Game Development Progress vs Hurdles

Greetings fellow Aspra Corp Employees! 

While I am working away on the next release of ACS:CM (Starfield might be getting in the way...), I thought I would share my findings. I am over five months into actual development of my game (almost three months on Itch.io!), and an old adage has become routine for me: "You don't know what you don't know."

Simply put, I came into game development with some understandings of project management; my background is in it, and though I have through this game implemented my knowledge, I felt there were many places my understanding of time management, scope creep, timelines and -most of all- a steady pace vs sprints would come in handy. But I also knew that there would be things I would learn that I didn't expect in my initial planning. I am finding the largest hurdle is one that I had considered but not truly considered; my need for perfection.

I WANT this game to go public; I want others to give me feedback, to enjoy what I've created, and to share beyond just the small team of game testers currently assisting with review. However, there is a burning desire to launch ONLY when things are perfect.

Friends, especially those of you who have ever made a game, can relate; that's impossible. I look at Starfield, a MASSIVE game with hundreds working on it, and some are considering this "The Bethesda Game with the Fewest Launch Bugs" (https://insider-gaming.com/bethesda-bugs-game-sources/#:~:text=In%20June%2C%20Mi...). And, be that as it may, I've already had multiple CTDs, objects/persons clipping through the environment/each other, etc. Typical Bethesda fair.

So, if a major game company isn't going to launch perfect, why should I worry?  Namely, my concern is with my own 'artwork.' I use the term loosely, as many do not consider AI Generation artwork; you can read my disclaimers in-game about my own thoughts (and, I suspect, I will need to write a post about it at some point...). 

But that ability to take photorealistic pictures and add in fantastical features has me hooked. The ability to set a scene or a pose or a person as I want it (with some stipulations) means I can let my perfectionism run rampant. And, oh friends, does it.

Take, for example, the first few images in the Prologue. Photoshopped, with some AI Generation thrown in, they were my first attempts to create something that met my need to set the scene perfect with the fantastical elements of a real world scenario. I look back at them now and I can't help but think how ghastly they are compared to further iterations, and how I should take time to redo them.

And, knowing me, I will; I will take time already allotted to get to V.0.2.0 (my projected public beta release) to instead focus on making images look that much more like I envision.

It's a slippery slope, and something I had never considered, even when I knew my perfectionism would kick into high gear no matter what I told myself. 

So here's to sticking with my -other- mantra, which is, "This is a marathon, not a sprint." I'm in it for the long haul, and at some point, I'll come back to those images (I won't be able to help myself), but for the moment, they convey what I want and allow me to move on to the much juicer details of Chapter 2 and Chapter 3. 

Happy Hunting!