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About

"Stay determined. Just roll with the punches."
Life Goal: Take all the best experiences gaming ever gave me, and pay it forward.

Tony Yotes: 

     Hey, I'm Tony Yotes, but just Yotes works just fine. I was born in the '90s, which in my humble opinion, was the perfect age to grow up playing awesome games across all generations. That childhood inspired me to pay those good times forward and create my own video game empire.

     In 2016 I graduated from the Pennsylvania College of Technology with a Bachelor of Science in Gaming & Simulation. Despite the four years of work and debt invested there, I believe in prioritizing personal project experience over formal education. Chasing my game development dreams around the clock outside the classroom since the 10th grade was my way of making use of the immense power of determination.

     On August 25, 2013 I decided to travel the risky indie dev career path in earnest. Trademarks were filed and five experience-filled years later Yotes Games, LLC became an official entity! During my freshman year at college I taught myself the magical art of mobile game development and started making small games to build the experience I needed in order to make my more ambitious ideas a reality. Someday I hope to be a successful self-employed independent developer and make a name for myself in the industry.

Skills: 

     Over the years I've developed skills necessary to create and sell video games from scratch. I've used a variety of programming languages like Java, C++, Objective-C, C#, Python, and Javascript and I've gotten to a comfortable point with coding where I'm confident in using any language so long as I use my high standard organization practices to make even the most complex systems easy-to-read. 

     Those same organization skills come in handy in project management, which has led me to shipping multiple titles on the app store and cooperating with small teams remotely to produce contract work for my game projects.

     Since 2019 I've been collaborating with an increasing number of developers on a single project. The experience has taught me a lot about other perspectives in game architecture and helped me practice communicating complex ideas in order to add features to the games we create.

     I've also developed great pixel art skills, a competent drawing ability, novice video & audio editing ability, years of experience in UI & UX design, well-honed writing skills, and I am constantly learning about game design and storytelling to make better and better products.

     I'd say my greatest skill of all is the ability to learn whatever I need to get the job done. If I want a thing to exist, I will make it happen.

This Blog: 

     Every month I write about what indie development tasks have been completed by the team, list lessons we've learned through that experience, and talk about what we plan to do next. In game development, there's always more to do and more to learn. I write in hopes of speeding up that process for whoever's reading by sharing all the ups, downs, and sideways I go through in trying to bring a game idea to life over the course of several years.

     This has been a personal little ritual of mine since 2013 and I don't plan on stopping any time soon.

Yotes Games:

    Yotes Games, LLC exists to make games that are fun to develop, and fun to play. Time and time again, indie developers have proven their passion projects can stand up against the biggest blockbusters because there are always people out there looking for something new, simple, or forgotten. We've got a million ideas, but by now we've learned it's execution that matters most.

     The industry is crowded with publishers prioritizing business over art when there should be more of a balance. Games with a short-term profit focus at the expense of the creators and players will lose the creative human element that spawns well-executed ideas and generates passionate communities that enjoy the game years (or even decades) after release. 

     We have long-term goals of setting an example for the games industry in terms of how to treat its workers as well as respect its customers. Revenue share for employees and no shareholders detached from the game's development calling the shots. Game mechanics and features intended to delight the players and deliver more than what was promised, not exploit them for as much money as possible. We believe that if we do right by the creative vision, and do right by the people who will eventually enjoy that vision, the money to contribute to something even greater will follow.

     Leading by example. Creating an environment people want to be a part of. Yotes Games is here to show the world that work can be fun instead of being a draining grind and become further proof that ambitious dreams are worth chasing.

     With each released game more excellent than the last, Yotes Games continues to blast upwards to one day stand alongside the great developers that inspired it.

The future isn't always clear, but that's the fun part. This blog chronicles that journey.

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   It doesn't matter how young you are, whether you have formal education or not, or even what tools you have. If you love making virtual (or even tangible) experiences and have any means of doing so, just get started. Practice your talent. Sharpen it. Because you are already a game designer. You just need to make something to play and prove it to yourself.