When creating a game, the amount of labor that needs to be done can quickly become overwhelming, especially when it is just one person working on it. Therefore, it is important to have a well-defined schedule to make sure both physical and mental energies are not wasted and scattered all over the project. When I first began creating Draconic Echoes: The Ardent War, my work was scattered, and progress was slow while creating the Prologue and Chapter 1. After getting more of a mastery of the game’s engine, I decided that I needed to sit down and plan out how to create more chapters effectively. Then, I remembered Day[9]’s DayKnights 30 Day Projects, and created my schedule based on those principles. You can find a full description of that format here:
https://dk30.day9.tv/about?t=1582666010748
Although my project wasn’t a 30 day project, I applied the same principles to break down the production schedule of the content of my game. Each chapter alone came to be about a 3 week project. Here’s approximately how each chapter broke down:
Week 1 – Area Design
Monday and Tuesday – Create world areas, villages, and cities
Wednesday – Create the area for side quest 1
Thursday – Create the area for side quest 2
Friday – Create the area for the chapter’s main quest
Week 2 – Content Design
Monday – Design enemies and skills for those enemies
Tuesday – Create bosses, boss encounters, and put enemies in troops
Wednesday – Design side quest 1
Thursday – Design side quest 2
Friday – Design the chapter’s main quest
Week 3 – Populating and Quality Assurance
Monday – Add treasure chests to the world and NPCs to the population centers
Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday – Testing, fixing, and testing again, then more fixing
Friday – Create equipment and items for the next week’s chapter
Of course, many of these steps like “design the chapter’s main quest” is broken down into more specific steps, but those steps differed depending on the chapter.
As you can see, this schedule seems much more doable than just saying, “I’m going to create a chapter of my game in 3 weeks.” This method will ensure that you have everything you need when you need it, and it keeps you on track. If you have a long, daunting project to do, I highly suggest applying the principles of the DayKnight 30 day project, even if it’s not precisely one month. After all, the content of Draconic Echoes: The Ardent War is a collection of several 3 week projects.
If you’re curious about how all my nonsense actually plays out in a game, check out Draconic Echoes: The Ardent War on Steam!