Devlog: Bureaucracy is Violence — Four Days in Godot, My First Finished Game

Hey everyone!

This is my first real devlog, and honestly, my first finished game ever. Bureaucracy is Violence started as a random idea: What if I actually sat down, learned a new engine, and forced myself to finish something in less than a week? No competitions. No themes. Just stubbornness.

Why This Game?

I’m one of those people with a graveyard of half-finished prototypes and “great ideas.” So I gave myself a challenge:

• Pick a small, simple concept

• Learn Godot from scratch

• Build the whole thing in four days
  The result? A frantic little game about stamping paperwork, dodging fake forms, and getting fired (repeatedly).

The Process

Day 1: Stumbling Through Godot
Never touched Godot before, so most of the first day was spent wrestling with the basics—scenes, nodes, and wondering why signals exist just to make my life harder. But by the end, I had my first form on screen and a button that actually worked.

Day 2: Core Gameplay and Broken Everything
I hacked together the main loop: forms appear, you stamp or reject, the score climbs, and then the pace gets out of control. Debug messages everywhere. Nothing looked good, but it worked (sort of).

Day 3: Actual Art and Audio
Replaced programmer art with real(ish) assets, added sound effects, and made the UI not look like a crime scene. Gave the game its “fired” screen and a difficulty curve that’ll humble anyone who thinks they’re good at paperwork.

Day 4: Polish, Panic, and Exporting
Final tweaks, bug squashing, and that “let’s just fix this one last thing” loop. Learned how to export for Windows, fight with icons, and generally hate how much time polish takes compared to core mechanics. But I did it—it’s finished!

What Went Right?

• I finished an actual game for once. Miracles do happen.

• Godot is way less intimidating now.

• Discovered a gameplay loop that’s simple but gets your heart rate up.

What Went Wrong?

• Difficulty scaling is brutal—sorry in advance.

• Exporting icons and builds is way more annoying than it should be.

• Probably a few bugs hiding in the forms. It’s tradition.

What’s Next?

Not planning any major updates—this was my “prove I can finish something” project.
If you play it, I’d love feedback (or just stories of how fast you got fired).
Thanks for checking out Bureaucracy is Violence and supporting a first-time Godot dev!

—PixelRegret