Civ 3 - The natural enemy of the indie?

[Fry Crayola]

I just had to. Dammit!

Last night I fired up a new game of Civ 3. Now I'm addicted to the thing again (as is the way) and can't get my mind off it. I still owe those Japanese a good hiding after they attacked me back in the dark ages.

But I also have work to do. It was a bad decision in the end. I don't think I've ever played as addictive a game.

Anyone else here make the cardinal mistake of getting sucked into an existing game, relinquishing time set aside for development?

[Robert Cummings]

I think the type of game you chose to make is fairly big for an indie too. You have to prevent gaming till after 6pm, and make sure you get 3 things done every day on your game, no matter what things they are, so long as you get stuff done...

Forget civ3, it's not important. You want out of belfast, then you're going to have to work at it. It can be done but you need to FOCUS.

[Daire Quinlan]

Forget civ3, it's not important. You want out of belfast, then you're going to have to work at it. It can be done but you need to FOCUS.

LOL , Belfast isn't THAT bad !!
OP is right though. Every now and again those irritating games come along that suck up every ounce of your free time for a week or so. CIV3 was the first game to do it to me, then Rome Total War ... At the moment I'm playing Soldat for about an hour a night now that I've actually found a realistic server that actually occasionally has people in it.

At the end of the day though its all just procrastination. I've got a couple of things I have to do to progress at the moment, including modelling a couple of low-poly characters. Don't particularly enjoy it so I've been putting it off and browsing CGChat and CGTalk instead and getting all down on myself because of the quality of some of the work on those forums. I'll have to give myself a slap on the head this weekend and get some work finished !

I mean, I'll have to get stuff done if I ever want to get out of Dublin, right ? :)

D.

[baegsi]

IMHO civ 3 (or any other seductive distraction..., well almost any ;) ) is not the problem. When I'm working on a project and it goes really well (I make progress, I'm creative, get posivitve feedback, etc), you can give me the worldsbest game ever and it won't interest me because I get everything I wan't from my project. However, if I'm stuck, then it's a different story.

So, the challenge lies in organizing your projects in a way you won't get stuck and have some sort of success every day.

[Fry Crayola]

Belfast isn't that bad. But don't be hard on Richard, Daire, because it was me who said I wanted out in the UK roll call thread.

Civ 3 is only the problem at the moment because I've recently gone through a slack period, so I'm not fully engrossed in the development. So I fired up a game last night, not really thinking I'd be playing for long (I started it at 8) and next thing I knew it was 2am.

Still, the beauty of it is that a game only lasts a few days, so when I'm done with it (assuming I can wrestle the computer from my girlfriend during non-development periods) I'm done.

And that three-things-a-day is a good idea. I've got one done now, so another two and I'll feel a little better about myself. Then I get to go and paint a new flat.

[Nexic]

I get sucked into playing games when I'm near finishing a game (the boring part). When I'm near the start of a project I don't even have the chance to even start playing a game, because I'm usually so excited about making it happen.

During Desperate Space I got dragged into: System Shock 2 (few days), Doom 3 (few days), Diablo 2 (almost 2 weeks!)

Now I try to only play indie games, because I don't have to play for more than an hour in one go ;)

[svero]

I havent played it much but I sometimes lose one of my partners to civ 3 for days at a time...

- S

[electronicStar]

You don't have to feel guilty to interrupt devellopment to play a game for a day or two. You can't just stay coding your game from start to finish, you need distractions or else you'll hit mental roadblocks. Playing another game can also give you new ideas and let you see your own game under a different angle.
You also need fresh air and physical exercise once in a while.:)

[Robert Cummings]

And green vegetables. Or have I gone too far?

[BlueWaldo]

Civ 4 should be out in November. I think I'll be taking a month off.

[Fry Crayola]

I don't think Civ 4 will be any better than Civ 3. Which in turn wasn't any better than Civ 2.

It's all refinements to a phenomenally good game.

Still, I can't wait.

And I haven't played Civ 3 today. I did work. And then painted some walls.

[Robert Cummings]

I loved Civ1 on the Amiga. thats all I've tried in the series. You had to use your imagination with that one :)

[cheese_phantom]

The Civ series seem to be the natural enemy of anyone who has any sort of work to do. I used to play Civ 2 during my master's thesis and I think the game itself should have been it's subject :) Each time I wanted to write something, there was this tempting desktop icon. I always said to myself "Ok, just half an hour" and then half a day was gone. The other game I had at that time, and which I played even longer than Civ 2 was X-Com: Apocalypse. And I was lucky, because I didn't yet know about Championship Manager and Railroad Tycoon. Those where my favs during my Ph.D...

I can't find such tempting games like these nowadays. Either they can't make games like this anymore, or, work I have to finish nowadays isn't as urgent and important as the work I had to finish in those days :D

[Ska Software]

I lost a good sunday of work to Tony Hawk Underground.

[Escapee]

Civ 3 is evil , i used to play 30+ hours straight and get sickened after that , the only way to defeat the game is to uninstall the game ...

[tunca]

I don't think Civ 4 will be any better than Civ 3. Which in turn wasn't any better than Civ 2.

I'm happy that the game isn't better with the sequels. Because I used to play civ 1 on PC and I hardly finished high school. I was worried about the future of the coming generation :) with civ sequels. Can't imagine if they were better.

[arcadetown]

Now I try to only play indie games, because I don't have to play for more than an hour in one go ;)
Good thing Xeno Assault 2 was just 100 levels or it would have burned more of my precious time.

My advice... stay far away from retail shelves. Warcraft 3 and Doom 3 sucked down way to much of my life. Ever keep playing until the morning light starts coming through the window? Happened to me a few nights on end. So I purposefully try to avoid retail titles these days.

[Fry Crayola]

But I still have about 10 unfinished titles! Heck, unplayed titles!

And there's another 10 or so I want to buy.

I may need a time machine of some sort.

[dustinh]

With Dragon Quest 8 and Advance Wars DS just around the corner I won't have time to work on games until next year :D

[tunca]

Anyone else here make the cardinal mistake of getting sucked into an existing game, relinquishing time set aside for development?

I condemn this thread. 2 days ago I installed civ 1 and finally destroyed all the other nations at King (4th hardest level of 5).

Not only civilization but anything about civ is my enemy.

Thank god I can't play the new civ games.

[merovingian]

18 years ago this Summer, I was facing a 30-day deadline to release a piece of software. So what did I do? I immediately got addicted to Sundog and spent 42 hours straight solving it, slept for 18 hours afterwards, and then went to the gym for the first time in my life, where I nearly passed out from exertion.

I went on to make the deadline with hours to spare. Sometimes, you just need to give your brain a coldstart.

More recently, the long development schedule of my last indie game was interrupted by Doom, Doom 2, Warcraft II, XCOM, and TIE Fighter.

Give yourself a break - you need lots of those to stay creative.

[Escapee]

I 'm immuned to highly additive FPS game like DOom 3 & Half life 2 because i had motion sickness and disorientation after playing such kind of game for few mins.

Like others
I 'm playing casual game most of the time now to keep my mind relaxed after long day of work.

[ManuelMarino]

I think nothing is more addictive than a good role playing game. And I'm very very sure OBLIVION will really be a problem for everyone and not only devs trying to focus :)

I'm sure when it will be out, I'll be "busy" for a long, long time...