Introduction

Here I set my SMART(ER) goals using past-tense.

Answer:

• what?
• who?
• when?
• where?
• why?
• how?

Goals

Become more fluent with Shaders/GLSL

Set on 2020-11-15

Component	Description
Specific	I became more fluent with the shaders…
Measurable	…when I discovered that I can sketch a special effect as fluently as I can illustrate a character in my head using pencil and paper.
Achievable	I knew I crossed a major hurdle when one of my shaders that I put on shadertoy over a weekend got 20K views.
Relevant / Realistic	Really getting fluent with shaders gave me a new superpower, as I could achieve awesome VFX across any game engine and platform.
Time-bound	I reached this level by end-2022.
Emotional attachment	Being a shader pro comes with a level of prestige, as its consider an arcane art, where most practitioners still copy/paste shaders off the web and hope for the best.
Reward	The reward was in the mastery of shaders itself.

Become more fluent with Phaser

Set on 2020-10-25.

Component	Description
Specific	I became more fluent with the Phaser game engine…
Measurable	…when I discovered that I don’t need to consult the docs anymore, and I had a good grasp of the advanced features.
Achievable	This was possible by only using Phaser for all game development, trying out all Phaser features during game jams, and being active on the Phaser Discord.
Relevant / Realistic	Focusing on Phaser turned out to be a good decision for me, due to my history with web development, and the studio’s focus on online titles.
Time-bound	I reached this level by mid-2021.
Emotional attachment	I felt great pleasure being able to fluently make games without getting stuck and having to resort to docs or Discord every other minute.
Reward	The reward was the state of flow I achieved with every game development project.

Be a better designer

Set on 2020-10-25.

Component	Description
Specific	I became a better game designer…
Measurable	…by releasing video games that people thought were super fun (stretch: that won a game jam; that was lauded for its design; that was featured favourably in a GMTK video)
Achievable	I incorporated appropriate design considerations from my literature with every game I made, and entered at least one game jam per month to hone my skills. (stretch: I made a small game exercising a new design methodology every week, each time asking for feedback about the impact of the design decision from play testers.)
Relevant / Realistic	Better design turned out to be very relevant, as my badly designed or bland games were shunned regardless of good graphics or interesting characters.
Time-bound	Exercising and fine-tuning one aspect of a design methodology every week turned out to be achievable.
Emotional attachment	When I didn’t become a better designer, making games became just another computer programming exercise.
Reward	The reward was in the outcome itself: more people liked my games, which means I could afford to make games full-time.