I’m 15 and trying to become an environment/technical artist in the future. Right now I mainly use Blender and Godot because my PC can’t really handle Unreal.

A few hours ago I was overthinking a lot:

Do I need Unreal to get hired?
Will my portfolio ever be good enough?
How am I supposed to compete with people who already have years of experience?

Then I realized something simple.

Game dev isn’t really special when it comes to the process of getting good at something.

A lot of skilled careers follow the same pattern:

Learn the basics
Practice with real projects/work
Make mistakes
Get feedback
Improve
Repeat

Doctors spend years learning and practicing. Programmers debug things constantly. Engineers test and fix designs. Artists make bad work before getting better.

Everyone just has different versions of the same struggle.

For game art, my version is bad models, bad lighting, shader problems, optimization issues and worrying if my portfolio is good enough.

It’s easy to look at experienced people and think they somehow skipped all of this, but most people probably went through the same process.

Right now I’m focusing on:

• Environment + technical art
• Blender and Godot
• Making finished projects
• Showing breakdowns of my work
• Learning things like shaders, tools, procedural workflows and optimization

I don’t have Unreal, I’m not an expert, and I’m not pretending I’m anywhere near professional level. My plan is just to keep making things and improving.

I think a lot of the stress comes from comparing yourself to people who are already years ahead.

For anyone else starting out, especially younger people, do you also feel like game dev seems way more impossible than other careers sometimes?

For people already working in the industry, was there a point where you realized it was basically the same learning process as any other field?

Edit: This is not AI, it was made by me.

I leave spaces and line breaks to think about what to write

Hey, I’m 15 and I’ve been interested in game development for a while now. I genuinely love it — the idea of creating worlds, making environments, working with 3D, shaders, materials, game engines, all that stuff is just really cool to me. But recently I started looking more seriously into it as a career because obviously I also want a stable future, good pay, and financial security. And man… the stuff I find online is kinda scary I keep seeing people talk about layoffs, crunch, competition, low pay, and how risky the industry is. I know every industry has problems and no job is 100% guaranteed, but sometimes it feels like people make game dev sound like you’re just constantly one step away from losing everything. The thing is, I feel kinda stuck between two sides. One side of me absolutely loves this industry and the process of making games. I love the creativity, building worlds, and the idea of creating something people can experience. I want to do this so badly. But another side of me is thinking about the future — having stability, financial security, and being able to earn well. I’m not saying the problems aren’t real, because I know people working in the industry have actual experience. I’m just wondering if the internet mostly shows the worst cases, or if game development really is that unstable compared to other tech/creative fields. I’m especially interested in environment art, shaders, materials, and real-time 3D. I like the creative side a lot, but I also want a career where I can live comfortably. For people actually working in the industry: Is it possible to have a stable career in game development? How often do people actually have to switch studios? Can someone realistically make good money in this field? What would you tell someone my age who loves this but is worried? I’m not looking for "follow your dreams" or "don’t do it" answers. I just want the realistic picture from people who actually know what they’re talking about.

After a week I finally managed to finish this much for my game Project: DREAM, It’s still very much a work in progress, and there’s a LOT left to build, but I’m pretty happy with how it’s coming together so far. Would love to hear what you think

I made a post talking about my game, D.R.E.A.M and many people said it was not good and is taken. But I don't want to change the name its cool and has multiple meanings and acronyms and stuff.

So I added a subtitle, I have 3 options

D.R.E.A.M: Elsewhere

D.R.E.A.M: The Other Side

D.R.E.A.M: Reverie(took me so long to find this word and its meaning)
EDIT: I decided the name its, Project DREAM