Blog Post 9: Course Reflection



Looking back at it all, I think the best thing I could've learned from this class is just how important iteration is. You can't cut corners, and being an illustrator aiming to do polished work for a studio one day, you really can't cut corners. People notice, and you'll get fired fast.

To compare it loosely to my presentation (which subject-wise isn't related to illustration at all) speeedrunners are only able to get to where they are by practice, and by perfecting through practice. Though I suppose "perfecting" isn't the right word here. Rather, each iteration, be it speedrunning a game or designing a game, you can't just expect your first go at it to be spot-on. If anything, it's going to be terrible, amateur, and nothing unlike what other people have done already. It takes iteration to push a creator past their comfort zone and past the surface of an idea, to get to the nuggets of potential within. It is by no means easy, it takes self-awareness for someone to know they have to make the effort to push until they really find the spark to their project.

The people who made the most polished games were the people who pushed through and made it their mission to overcome the obstacles to make a viable product. Nothing comes easy, not video games, not drawing, not even just basic rule building for a board game. Its kinda funny, this whole course can just be summed up as "do honest work" and there's something poetic about it.

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