I don't think most projects fail because the idea was bad. I think many projects fail because the code becomes too difficult to work with.
At the start everything is easy.
- You add movement
- You add enemies
- You add UI
- You add inventory
Everything works.
But then suddenly every new feature takes twice as long as it should. You fix one bug and create three more. Changing one thing breaks something completely unrelated.
The project just becomes heavier and heavier until eventually you stop wanting to work on it and give up.
That's the point where many projects die and end up in your giant pile of unfinished projects.
Clean code isn't about making code look pretty, it's about keeping complexity under control!
It's about making sure the project remains enjoyable to work on even after months of development.
Because if your project becomes painful to work on, finishing it becomes much harder, and finished games are worth a lot more than abandoned prototypes.
So if you want to take your games to the finish line then I encourage you to think about the quality of the code that you're writing.
I have an entire 1hr talk on YouTube all about this topic titled: "How to Write High Quality Code that doesn't fall apart."
If you're trying to be a professional game dev as opposed to just a hobbyist building throwaway prototypes, then I highly recommend you learn how to write proper high quality clean code. Best of luck!
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