 Once upon a time, long before the current era of indie video game successes, one man wanted to try his hand at making his own game. Daisuka Amaya, known better by his online username, Pixel, didn't set out to create a gaming icon. He had no intention of revolutionising small-team video games, or of revitalising an ageing game design style. Yet somewhere along the five years that Pixel spent playing around with his little game project Cave Story, that's exactly what he did. Daisuka Amaya didn't have any lofty ambitions in life. He was working hard at school, studying computer programming, with the hopes of one day getting a standard office job and living a fairly simple life. Pixel, as he became known online, enjoyed experimenting in his free time. He loved drawing, although he was very well aware that his skills were limited, and he enjoyed making music. He also loved video games. So when a friend of his, who lived in the dorm building at school, showed off what he was doing to make his own computer game, Pixel was seriously impressed. He convinced his friend to teach him how to program video games, and spent hours listening to everything he had to say. After a lot of thought, Pixel decided that just for fun, he was going to make his own video game, inspired by the classic titles that he'd played when he was younger, but building on the basic formula in order to create a more nuanced, story-driven experience. Because programming and animating a modern 3D game would take a lot of work and effort, Pixel decided to make something that he could finish all by himself in his spare time. For this reason, he began creating a game that looked decidedly retro, with old school chiptune music and simple blocky graphics. Pixel worried that the game might not be received well. After all, his game had a very dated, almost archaic feel to it. Gamers surely would want something a little more modern, but as this was a personal project that Pixel was making just for fun, he figured it didn't matter what kind of game he made so long as he was having fun. Pixel was a fan of many different kinds of games, from Final Fantasy to Super Mario Bros, but the game that he was the most interested in emulating was Metroid, in which the player explores a spooky cave labyrinth while fighting off alien monsters. There was just one problem with this game. In Pixel's mind, Metroid was far too scary and harsh. He liked games to be cute and fun. As he began designing his own game, he tried to make his characters as adorable as possible. The first step was composing the game's theme song, named the Plantation Theme, before Pixel dived into creating art assets for his main character. He fiddled around for a while, getting his protagonist's appearance just right, and messing with the physics of his movement and jumping until he was pleased with it. Pixel deliberately created this character to take advantage of the limitations of the retro game's style. His player character had a big head, the better to show expressive eyes and convey emotion, with bold colours and large arms to clearly show off movement. As Pixel moved on to creating artwork for the other characters, he deliberately made them stand out, often using a lot of white in his designs so that it would be clearly visible against the black background of the caves. While Pixel felt that the game, tentatively titled Cave Story, might be a little late to the party in terms of its retro aesthetic, he couldn't deny that advancements in modern game programming meant that it was a lot easier to build his own passion project now than it would have been a few decades earlier. Perhaps this game wasn't such a bad fit for the modern era after all. Pixel didn't plan much out in advance, and simply threw himself into game design, figuring out what worked and what didn't through trial and error. He found himself focusing on the game's feeling as much as the more technical aspects of gameplay. He wanted to use the environment, art assets, sound effects, and background music to convey emotion, leading the player on a journey that was far more centred in storytelling than the majority of 2D platformers from the past. Pixel really focused on the sounds of his game, initially starting with a simple microphone to record noises that he made himself, and eventually programming his own audio tools so that he had complete control of the way his game sounded. He felt that the noises within the game, from the sound of gunfire to the trills of the chiptune music, should teach the player about the world around them, and prime them for how a certain scene within the game should make them feel. He wanted the player to learn through their ears as well as their eyes when playing Cave Story. After two years of hard work, Pixel had all but completed his fledgling game project. He'd made a few little games over the years as well in order to practice the skills he needed, but this was his big success, and he was fairly proud of it. He showed it to a friend, and immediately received a lot of negative feedback. His friend didn't mince words and listed all of the game's faults as he saw them, pointing out multiple places where the experience simply wasn't all that fun to play. Heartbroken, Pixel went away, and took a long, hard look at the work he'd done over the past two years. His friend was right. This game simply wasn't as enjoyable as he'd wanted it to be. There were a lot of elements that just didn't work with the gameplay that Pixel was trying to create, and so Pixel made a hard decision. Cave Story was almost entirely complete, but it didn't matter. He was going to scrap the entire project, everything he'd done up to that point, and start all over again. Despite having to begin his work from scratch, Pixel threw himself into his project with eagerness. He axed a lot of the ideas that didn't work, originally Cave Story involved switching between a few player characters, but based on his friend's feedback, he realised that he needed to take a different approach in order to keep the player invested in what was going on. For this reason, Pixel gave his protagonist very little backstory and introduced the idea that the character had amnesia. This way, the player was learning about the world in tandem with the character that they were controlling. It was important, Pixel felt, for the player to empathise with the game's protagonist, and feel like this little avatar really represented them within the story. Pixel used the story as a hook to try and get the player to keep pushing forward. Instead of being based around exploration for its own sake, the game was designed so that the players would want to progress in order to see more of the story unfold. It was turning out that the title Cave Story was very fitting for the game indeed. As Pixel worked, life moved on and he graduated from school, ready to begin professional employment. He entertained the idea of trying to become a professional game programmer, but he ultimately decided that this wasn't for him. Pixel liked working alone and having complete creative freedom over his project. He decided that he'd be better off getting a more traditional, safe office job and working on personal projects in his spare time. So Pixel became a programmer for a print systems company and continued to tinker with Cave Story on evenings and weekends. He'd learned a lot from all his experimentation on the original version of Cave Story, so he was able to work quickly on this new, improved version. Nevertheless, this was still a long process as he wanted to make the game the best that it could be. Game design for fun was far more rewarding than being forced onto a strict schedule anyway. Pixel deliberately took his time, working on the game when he felt like it, and putting it to one side when other things became more important. Sometimes, instead of pushing to finish his project, he'd simply daydream about it, or think about what could be done to improve it. And sometimes, he wouldn't even do that. Eventually, after years of work, the project began drawing to a close. As the finish line came into view, Pixel was looking forward to completing Cave Story and moving on to other hobbies. It had been fun working on this game, but five years was a long time to spend working on a single game and he was eager to try new things. Pixel viewed Cave Story as his grand final video game project. Once this was done, he didn't intend to make any more games, and he figured he'd instead devote himself to other pursuits. The tedious bug testing and final tweaks on the game were proving to be quite frustrating, and he was looking forward to having this all behind him. Pixel released the game to the world, distributing it for free over the internet. He had no interest in financial game, and was happy to see it go out as freeware for anyone who might like to try out his hard work. A friend of his ported it to Mac, increasing its reach, and eventually a fan of the game completed an English language translation, allowing it to travel even further. For a while, Pixel was caught up with post-release bug fixes and patches, which was frustrating in and of itself, but eventually he was happy to leave the game as it was. What Pixel didn't anticipate was the response his game would receive. Players around the world fell in love with his creation, praising him for his work, and celebrating his achievement. Gamers appreciated all of the little touches he'd put into his game in order to make it the engaging experience that he'd wanted to create. Pixel had been wrong to assume that people wouldn't want to play an old-fashioned retro-style video game. The game circled far and wide online, as players embraced the simple art and chiptune music. What really surprised Pixel was how popular the game proved to be with young people. He'd assumed that because his game looked old, it would only appeal to people who, like himself, had a nostalgic fondness for retro game looks. He was certainly wrong. Players who were too young to remember the NES or the SNES were just as enthusiastic about Cave Story as anyone else. Pixel had done it. After five years, he completed his big video game project, and to a high standard that he could be proud of. He hadn't made a penny from his game, but he didn't care. This had all been an exercise in personal development, and he was happy to have succeeded in making the game he wanted to make. In a way that he was pleased with. Ultimately, he retired from video games development. This had never been his biggest priority. Instead, he had something far more important to do with his time. He had gotten married, and he and his wife were beginning to raise a family together. This was what mattered most to him, and he was pleased to continue his life as a salaryman so that he could support his loved ones, content in the knowledge that he had created a game that he was proud of. At least, for now. But what happened next is the story for another day. The moral of the story is that sometimes hard work is its own reward. Daisuke Amaya set out with a very specific vision in his mind. He knew exactly what kind of video game he wanted to make, and he wanted to do everything in his power to make it a reality. This took a lot of work. Pixel had to learn everything from scratch, and even start the entire project again when he felt like it wasn't going the way he wanted it to go. Throughout all that work though, Pixel kept pushing forward, to the point where he could be proud of his finished creation. When you set yourself a goal for personal improvement, it's worth remembering Pixel's example. It doesn't matter what the end result of your work might be and whether or not you're celebrated for your achievements. As long as you, personally, can be pleased with what you achieve, that's what matters. So long as you're having a good time and you're proud with what you're managing to accomplish, your struggles will be worth the effort.