John Romero Says Stop “Waiting For Permission” To Make Games

John Romero has been offering advice to aspiring indie developers, mainly with the message that they need to stop “waiting for permission” to make games and just make them. A sentiment that we are more than happy to spread.

Romero’s talk at GDC was called “Back to the Garage: The Return of Indie Development (From Those Who Were There and Some Who’ve Just Arrived)” so from that you can grasp the angle he is coming from. Romero began making games in his own time, he just got a few things together that he had to hand and just went for it with a few like-minded fellows. What he ended up creating was Wolfenstein 3D, DOOM and Quake, amongst others of course.

Romero thinks this mentality needs to be brought back into the development scene these days as so many aspire to make games but ultimately procrastinate instead of just going for it. He goes on to say that people justify it by thinking they need to go to school to learn how to make games when they don’t.

“I talk to a lot of people who want to become indie and want to make games and I guess the biggest thing I find when I talk to these people is that they are usually waiting for permission to make games for some reason,” said Romero. “Like ‘I need to get into school to learn how to do this, and then when I get out I will get a job’ instead of ‘hey, you’ve got a computer and get some books – all the information is right there.”

“There’s the self learning thing and also the people who already have jobs…but they’ve just got too much stuff going on. Find some other people you can [develop] with in the same location. That’s the way a lot of us started here; we just made games because we wanted to or we had to… when I was at home, it was all about making games.”

He’s got a point and it’s one that is being spread with the Pirate Kart as is outlined on its official website. If you want to make games, there are plenty of free tools out there and let’s not forget, there is no right or wrong way to make a game. There are bad and better ways of course, but you need to get out there and start discovering what you can create rather then hoping someone will tell you how to do it, or until you have some funding or become desperate enough to begin making games.

Just make games and then tell people about them – that’s the best way to learn.

Via PC Gamer