During GameJam I made a simple level and assembled it into an executable file. And it turned out that such a small card weighs more than two gigabytes (2.6 gb) in total.
Question: is there any way to reduce the size of the game? Yes, the question may be stupid, but still. Attached screenshots.





Thanks in advance!

P.S Used only models from packs from GameGuru
P.P.S So far, I only see an option to reduce the variety of assets so that fewer models are packed into the game

I wrote a tutorial on texture optimisation you might find useful: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/222504
You should start by making copies of all your original textures so you don't overwrite them, but then you can start going through a reducing the size of each one until you're happy. Objects in the far distance don't need a 4K texture on, they might not even need any other PBR maps other than _color.

Do the same optimisation with sprites too, if you have any. It's tempting to use 32-bit png files for quality, but a 16-bit dds will be much more cost effective.

Your map does look like it contains every building made for Game Guru, so you're right that reducing the variety of different buildings might help you save a bit. I would also give your city a more consistent look.

Other tips:
- Save all sound files you don't need to be directional as .ogg
- Once you have your standalone, delete all the titlebank folders for every resolution except the one you're working in.

That's about all I can think of.

AE

yh not much other than reducing textures and sounds - GG uses a crazy amount of storage with even a blank game taking up nearly 1gb...

What ?
371 meg for a blank standalone and most of that is the actual engine which is to be expected.
After that its whatever maps and assets you add.

Everyone will get very different minimum sizes of standalone build due to the simple fact that GG copies over a load of stuff that you aren't even using in your game and that will depend on what extra custom stuff you have in your GG folders.

For example *all* shaders are included, regardless of whether they are used, in fact it appears that everything in your effectbank is copied over.
Similarly any extra stuff installed into gamecore will be copied over regardless of usage, things like custom weapons, sound effects, particle sheets etc.

My effectbank folder is almost 400Mb on its own, in a newly created GG folder structure, even after all the base shaders are compiled, it is around 130Mb.

So for me an empty standalone is around the 680Mb mark.

Also worth noting that around 30 Mb of your standalone is the av dll files, presumably they contain the support for various video/audio but equate to twice the size of the GG executables!

Exactly, I didn't think about it...
I worked with textures and reduced the size to 1.27 gb

Thank you so much for your advice!

P.S The location was conceived in the form of randomness and mountains of garbage. I did it on the topic of "Addiction", so it occurred to me to make such a chaos here )
But thanks for the advice anyway!

I have been tinkering with an 'optimizer' for standalones created in GG watch this space lol pun intended

just tried a new one with my pretty much fresh install of GG and it uses 400mb so yes does seem a lot smaller than before when my GG had a lot more stuff in it.

i believe max is supposed to be taking a more unique project / separated approach so this might not be an issue there at least.