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u/panther8387

I have lost sleep, I have lost money, I have lost friend, I have lost devs, and I will still release this game on July 25th.
▲ 0 r/GameDevelopment

I have lost sleep, I have lost money, I have lost friend, I have lost devs, and I will still release this game on July 25th.

So in August 2025 I decided I was gonna try and make my first indie game.

At the time I honestly had no idea what I was getting myself into, i just knew i wanted to build a studio. I put out posts looking for people that wanted to come along for the ride and ended up having ~220 people apply. I interviewed like 70 of them and eventually a really small group of us decided we were gonna try and build a game in 6 months which now feels completely insane lol

This has probably been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done honestly.

We lost people early on, lost our lead developer, brought new people in, changed direction a million times, burned through money faster than I expected. There were multiple points where I genuinely dont think we even knew what game we were making anymore.

What started as this weird vacuum cleaning simulator somehow slowly turned into this strange hell cleaning automation game called Hell Cleaners.

And weirdly enough I think thats probably the biggest thing I’ve learned from this whole process. You dont really “protect” the original idea, you just survive long enough to eventually discover what the game actually wants to be.

Game development is brutal though man.

Programming is hard. Art is hard. Sound design is hard. Game feel is REALLY hard. Scope management is hard. Getting all of those things to somehow work together into something that actually feels fun feels borderline impossible sometimes.

but I can honestly say I’m really proud of what the team has managed to put together in the last few months.

If you’re trying to become a game developer yourself just understand right now its probably gonna be harder, take longer, and cost more than you think it will. Probably by a lot.

But I do think every time you finish something and start over again you get a little better. Not easier exactly, just better at surviving the process lol which is why it is so important to us to hit this release deadline so we can learn through an ENTIRE process before moving onto the next

Anyways, I’d actually be curious hearing from other devs that went through similar stuff on their first projects. Especially around scope creep, pivots, team issues, all that kinda stuff.

And seriously to everybody out there still grinding on their games right now, I respect the hell out of you guys

Shout out to my team, shout out to unity for existing so we can make it happen haha

We have an alpha version out right now for brutal feedback if anyone wants to check it out, lmk.

yokzona.itch.io
u/panther8387 — 1 day ago
▲ 81 r/gamedev

I have lost sleep, I have lost money, I have lost friend, I have lost devs, and I will still release this game on July 25th.

So in August 2025 I decided I was gonna try and make my first indie game.

At the time I honestly had no idea what I was getting myself into, i just knew i wanted to build a studio. I put out posts looking for people that wanted to come along for the ride and ended up having ~220 people apply. I interviewed like 70 of them and eventually a really small group of us decided we were gonna try and build a game in 6 months which now feels completely insane lol

This has probably been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done honestly.

We lost people early on, lost our lead developer, brought new people in, changed direction a million times, burned through money faster than I expected. There were multiple points where I genuinely dont think we even knew what game we were making anymore.

What started as this weird vacuum cleaning simulator somehow slowly turned into this strange hell cleaning automation game called Hell Cleaners.

And weirdly enough I think thats probably the biggest thing I’ve learned from this whole process. You dont really “protect” the original idea, you just survive long enough to eventually discover what the game actually wants to be.

Game development is brutal though man.

Programming is hard. Art is hard. Sound design is hard. Game feel is REALLY hard. Scope management is hard. Getting all of those things to somehow work together into something that actually feels fun feels borderline impossible sometimes.

but I can honestly say I’m really proud of what the team has managed to put together in the last few months.

If you’re trying to become a game developer yourself just understand right now its probably gonna be harder, take longer, and cost more than you think it will. Probably by a lot.

But I do think every time you finish something and start over again you get a little better. Not easier exactly, just better at surviving the process lol which is why it is so important to us to hit this release deadline so we can learn through an ENTIRE process before moving onto the next

Anyways, I’d actually be curious hearing from other devs that went through similar stuff on their first projects. Especially around scope creep, pivots, team issues, all that kinda stuff.

And seriously to everybody out there still grinding on their games right now, I respect the hell out of you guys

Shout out to my team, shout out to unity for existing so we can make it happen haha

We have an alpha version out right now for brutal feedback if anyone wants to check it out, lmk.

reddit.com
u/panther8387 — 1 day ago
▲ 24 r/indiegames+1 crossposts

I have lost sleep, I have lost money, I have lost friend, I have lost devs, and I will still release this game on July 25th.

https://yokzona.itch.io/hell-cleaner

Back in August of 2025, I set out to build my first indie game.

I made a post looking for people who wanted to come along for the journey, and from August to December I interviewed people nonstop. Around 220 people applied. I interviewed roughly 70 of them. Out of all of that, I landed on a small team of about 4 or 5 people, and together we set out to do something honestly pretty insane: build a viral indie game in six months.

Without question, this has been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.

We lost people early in the process. We lost our lead developer. We brought new people onto the project. At multiple points, we barely even knew what game we were making anymore. The project went through setback after setback while I poured a tremendous amount of money, time, and energy into it.

I’ve lost friends.
I’ve lost money.
I’ve lost really talented people who worked on this project.

And somehow, I’m still here.

And this game is still coming out.

What started as a weird vacuum cleaning simulator somehow transformed into a skeleton shooter, then into this strange hell-cleaning automation game. It’s been chaotic. Messy. Confusing. Sometimes honestly kind of ridiculous.

But the thing I’m most proud of is the people who stayed.

The people who stuck through something incredibly difficult and continued showing up every day to build something together. And realistically, what we’ve managed to create in the last three months, I’m genuinely proud of.

Game development is brutal.

Design is hard.
Programming is hard.
Art is hard.
Sound is hard.
Game feel is hard.
Progression systems are hard.

And somehow the hardest part is getting all of those things to work together into one coherent experience that actually feels fun.

That’s what we’ve been trying to do since January 1st.

So I guess this post is also for the people out there trying to become game developers themselves.

If you decide to go down this road, understand right now that it will be harder than you think. It will cost more than you think. It will probably take longer than you think too.

Honestly, probably 100 times harder.

But if you are lucky enough to actually finish a game and put it out into the world, that alone is an achievement most people will never understand. And I genuinely hope the people who go through this process choose to do it again.

Because every time you finish something and start over, it gets easier. Not easy. Easier.

You make fewer mistakes.
You become sharper.
You build better games.

That’s the whole point.

So if you’ve read this far, thank you. Seriously.

If you decide to play the game, I’d genuinely love your feedback. The game is still deep in development. There are bugs everywhere. There are unfinished mechanics, rough visuals, placeholder systems, and plenty of things we still need to improve.

But this is the phase where we start figuring out if this thing actually has a chance.

And I want the honest truth.

You’re not going to hurt my feelings. I appreciate harsh criticism just as much as positive feedback. At the end of the day, we’re trying to make a game people genuinely enjoy. Something worth your time. Something worth paying for.

And if we’re missing the mark, we need to know.

To all the other game developers out there, seriously, I salute you. This is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.

But also one of the most fulfilling.

The funny part is, the work itself doesn’t feel hard to start. I don’t have to force myself to do it. I wake up at 5 a.m., work 10 to 12 hours a day, and still want to come back the next morning and keep building.

The work is brutal.

But I love doing it.

u/panther8387 — 1 day ago