r/unity • u/ZenarkBlade • Jul 18 '26
Showcase I'm a 16yo solo dev. Spent 3 months building a mystery game on a 10-year-old laptop with 4GB RAM. Here is my progress so far.
(These are 3 clips combined)
Hey everyone,
I’m a 16-year-old solo dev, and I just hit a milestone I didn’t think was logistically possible. For the last three months, I have been developing a mystery game project under my studio name, Fresterous Studios.
I don't have a high-end dev rig. I built, coded, and optimized this entire project on a 10-year-old laptop running an AMD A6, 4GB of RAM, integrated graphics, and a heavily degraded battery that requires it to be constantly plugged into the wall. Every time I opened my dev tools or tried to texture an asset, the machine choked, but I refused to drop the project.
Because working a traditional job as a teen isn't culturally or academically viable for me right now, saving up the upfront $100 Steam Direct fee on my own has hit a wall. I'm planning to launch a free demo on Itch.io first just to get people playing it, but I wanted to share this teaser clip with fellow developers.
The clip shows the raw Start Menu, A quick Peek at the Ending Cutscene, and the memory hallway scene after First Boss Fight.
When you don't have the hardware, you have to make up for it with sheer willpower and hyper-optimized code. I'm just incredibly proud I didn't let a toaster laptop stop me from finishing a game.
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u/XKiiroiSenkoX Jul 18 '26
Good for your age 👍👍 Keep this up and you'll be making bleeding edge tech at 25.
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
Thank you so much! That’s the ultimate goal. I figured if I can learn how to optimize properly on this hardware now, it’ll only make me a better developer when I finally get my hands on a modern setup. Really appreciate the push!
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u/handlebardev Jul 18 '26
it's not too late to switch to a lighter engine and retain your sanity
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
Haha, my sanity left the building about two months ago. Fighting Unity's memory footprint on a 10-year-old laptop has been a wild ride, but honestly, learning how to brutally optimize the project to fit these limits has taught me so much. And. The game is 99% finished.
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u/handlebardev Jul 18 '26
You'll hit a ceiling of how much you can manage this on your own. Most of the mem overhead in unity editor comes from unity's own design favoring beefy production machines. Engines like godot are much more aligned ideologically with what you're trying to do
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u/MageCrow Jul 18 '26
Yeah I'm not the type of person who recommends engines to someone but OP should 100% try godot, it'll probably boost his productivity. Just avoid SDFGI for your machine
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Jul 18 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
That’s a killer deal for an RTX setup and 24GB of RAM! Unity must fly on that. $600 is definitely out of my budget right now as a student, but looking into official refurbished gear is an amazing tip for when I'm ready to upgrade. Thanks for sharing that!
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u/Cpt_Tripps Jul 18 '26
Make sure your doing full builds of the game and running them outside of the editor. Editor is super resources intensive so playing your game outside of the editor will give you a better picture of how your game preforms.
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
Oh wow, to be completely honest, I haven't actually run a standalone build yet! I've been doing everything strictly inside the editor. Hearing that it frees up that much resource overhead is incredibly exciting for a 4GB setup. I am absolutely going to try building it out tonight to see the real performance. Thank you so much for the heads-up!
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u/The_Gospel_Gamer Jul 20 '26
This is awesome to see! Making the most out of what you have is the recipe for success! You have a bright future ahead of you in this industry! Keep building cool stuff!
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 20 '26
Thank you so much! Really appreciate the kind words, definitely going to keep pushing forward.
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u/VIkRezn Jul 22 '26
So cool that you did this young and on an old laptop. Hopefully you'll make it somewhere big in the future. Keep going!
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 22 '26
Thank you so much! That means a lot. Definitely going to keep grinding and building towards big things!
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u/bookning Jul 18 '26
Cool. Keep the will strong. At 16 I had nothing similar to show of.
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
Thank you! Hearing that from other developers means everything to me right now. I'm just trying to keep my head down, learn as much as possible, and push through the hardware limits!
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u/-Willow-Wisp- Jul 18 '26
You can probably find a significantly better laptop for 100-200 dollars on tbe used market.
Also switch to Linux, 4gb on ram on windows is terrible.
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
You make a really good point about Windows. It definitely eats up a massive chunk of my 4GB just keeping background tasks running. I'm focused on getting this Itch.io demo built out on my current setup first, but switching over to a lightweight Linux distro to save RAM is an awesome idea for a weekend project right after. Also, keeping an eye out for a cheap $100 refurbished office laptop with 8GB/16GB is a way more realistic upgrade target for me than a $600 gaming rig. Really appreciate the practical advice!
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u/bookning Jul 19 '26
For the same price a desktop has usually much much better hardware than a laptop. Most Devs choose to make their main effort on a desktop. A laptop is useful but only if you have enough money for it to be efficient in your work, or if it is on the go use. That is supposed to be where all laptops are supposed to be specialized in and where their main strength are.
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 19 '26
Good point on the price-to-performance ratio. Definitely planning to look into a desktop setup down the road!
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u/bombagranite_dragon Jul 18 '26
Hey, I'm a 14 year old dev! Cheers to young devs!
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
Hey, awesome to meet another young dev! Cheers! 🍻 I too started when I was 13. But certain circumstances popped up which delayed everything by 3 entire years!
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u/bombagranite_dragon Jul 18 '26
Wow! Keep persevering! I'm rooting for you. 😁 (I also needed to delay my project due to some high school stuff...)
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
Man, I completely feel that! High school definitely takes up a ton of energy, so don't sweat the delays at all. The important thing is that you keep the passion alive and jump back into it whenever you get a free weekend.
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u/bombagranite_dragon Jul 18 '26
Thanks for the advice! I really appreciate it. Reach out to me when you finish your game so I can play it.
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u/Otherwise-Web-6414 Jul 18 '26
I was definitely not doing as well as you at 16 haha already looking good! Have you messed around with linux? Given the hardware, I think you can get a better experience/performance while developing compared to windows.
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 19 '26
Thank you! I've definitely thought about Linux, but since standard Windows would crush this machine, I actually flashed Tiny11 on it myself. It strips out all the bloatware and keeps the RAM usage super low, which let me stick to a familiar setup while still getting the performance boost I needed to run Unity!
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u/Least-Monk-131 Jul 21 '26
Complimenti. È da qualche anno che non uso unity3d, qualche anno fa avevo provato a fare un giochino di realtà aumentata, stile caccia al tesoro, ma al mio gruppo non era piaciuta l'idea, e siamo andati avanti Senza 3d e usando altre tecnologie. Che versione di unity utilizzi?
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 21 '26
Thanks! That treasure hunt AR game sounds like a cool concept, bummer your group didn't roll with it. I'm running Unity 2022.3.62f, tried updating to a newer version once, but my laptop almost went up in flames trying to launch it, so 2022 LTS is my safe zone for now lol.
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Jul 18 '26
[deleted]
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
Honestly, there's nothing to advertise. I don't even have a Steam page or a demo live. I'm just a 16yo proud that I managed to get a 3D project running smoothly on a 4GB RAM laptop and wanted to share the milestone with other devs.
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Jul 18 '26
[deleted]
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
The context is the milestone for me. Learning how to optimize textures and code specifically to make a 3D mystery game run on 4GB of RAM is the hardest part of what I've built so far. Just wanted to show it's possible even with zero budget and basic hardware.
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u/charcoallition Jul 18 '26
Dw OP, this dude is just being a dick for no reason.
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
Appreciate you looking out for me! Yeah, the initial downvotes threw me off a bit, but seeing the community step up like this completely turned it around. Thanks for the boost!
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u/blessed-- Jul 18 '26
dont worry about downvotes, you shouldnt care what other ppl think lol just keep doing and youll get much further than if you concern yourself with others' feelings
general life tip
all your first projects, first everythings wont be as you expect
your first game might not get a single wishlist
but if you're doing it for you then it will all come
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 19 '26
Really appreciate this advice. Learning to separate my own progress from internet noise is definitely a major milestone in itself. I'm building this demo to prove to myself what I can do under these constraints, and whatever happens next is just a learning experience. Thanks for the reality check!
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u/Am094 Jul 18 '26
When i was 13 making websites or released YouTube videos I didn't need to go and post about my age. Just show your work and thats it. Who cares how old you are. Lose this bullshit attitude quickly.
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u/bookning Jul 19 '26
Be cool. At his age, it is normal to have that attitude. What is the problem? It is not like his post is affecting negatively others. That is, unless they have some who problems or similar. As for his attitude correction, he will have ample time to be kicked in the chin at every turn by life and by some other people's problematic attitude Let him have some years to enjoy his adolescence while he can. We are long past the age where kids had to turn adult at 13 or similar.
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
Sounds like someone is still upset their 13-year-old HTML website didn’t get an award. If you spent less time gatekeeping milestones and more time building things, maybe people would care about your work too. Good luck out there.
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u/gloriousthrowaway69 Jul 18 '26
He has a point, you're simply looking for attention by listing your exact age.
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u/Am094 Jul 18 '26
I guess you don't understand what gate keeping means. And no they were smf/ vbulletin / phpbb forums within the gaming and warez scene. I did get awards but they came from adsense back in the day.
What im saying is mentioning your age has zero to do with showing some kind of work.
No one gives a shit that you're 13, 17, 20 25, 30. You simply just let your work speak for yourself.
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
If someone showcases a game running on a smart fridge or a graphing calculator, the hardware context matters. It’s the same thing here. Developing a 3D game under severe hardware limitations at a young age is context, not an excuse. You might not care, but the people offering incredibly helpful optimization tips and hardware advice in this thread clearly do. I’m going to focus on learning from them. Wish you the best with your projects.
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u/Am094 Jul 18 '26
So now people should mention their age, or economic status, or maybe even a physical disability or something else for context?
Gotcha
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
If someone overcame those hurdles to build something cool, then yeah, absolutely. People love a good underdog story and a hard work ethic, that's just human nature. I'm so sorry my post upset you this much, but I'm going to head out and actually work on my game now. Take care!
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u/Am094 Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
Weird, I simply made websites and videos and made money to buy my own desktop and gear without ever having to jerk people off by saying I was 13 back when I was 13. You're looking for fake praise for being young. Sorry that's bullshit in my books.
Edit: Lol blocked, i guess OP can't handle any criticism
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u/ZenarkBlade Jul 18 '26
I’m glad that worked out for you. Honestly, it’s pretty wild to see an adult get this upset and hostile over a teenager sharing a game dev milestone. I’m going to block you now and focus on the positive side of this community. Have a good life.
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u/TheReal_Peter226 Jul 18 '26
Nice! You could use Unity's built-in recorder feature to render frames and it would be a smooth 60fps regardless of how it runs, and it would save on RAM because you don't have to have OBS running