   How much time do you have?
  I like game programming, even though I may not be all that good at it. But when I have a full time job, and live on my own, I have to cook / clean for myself, do laundry, get groceries, etc etc. plus excercise and see my friends once in a while, theres really not much time left for game stuff. Maybe half an hour a day, plus a few hours on weekends. That really doesnt cut it. It would take years to learn how and make a simple tetris clone at that rate. My question is, for all those people out there that have really cool game demos, and don''t do it for a living, how do you find the time?  Are you super fat? Are you antisocial? Both? Once in a while, theres a thread asking people how old they are. Everyone always replies saying they''re 13 or something crazy like that. So mabye that''s it? Is everyone still living with their parents, and therefore have TONS of free time? 
  I''m at university, so I guesss it doesn''t count. I''m living on campus, and have a ton of free time. But if/when I get on the job market, I''ll use the time = money equation. Reduce your luxury spendings, get a smaller appartment, or something, and get a part-time job instead of full time (or take a sabatical). Then you''ll have a lot more time.I don''t see earning a lot of money as an accomplishment in itself.Cédric ;  I''m 19, and I''ve been programming in my spare time for quite a while. Going to school or having a 9-5 job is about the same (and I''ve done both), so I guess I can comment.I''m not really anti-social, but I don''t have lots of friends and we don''t hang out much (during highschool we did, but then everybody moved off so we''re not in the same city very often any more). Most of the talking we do is through ventrilo, a voice comm program. It''s fairly easy to talk and program at almost the same time (single processor multitasking, just like windows. beware of crash =-), and taking a break every few hours to play a game for a while isn''t too bad. I also don''t do any exercising, but I''m not really fat (overweight, yeah, but not fat). Cooking for me consists of 5-10 minutes over the oven warming up something that is precooked (like frozen hamburger) or fixing something that doesn''t take long (macaroni and cheese is a staple of my diet). I''m lucky enough to live with my parents, and they are kind enough to do my laundry so that doesn''t take any of my time usually (but I do it sometimes, and really it doesn''t take that long). Grocery shopping takes almost no time when you eat a "healthy college student''s diet" - just go down 2-3 aisles and randomly pick stuff from them (I wouldn''t shop for myself either except that my parents and siblings are always on various diets and I''d rather eat good tasting food than be overly healthy).I really don''t get much programming done at all, but I''ve always had plenty of time to do so. I don''t have a cool game demo either, but I''m more concerned with learning about various things than making a cool demo. My current project is a Lisp interpreter which will probably be the scripting language I use in any games I make (I can''t stand the other choices like Lua or Python, so I figured I might as well make my own =-). ;  I'm in the same situation as you Andre.  I have a full time job and have about one hour each day to get into it.  That's just about enough time to open up my project, find out what I have to do and then quickly write a few lines and comments, and then quit.  It's really not enough at all.  Yes, I've tried to cut it off my sleep time, but it didn't work.  Thanks for asking that question, I'm interested to know what solution some people have found.I recently purchased a Pocket PC and have been looking for a C++ compiler so I could do some stuff when I'm traveling, but can't find a C++ compiler, only C.[EDIT]I wouldn't consider a 9-5 job the same as school.  When I was at school, I had PLENTY of spare time.  Only having 5 courses a day (non on Friday) and being able to finish the homework between classes was easy.   [edited by - Rob Loach on February 5, 2004 1:15:59 PM];  I find it hard to believe that you can''t find time somewhere in there.I have a full-time job, a terrific social life (can''t program on the weekends), a wife and kid, a good-sized house and 2 pets to take care of. I do all the yard work, car work, much of the cleaning of the house, I find time to exercise, spend quality time with my loved ones and meet new people and I *STILL* find time to program and play games.You just have to prioritize. Spend one day cleaning the house and taking care of chores, so the next day you can spend several hours coding or playing games. Do you exercise 7 days a week? That''s not necessary, 3 days a week should allow you to keep up a decent physique. Do you have an apartment and just one car? That means no yard to take care of, no garage to keep clean, probably no pets to feed/water/love, no extra cars to fix and maintain, no kids that need help with their homework.Heck, you find time to post here, don''t you? Find time to surf the internet? How do you make time for that? Replace some or all ''surf time'' with programming. ;quote:Original post by Rick Scott   I find it hard to believe that you can't find time somewhere in there.I have a full-time job, a terrific social life (can't program on the weekends), a wife and kid, a good-sized house and 2 pets to take care of. I do all the yard work, car work, much of the cleaning of the house, I find time to exercise, spend quality time with my loved ones and meet new people and I *STILL* find time to program and play games.You just have to prioritize. Spend one day cleaning the house and taking care of chores, so the next day you can spend several hours coding or playing games. Do you exercise 7 days a week? That's not necessary, 3 days a week should allow you to keep up a decent physique. Do you have an apartment and just one car? That means no yard to take care of, no garage to keep clean, probably no pets to feed/water/love, no extra cars to fix and maintain, no kids that need help with their homework.Heck, you find time to post here, don't you? Find time to surf the internet? How do you make time for that? Replace some or all 'surf time' with programming.   Wow, I envy you Rick.  I only have about a total of three hours a day free (during the week).  Those I give to eating/cooking, preparing for the next day, etc.  Weekends?  I'm usually socializing, or sleeping.[EDIT]I only surf the internet when I'm waiting for something to come my way when I'm at work. [edited by - Rob Loach on February 5, 2004 1:19:55 PM];  I would have to agree that school is nothing like work. School is a vacation comapred to work. Everyone always says "yeah, but when youre done work at 5:00, your done", meaning there is no homework or junk like that. But even if you add up all the homework time and class time, youre still only puttin in 4 or 5 hours a day, tops, when going to school. Thats what I find anyway. Its only about half as much time as a job. I guess I do need to prioritize some more. Thanks for the replys! Keep em coming. ;  I''m in the same boat too.  But I work 4 10-hour days with an hour round-trip commute (which leaves little time at all during  on those days for much more than getting home and walking the dog).  I generally, eat at a friends house one night a week and play raquetball or go out one other night.  To be able to do that I often work 11,11,8,10.  So the two 11-hour nights really leave me little time.  I can generally spend and hour or two doing something, but don''t find that I''m very productive at programming after a long day of work.  Plus the later I work cuts into my sleep time and makes time even more cramped (or me less productive) the rest of the week.BUT, the 4-day week is great!  It gives me one whole extra day to do something.  Lately, I often spend a day at friends and a day programming.  Then the extra day I can do house cleaning/whatever and still do some more programming if I want.  But even that doesn''t feel like much time to me.  I''m always feeling that the project is moving too slow.  But I often "waste" time here or playing games (it''s research!!).  So I think I can improve a little.If you can work an adjusted work week, you might look into that.  For me it helps gather all my few hours each night into one whole day.   Tadd- WarbleWare ;  I could have written the same post myself!  I have a full time job with a 45-minute commute each way.  My job is in software, so that allows me to do a certain amount of research while I''m there.  In the evening I''m working on a second degree and running a small (microscopic) business.  On the weekends, I spend the days with my daughter.  Add that to keeping a reasonably decent home and the general day-to-days, and there''s not alot of time left for anything else.  When I do squeeze something in, it''s generally late at night.  Last night was very productive, but I didn''t sleep.  The biggest problem with this is that it will work for the first 80% but not the second 80%, iykwim.  It''s one thing to get a proof-of-concept up that has some eye candy or elegant data structure, but debugging and getting the project to a 1.0 state has been impossible for me so far.  This is partly due to the fact that good debugging takes patience and attention, two things that are in short supply in the wee hours of the morning. I find this topic very interesting, a little depressing, but at least it''s not just me.  One final note, not to bring on the sugar coating, but don''t let it get you down.  At least you get the tetris clone in the end. ;  No social life here.  But I''m forcing myself to finish my game; if I can make some decent stuff (and I think I can), maybe I can sustain myself making shareware games. I''ll worry about a social life later  Just so you know where I''m coming from, I also have a full time job, and live on my own. I''ll fit in 1 - 4 hours of coding a night, and try to have productive weekends too. Occasinally give myself a day off if I''m feeling burnt out  Jesus saves ... the rest of you take damage."A page of history is worth a volume of logic." -- Oliver Wendell Holmes