How to try your hand at game development and create your first mobile game

For a novice developer, the easiest way to start immersing yourself in game development is to create a hyper-casual game: it is quite simple and has elementary mechanics. The transition to the gameplay here is instantaneous.

You can make such a game even alone. It can take you from several hours to a couple of days to create it, and about a month or two to bring it to a release state. Let's figure out exactly how to do it.

How to create a hyper casual game

There are several important steps that you cannot do without. Let's talk about each of them in order.

Decide on an idea

You can generate an idea for a game using brainstorming. And your insight will help in this matter. Remember what games you liked and analyze why.

For inspiration, you can download the 30 most popular projects on the App Store or Google Play. Be sure to pay attention to each of them. See what you like, what annoys you when you want to make a purchase or watch ads for bonuses. Write down the moments that seemed interesting.

But remember that it’s better not to choose a product that is too niche or complex to start with, but to consider something more popular and simple. For example, three in a row games.

Find a developer community

These can be various chats, sites and groups on social networks where you can ask any questions related to game development. You can view the list of telegram channels dedicated to game development, for example, Here. Another option is to simply type "game development" into the search box.

In these chats, you can ask the most basic questions: “Do I need a beautiful icon?”, “Should there be sounds in the game?” etc. Community members will help you navigate and understand in which direction it is better to move.

Subscribe to the maximum number of game groups in social networks. There you will receive the latest news about the industry, find like-minded people, learn success stories, discover useful materials and much more.

And if it seems like you might not be able to do it on your own, then there are people who will be happy to take part in the creation of the game. For example, artists, writers, composers, game designers and so on. But, of course, they will have to pay for their work.

Look up basic tutorials online

YouTube videos will be enough to create the first game. Almost all paid courses actually retell the information that you can find in the public domain. So don't waste your money.

You can easily find the videos you need by key phrases, for example: “creating a game”, “how to create a game quickly and easily”, and so on. It's worth starting with the simplest lessons. They will tell you about the basics of the entire gameplay and will explain step by step where and which button you need to press in order, for example, to make character.

Then you can move on to the study of popular graphic editors - for example, Photoshop. Without them, it will not be possible to create characters and graphics for your game. You can also find videos for queries like “Photoshop tutorials” or “easy drawings in Photoshop for a game.” The service will give out a lot of tutorials for different types of games and engines, and you just have to choose the appropriate option.

Choose a game engine

The engine is the underlying software of the game. In fact, this term combines a whole range of application programs that provide graphic visualization, sound, movement in-game characters and so on. Here are the most popular options right now.

• Unity is a cross-platform game engine. Due to its simplicity and accessibility, it is especially popular among indie developers and beginners. Unity allows you to import content from other programs, and also makes it possible to buy assets directly from different stores.
• Stencyl is a free engine that allows you to quickly and easily create games on Android without having to write code. It has an intuitive interface and a good set of tools that gives users enough options to create 2D projects.
• game maker is a game engine that supports cross-platform development using its own Game Maker Language programming language. The advantage is the wide range of supported platforms and a large set of tools that allow you to quickly create and export mobile projects.

We recommend starting with Unity, as it's built specifically for mobile game development. It is also the easiest to understand: it can take 1-2 weeks to study it, a maximum of a month. After that, for example, you can make the ball roll. Unity also provides many resources with templates, textures, pre-made characters, locations and the like.

Choose a programming language

Next, you need to choose a programming language. It usually depends on which engine you're on. IN description Unity's core functionality, for example, states that you can choose one of three languages ​​to use it: JavaScript, C# or Boo.

The main thing is to understand that in any case, you will have to study the programming language closely if you do not know it. Our advice is to start with C#. It will take you about a month to study it.

Create graphics

There are several ways to solve this problem: outsource all the graphics or do it yourself draw all in Photoshop. If you decide to choose the first option, then you can search for an artist on freelance exchanges, for example on kwork. Well, or ask one of your friends to do it.

This is the easiest and least labor-intensive method, but it may require additional financial investments from you. For example, drawing one character will cost at least 500 rubles.

If you decide to do everything yourself, then you can not do without Photoshop. Start with something as simple as a ball that has eyes. And then gradually move on to your idea.

After everything is drawn, you will have to gradually build the visual part of the game and its gameplay: create the background and main characters, arrange the details, if any, and determine how the hero will interact with the space and objects around him.

Separately, it is worth noting that when working with graphics, you must also take into account the basics of optimizing applications for mobile stores - ASO. More on this in the next paragraph.

Set up app optimization

App store optimization (ASO) is the process of optimizing a program, the purpose of which is to improve its position and bring it to the top of mobile products in app stores. The higher an app ranks in search results, the more often it will be installed.

70% of all downloads for a specific keyword are received by the first three applications from the search results. The remaining 30% is distributed among the projects in the top 10. If your application has poorly developed text and visual components, then it will occupy low positions, which means it will rarely be installed. Therefore, when working with the interface and gameplay, you need to think about optimization mobile app pages.

For starters, create beautiful screenshots and icons. Images must be recognizable. For example, if the main character in your game is a bird, then it is worth adding it to the icon. The main thing is to make the icon stand out by experimenting with color, orientation, and size, and not overload it with small details.

There are many research about what helps to attract the attention of users. For example, the use of blue, pink and purple colors is most often found on icons. Therefore, it is worth considering a color scheme to make the application stand out from others.

Also, to increase the number of downloads and installs of the game, you should not be limited only to the domestic segment of the audience. quality localization will increase the success of the application in other countries: algorithms will recognize the presence of a foreign language and will display your project, including for foreign requests. Localization must be configured both in mobile stores and within the game itself.

The most relevant language is English, so it’s worth starting with it. It is followed by Vietnamese, Chinese and others. If the application is in demand, then over time it will be possible to translate it into all remaining languages. But at the start, this will not affect either downloadability or popularity.

Get Feedback

Ask friends or family members to try your game and give feedback. Use these comments to improve the app and make it more attractive to players. You can also write to professional chats of game developers and ask them to evaluate your project by dropping a link to it. So you will also get a professional assessment of your idea.

Publish your game

When your app is ready to be published, feel free to submit it to Google Play or the App Store. But before that, be sure to study the rules of mobile stores - you can do this here And here. Violation of them can lead to blocking your account and greatly complicate the moderation process before publication.

You also need to register on the platform of your choice as a developer. Be sure to provide real data about yourself, otherwise you will lose access to your account.

An important point: registration is paid. On Google Play, you have a one-time fee ($25), but on the App Store, you will need to pay every year ($99).

Monetize the game

There are different ways to monetize mobile games: through in-game purchases, subscriptions, and so on. For hypercasual projects, the main source of income is usually advertising. For example, banners inside the game or the issuance of some bonuses for watching videos.

These cutscenes are found in almost every free game, as this approach has the advantage of being easy to place. The developer connects to one of the advertising networks (AdMod, AdColony, Google Ads and others), selects the appropriate price range, and the site does the rest: it finds advertisers, adds ads to the app, and collects analytics by her.

To motivate users to watch more ads, they make them rewarded ads. For viewing give in-game bonuses: lives, currency, items. They make the gameplay a little easier, and absolutely free, which encourages play on.

The number of downloads of your game in the App Store or Google Play directly affects your earnings. The more people download the app, the higher the income will be. The rating of the application also depends on the number of downloads, so the higher it is, the more downloads.

It is important to understand that your first project may not work. But doing everything for this is definitely worth it.

What to do next

So, you have studied hyper-casual games, created your own, tested it and put it on different platforms for download. What to do now?

To further develop in gamedev, you need to constantly improve your skills: study new technologies and tools, take online courses and connect with game developer communities to learn about new industry trends.

Regularly release game updates with improvements and improvements. How to do this, for example, you can read in instructions from Google.

Also respond to comments in stores and improve communication with your audience. To do this, you can create a community on Discord, where you will post the latest updates and improvements to the application or conduct polls about what the game is missing.

Moreover, you can look for publishing companies to try to promote your game further. If they like your idea, they can run a small advertising campaign at their own expense and give you feedback. For example, offer a contract if the audience liked the game, or say what it lacks and whether it is worth trying to work on another project.

And a short but important tip: don't be afraid to try and bring your ideas to life. The market for mobile applications is growing and changing, and perhaps it is you who will have to bring something new to the gaming world.