyboard / controller. Obviously you can't just jump in and expect to animate a walking character your first day. I would start by learning how to handle user input: maybe start with how to roll a ball, and progressively learn more complex functionality.

One huge thing to keep in mind is that something like game development is a multi-disciplinary project. To make a game you'll need developers, designers, modelers, concept artists, animators...the list is pretty huge. With this in mind, try to find local people who are at the same point as you in your personal development. For instance, if you're interested in learning game development - you'll probably need to work with at least one 3D artist to get your game off the ground. Finding like minded people to work with early can be a huge help.

Start small, write out a solid plan, set reachable goals, meet people who share your interests, and don't expect too much too quickly. That's probably how I would go after something like that.

Hope this helps.

This is a pretty solid Unity course to get you started - https://www.udemy.com/unitycourse/learn/v4/, also Nick has a good introduction on Unity here on Treehouse as well, definitely a good place to get started - good luck!

In my opinion, you should help out with other open world projects. This will mean that you get experience making this type of game. You can also meet people who would be willing to help you in this project. Also I would recommend the same Unity course as Michael Peterman.