How to get a programmer

To truly get it done, possibly, but a better way is be the guy that is familiar and understands what is good and bad in each respective area of the game development. That way you can tell if anyone you hired to help you is doing it right or a bad job.

Not all programmers are lazy but generally all programmers are busy if they are good. It’s a skill set that is in high demand and if you are good you will be able to find work.

A good bit of the programmers here giving you advice are probably already tied up in projects and have work lined up for months out. So it’s not them being hill commanders to dictate how your game is built but more as people who have found the pitfalls of game development and are trying to warn you about them.

With that being said you always have to take it with a grain of salt. As the experience levels of the programmers vary, the scope and types of games they worked on also vary, it means their advice may not always apply to your game.

It’s true you can do single player games all blueprint and I think small scoped multiplayer games as well. But if you are going for any multiplayer over 10 people in a game, C++ replication with good stable networking is needed for the game to feel smooth, especially competitive games. This also means all art assets need to be optimized to get a good feel while having the lowest cost on the hardware.

Do not let anyone break your spirit, this is a rough field where breaking into it requires tons of studying, experience of trial and error, thick skin and the ability to stay motivated.

Also like everything in life people only want to work on things they know will succeed. That’s why everyone wants to see your progress over time, they want to see you are motivated and not giving up. If a programmer is only working on your project and its revenue share, they won’t get paid if the game doesn’t succeed. Which ideally most would want to join with less than a year left in development because they will have to support themselves that whole time.

If the programming work is paid. It’s a different story but the skill levels you get will be dependent on the pay. For example if I google “unreal engine C++ job remote” there are 60+ jobs all of varying difficulties with pay range of 55k-250k a year. Which any good programmer with experience and/or portfolio can get. That’s what you are competing against.

All in all it’s hard to get a good programmer without funding. However if you become a generalist that can identify good code and understand all the gameplay features you need with a rough idea on how difficult they are you can hire programmers for a one off job to create said system or feature. This is probably the cheapest pay route to build a game.

Otherwise with revenue share you are most likely going to get a hobbyist or an aspiring programmer trying to get better and build their portfolio.

Good luck and never give up.