Yes but also no. For me it kind of killed other games because I suddenly started looking at stuff like assets and how much effort was put into them. Gamedevs can put so much detail into stuff the average user does not notice at all.

Creating something from nothing is always a good hobby. Whether it be a jigsaw puzzle or planning/designing a game that does not exist yet.

Well, of course it’s a good hobby. Does it work for you? I don’t know.

I’ve been building random stuff for years. It has never amounted to a finished project, but I still keep doing it just because it’s fun to make things do things on screen. I didn’t start out as the sharpest tool either, but I’ve been getting better.

If you really enjoy it, I think you’ll just keep coming back.

Why not?

You say you’re not the sharpest tool in the shed, but I think gamedev is a good way to learn a variety of skills. And doing it as a hobby takes a lot of pressure off and allows you to take things at your own pace.

Grab godot, grab some tutorials, make something. It really is that simple. Just set your expectations. Your games will be closer to Pong for a while but there’s nothing wrong with that.

If you don’t know what you enjoy the only way to find out is to try things, and it’s never been easier to try making a game. If you have zero programming experience whatsoever I’d say start here: https://gdquest.github.io/learn-gdscript/

Hobby? Absolutely!

Just don’t expect any money out of it. At all. If you DO get money out of it, consider yourself very lucky. Do it for fun first and foremost.

Join us, and in 10 years you can look back on all the features your game engine implements, without having started work on the game play!

I kid. Ask yourself: what do you want out of this hobby game dev, and do you enjoy it. That’s really all that’s important.

If you do want to see if you like game dev, implement Tetris. All of Tetris though. You need a menu, pause, animations, etc. When you’re done you’ll have a better idea. Tetris is great because it’s not a huge project. You don’t need to wrestle with complex graphics pipelines, game design is mostly done, but you can take it in your own direction and add your own flourishes.

Learning to program I liked making top-down zombie shooters and platformers. It was a cool moment when I figured out a nice way to have smooth character positioning on a tile based map.

I know most of you will say do what you enjoy, the thing is im not sure what i enjoy.

Well, I suppose there’s one way to find out: give it a try!

Gamedev is like the ultimate digital hobby if you do it yourself. You get to program, do art, sound, game design, etc.

The beauty of game dev, is that you can make the most cursed codebase, and as long as it works, the only person itll impact is yourself.

Also, startup costs are basically zero, there is no need for a top end PC, whatever you have now is probably good enough to start.

Try it, if you are having fun that’s pretty much all that matters.

Also, don’t expect to have the production value of a AAAAA $800,000,000 development team, even if you do use AI. There’s only so much one developer can do, no matter how sharp they are. There were tons of awesome single developer and very small team games that came out of the 1980s - so, if you can get happy with 8 bit style you might just surprise yourself.

The cost of entry is zero. (Assuming you have a computer.)

And if it doesn’t work out but you enjoy the building/coding you can look into building desktop or mobile apps for problems you might want to solve or have on hand for yourself.

I mean yeah, its a good creative outlet.

Its relatively simple to get started, just download godot or unreal engine and try a template, and just start messing with it. You’ll know quickly if its your jam or not.

Doing AAA games takes huge resources but you can do smaller games on a lot less. If you’re into programming you can develop games, and some simple hobbyist games like 2048 have been very popular.