Game statistics planned beforehand: How long would it take you to complete?

[Snake]

I recently played Bicilotti's hour game, The Firebird Island. I suggest you download and play it if you haven't. He says it's crap, but it's actually quite fun!
It is in the style of a CYOA book, which appealed instantly to me since I love those books and any game that plays like them. I was amazed that, even though there were a few spelling mistakes, one bug (which I found anyway) and one nit-picky thing of mine (Display command being used when I felt all text should have been on the "page" like everything else), he still managed to get a little story and multiple branches all done in an hour.
Like I told him on IRC, it would take me the entire hour just to think of and decide on what I was going to make. Which is why I never join such events.

But anyway...

See? I can never just ask a question. I told him over an hour ago, when I asked for permission to link to his game's download, that I was posting a thread in a few minutes. Gah.

This game of his inspired me to make a small CYOA style game out of a little CYOA book I made when I was a kid!
So I found the book and read it through. I figured, it needs a little fixing up but I've got a pretty good visual of what this game would look like and play like.

This was the first time I sat down and figured out how many of "this and that" I will need. What I've done in the past was make the graphics and animations as I need them and go back later on to add more. But it felt pretty good to get it all down on paper and see it.

So here are the statistics as they are at the moment:
14 BGs
23 Sprites
37 Animations
* I haven't thought of how I will handle branches yet, so I'll hold off on GUIs/hotspots/objects for now.
Also, these numbers aren't concrete at the moment since I may add a little more or decide I don't need something after all.
Come to think about it I forgot to count up how many sounds I will need. SFX will undoubtedly be one of the last things I do anyway.

The game will be in 320x240 resolution. All graphics (with the exception of sprites) will be scanned and then finished in MS Paint. The style of the graphics are somewhat cartoony, but not silly. There will also be a small bit of shading involved as well. 

I'm going to pretty much keep the branches the same, but it is in need of a fix here and there. So instead of doing a complete copy of the pages, it'll take me a little extra time to think of what I want to put in place of the actions/branches I take out.

It's a simple game. There will be no items, inventory, puzzles or dialogue.
Only branches made by the choices you make and animations to go with what you are reading.
And of course, basic scripting.

So with the given statistics and above info, how long would such a game take you to create into a fairly polished product ready for play?

With distractions? (kids, work, etc...)
Without distractions?

With or without distractions is completely up to you, being that everyone's home environment is different.

Also, how many of you plan the statistics out beforehand?

[Baron]

So here are the statistics as they are at the moment:
14 BGs
23 Sprites
37 Animations


So with the given statistics and above info, how long would such a game take you to create into a fairly polished product ready for play?

With distractions? (kids, work, etc...)
Without distractions?

Also, how many of you plan the statistics out beforehand?

Are distractions (kids, work...) optional?

It's truly hard to say how long it might take, as everything is contingent on the level of detail.  Is this a 320x200 game, or something high res?  Are you doing bitmap graphics or vector drawings?  Realistic style or cartoony?  Shading or flat colours?  Etc., etc.

But since you ask how long it would take me, I'll hazard an estimate.  I've been keeping track of my time spent on projects lately so that I can plan better, and I've become quite a bit better at it over the last year or so.  But, since I believe that work should only take as long as the time available for it, meeting my self-imposed deadlines might just mean I've sacrificed quality for predictable productivity.

14 backgrounds = 14 nights.  For me a night can be anywhere from 2-4 hours, depending on the health of my daughter and how much sleep I think I can get away without.  I never have the will to do anymore drawing after a background, but the thrill of finishing a BG usually gives me enough momentum to import it into AGS and set up the room so that I can test my character in it.

23 sprites = 12 hours if they are already sketched (even modestly) or at least rough models (pictures, etc.) already gathered.  So this would run me another 3-6 nights, depending.  Again, just like for backgrounds, I don't attempt a style that might be "above my level" because I know it will exponentially add to time spent.  On the other hand, if you don't have a good idea of what these things should look like, the time spent could easily double/triple. 

37 animations = 74 hours (very dependent on style, though).  Truthfully, most of my animations nowadays take 1 or 2 hours, but something complex (like a fighting yoda) or something that will be seen a lot (like a walkcycle) will take me several nights (10 hours min.).  If you can recycle most of a sprite each time that will really speed things up, but redrawing entire sprites, while rewarding to look at if done properly, really takes a lot of time.  So just a moving hand to "take" something I'd budget at 1/2 hr., but a bending over to pick something up could take 2hrs because of the body contortions. 

So graphically I have your game coming in at 128 honest work hours (distractions not included), or approximately 43 nights (at 3 hours a night).  Coding, debugging, importing, fiddling, music, sounds, dialogs, etc. etc. not included.

The depressing thing is, I would never have done some of (what I would consider to be) my better AGS work had I conducted this kind of exercise prior to plunging in.  Sometimes it's better not to know.  But as time becomes more of a precious commodity I find it helpful to know that what I've undertaken is feasible in a reasonable amount of time -otherwise, I probably wouldn't start at all now.  The best advice I could give you if you truly want to know ahead of time how much work will go into a project is to start keeping track of your time.  With each drawing you will gain a greater understanding of how long something will take you to do.  Since only you work like you, anyone else's estimates will only be rough approximations.

[LUniqueDan]

Welcome to the procrastination evaluation thread.

My answer is : 5 years. 
Cheerz

[monkey0506]

Using my own unpublished Finite State Machine module (unreleased primarily because of lack of enthusiasm over HeirOfNorton's version, despite what I perceive to be "improvements" ), if the graphics were already done I could do this in an evening.

If you're interested I could send you the script, complete with documentation and a demo..which I've had sitting on my hard drive for..a couple years or so. : But don't worry, I review it frequently only to wonder why I haven't ever uploaded it..meaning, it's up-to-date.

The basic idea would be that I would implement each "branch" as you put it as a state in a machine, and then whatever user input would be required in the form of a selection would be used as the transition between the states. Done.

[Snake]

Welcome to the procrastination evaluation thread.

My answer is : 5 years.  
Cheerz

If you knew me well you would have guessed at least twice that : Bottom's up!

Baron, I knew I forgot something (even though I read it and edited it a hundred times before I posted it). I've edited my post:
The game will be in 320x240 resolution. All graphics (with the exception of sprites) will be scanned and then finished in MS Paint. The style of the graphics are somewhat cartoony, but not silly. There will also be a small bit of shading involved as well.

Also, the distractions are dependent on your surroundings. Thanks for the response! I loved reading it!

I ask because a lot of you out there, unlike me, can throw together decent games with barely any time to think about it.
I would guess a week, maybe two for some of you to do what I am visualizing for this game. If I was under pressure, for say, MAGS, I could see possibly completing it within time. Maybe.

Monkey, I would like to take a look at it. It sounds very interesting, though I will be doing the branching myself

[Wyz]

Like I told him on IRC, it would take me the entire hour just to think of and decide on what I was going to make. Which is why I never join such events.

That's exactly the reason why you should enter them! During the hourgames you learn to stop thinking and tap directly into your creative mind. You need to let it all happen, and be confident that you're creative enough to make something great (and I know you are, I've seen some of your work).

It is a state of mind really, I a hopeless perfectionist and if I would think to much I would do work over and over and over and never get further that one room. So I have to tell myself I don't care about it till it's finished. There is always room to tweak things (not recreate) when you're game is finished, but it should be finished. Let the people that play test it judge it. Changes are the things that would bother you are actually not picked up by the crowd and are fine the way they were to start with.

To only thing left to procrastinate then is on the revised version, I have still two games in that state 

Ow btw, for a really easy method to implement a FSM in AGS I would just make a room for every state and use the 'after fade in' event to start dialog etc, and  the ChangeRoom function to branch.

[theo]

So I have to tell myself I don't care about it till it's finished. There is always room to tweak things (not recreate) when you're game is finished, but it should be finished. Let the people that play test it judge it. Changes are the things that would bother you are actually not picked up by the crowd and are fine the way they were to start with.

Amen! The tweak trap is a dangerous one! It is always more comfortable spending time remaking things you aren't content with, instead of actually finishing the stuff you haven't even begun work on. I'm certain this kills very many projects in their infancy. If you can focus on just finishing everything you have set out to do, instead of falling in the tweak trap over and over again, you'll find that you can do amazingly much in a very short time!

Regarding time estimation, the one thing I learned is that nothing takes up so much time as animation. So ask yourself if you truly need all 37 of them or if you through some nifty trick could reuse several of them and thus require less animations. It will save you lots of time and help you avoid loads of unnecessary headache (a good example would be: make sure your character can be mirrored so all char animations can be used for both left and right without being redone.)

[Baron]

I agree with Theo's point about planning -the easiest way to winnow down the work load is to trim unnecessary work in the planning process.  A few clever short cuts, like mirror-able sprites or recyclable poses (reaching pose gets added to dance animation, for example), can really cut down on work.  Also a well-placed message or single picture cut-screen can still enrich the gaming experience without the intensive man-hours required by animation.

Having said that, you seem to have put a lot of thought into the project already and you thought the game would be richer for the 37 animations.  I don't  think 130 odd hours is an unreasonable amount of time to spend illustrating what will be a medium length game.  Pixelating sprites in MSPaint from scanned images is a bit of a pain (I'd monochrome the scans first, then switch back to your proper colour depth to save "cleaning", if possible), so that might increase that portion of the work load.  But already having a good idea of what you're doing will save all kinds of "Waffle Time", as I call it.  Also, with small sprites to animate at 320x200 you should have no problem keeping work times down with a little discipline (i.e. avoiding Theo's "Tweak Trap").  Furthermore, the funny thing about animation is that the more you do it, the faster you get (especially when it is the same character), so the marginal cost of doing more animation is less for each additional animation.

The only way I'm coming out of this with a sense of closure is for you to make the game and then report back your actual work hours.  The rest of us will start up a pool via PMs to make it interesting.