Balancing Game Development time with everything else?

#1 Scheduling sometimes helps, though when you're talking about things like work and school- they obviously come first. There is that saying: Life kills the artist. And this is exactly what they mean. Myself, if it was crazy for only a week or two and trying to do dev work wouldn't bring any significant gains, I think I'd set it aside for sanity's sake. But if it's an extended timeframe and you want to make sure you don't fall off the wagon, then maybe try to find a block of time you can set aside and have clear goals ready for that block of time, so you can feel good about walking away with accomplished goals. Either way, it's really hard when life gets crazy.

#2 I've gone both routes... high intensity short burst development and longer, paced development.

I did a short burst of extremely intensive development, but I got burned out fairly quickly and ended up spending some "relationship capital" with my girlfriend.

I worked on Fractured Universe with a 90 day schedule and I ended up with a fairly fun, playable MMO RPG prototype.... it wasn't "production quality" due to some limitations of using stock Torque + FPS Starter Kit, but it was fun and close enough to completion that people could get a feel for how it was going to play out.

But, there's no way I could make a production quality MMO at that pace because of the significant amount of work it requires.

For the longer, slower paced development, plan your game dev week the same way you'd plan your school or job.

Tues / Thurs I work 2 - 4 hours a night. Mon, Weds, Fri I do a little art but mostly I spend time with my girlfriend. Most weekends I set aside an entire 8 hour block of time. One weekend a month I take a break and don't even think about game development. Breaks are important.

Make sure the schedule is sustainable indefinitely. Pace yourself and get into it for the long haul. If you have a significant other, be sure to get "buy-in" on the schedule before committing to it unless you want to end up being single. :P

I've been writing a production quality game engine framework and MMO RPG middleware for the past 2.5 years with this schedule. I've been averaging about 8k lines of code a month, and it's a sustainable schedule.

I think this route has been a great way to go... start with a short burst for prototype, dig in for the long haul to get things to the 90% stage, and then possibly do another short burst at the end in order to push it out the door.

Just make sure this final "crunch time" doesn't last for more than 2 - 3 months :P

Now, that's for making a huge MMO RPG... obviously your experience will vary based on the type of game you're making.

#3 I like the 1 week a month break idea. I find walking away from something for a little bit then coming back can lead to faster working over all.

#4 I do novel writing in my spare time, and I find that daily goals help me. I aim for no less than 3 pages a day, so that I can write about a chapter a week.

#5 I don't sleep... much, that helps :D

#6 Sleep is overrated anyway. ;-)

#7 I remember my month of being unemployed this winter, I have this vague notion of sleeping, it seems like it was pleasant... ;)