Hi everybody. I am currently in the process of learning XNA, and for information purposes, I can't create anything more than a good pong game ATM. I am only posting this thread to ask from your experience, and opinions, on the time consumption it can take for a few games. Keep in mind that I know it varies depending on how much content is going into the game, and how many hours a day you're actually working on it.



1. For those who are able to create side-scrollers and platform games, such as mario, how long would it take to create something like a 10 level game? Where all you have is a background, blocks to jump on and jump into, coins, enemys, etc.


2. Could one person, who is not exactly a 10 year programmer, but somewhat experienced (say, above rookie status), create an entire Mario clone by themselves within a reasonable timespan with todays technology? (XNA speaking ONLY) Also, what about the originial Zelda game with bad graphics and simple screen-to-screen gameplay? Can one person achieve such a feat by themselves in a reasonable time?



Thank you anyone who gives their input. It is highly appreciated.



Mark G

Hi Mark!

1. For those who are able to create side-scrollers and platform games, such as mario, how long would it take to create something like a 10 level game? Where all you have is a background, blocks to jump on and jump into, coins, enemys, etc.

Depending on the framework used, and the effort put into graphics, it can be done in a matter of hours.
I remember spending time after school coding small projects in the computer rooms, and a graphically minimalistic platform game with regular physics and collision detection,
stupid enemies etc would be done in less than a day. It really depends on the speed of your fingers, and if you already thought out the design already.
Sitting in class i would have thought up a simple structure. Game contains level, level contains a map of tiles, and starting point of player and monsters.
Then you basically "just" implement that. But i had already been programming for 10 years back then.

Coming from being able to develop no more than pong (and not passing any basic design principles aside from the one you just went through), it's still difficult to say how
long you would spend on a simple platformer. Have you learned about object based or -oriented design? Are you able to program certain things fast?
Are you able to draw sprites and (animated) tilemaps rather than only primitives (as needed by pong)?

2. Could one person, who is not exactly a 10 year programmer, but somewhat experienced (say, above rookie status), create an entire Mario clone by themselves within a reasonable timespan with todays technology? (XNA speaking ONLY) Also, what about the originial Zelda game with bad graphics and simple screen-to-screen gameplay? Can one person achieve such a feat by themselves in a reasonable time?

Bad graphics?... I don't know, but it likely took several months for many people just to make the original Zelda game.
Define reasonable time. If you've been programming every day for just a month, you'd still be able to pull of some feats, where somebody who's been programming on and off
for a year might be clueless about developing a simple game. From i first began to program till i was able to do a simple multiscreen game (that was a pac-man clone), it took 6 years.
So I'd like to know a little more. On how you progress in that course of yours.