Comparative differences between games design and simulation design - Part 14: Working on a project - What it's like...
Introduction
So one part is the development process is based around the actual process from start to finish. Although in games design, it is a stage process throughout development that is the same through all game developmnet:- Pre Alpha
- Alpha
- Beta
- Gold
Roles Within Company
Although this doesn't cover all companies, this interpretation is from the company that I work within. The following sections present sides from both internal and external parts. I will try to give explinations and examples from both sides.Customer
The best way to describe it in relation to games design is that the customer can be contextually viewed as the publisher of the product you are making. They are the person that will give you the money, they will view your product and provide feedback and suggestions and ensure you ahdere to what you have said.Within this industry, the customer is a group of people from different fields who input into what the requirements are there for the project. Although they won't demand the product as that's what the company who will develop will provide, the customers main priority is to essentially ask a question which the product will answer and within the team, will take input and ensure that the product that is being given is what was requested.
Team
In terms of games design, think of this as a developer within the whole games design process. The team will consist of three sections.PM (Project Manager) - The PM specifically orientates around controlling the aims via milestones, costs, staff alocation and time allocation on the project. The PM constantly keeps track, monitors and ensures that everything is working acceptably in the background for the team lead and team to complete the tasks.
TL (Tech Lead) - The team lead works with the PM to ensure that the project is working efficiently and sticking to the planned deadlines. The team lead ensures that all team members know there required taskings and what they need to do and what technology is needed to be able to complete that task.
TM (Team Member) - The team members are employees whom have specific skill based in relation to the project. Their role is to ensure that the project taskings are completed and ready for submission to the customer. The TM skills will be allocated dependant on the skills and abilities and job level. Obviously these are done from both the PM and TL but the members specific abilities are the main power to complete the job.
Different Types Of Project
Internal - Company Funded
Internal are self funded by the company for specific use / exploitation. As example, internal funding could be designed for specific things such as programs that can be used in the future, research into new products like mechanical products. Anything that can be used by the company for future gains or customer investment.Customer - Customer Funded
Customer funded is an external customer project where the external company is looking for a company to specifically to complete a project for them. Usually the projects orientate around the idea of answering a question or more specifically to create a program or product for a specific use for the companies use.
The companies who want to do the project, bid for the chance to do it proposing what they will make, what the final products will be, look like and for how much.
Development Process
The development process relates to the steps that occur during the development process. It's the step by step stages that each project goes through to ensure that the project has the best chance of being complete with the teams side complete to the best of their ability.Kick Off Meeting
The kick off meeting is to start the process off. It's a congregation to essentially set out what is needed, what to do and allocate the documentation and who needs to work on what. The kick off also allocates the overall discussion on what the following weeks will have tasking wise.The kick off meeting only happens once but other meetings can happen afterwards, the kick off allows everyone to know what the plan is and who else is working on that same project.
Trails / Mid Project Presentation
Trails are like mid project tests to show to your team and other teams / external companies where you and allow you to get together to present your workings so far.
An example was a project were two companies were cross working together for the same end goal. The trail was set to allow us to meet and work in trying to figure out the following:
- Are we both on track
- What do we need to do for future development
- Is there anything that we need to do to ensure that it's working effectively for the next trial.
Final Demo / Evaluation
Final Demo is orientated around the presentation of the final product in it's final state. Although they can be done in various ways, the process tends to be a layout of a presentation with all customer staff (whatever they deem important), tech lead, other necessary staff and PM if possible. The whole point of the demo is to essentially present what was made and how it relates to what was proposed in the bid phase.
When the presentation is completed, a demonstration is made of the whole product to allow the customers to see it in action. The customer can then provide feedback and suggestion ideas for the future. This allows for the idea of possible extensions of the project or continuing to other projects based of this idea as the initial design.
This tends to be the part of the TMs job being done, the last things are usually at this point to complete the SDD and other necessary documents.
My breakdown of working within a project
Its strange but the way projects are done via this company to previous jobs and their project. Its a good mixture of processes that the games design companies do but also what happened with my teaching career. Specially within training, they specifically look at the orientation of working with a strong sprint style framework bursting for a week / day (depending on the type of project it is) ensuring that everyone knows what they are doing so they are all at the same level of understanding. Teaching comes in, in the amount of communication that is done where everything is recorded and logged efficiently which helps produce a back log or paper trail but understandably ensures that everything is processed correctly.
There are however issues seen sometimes with working in an industry as an designer and not as an engineer. One big issues seen is that the engineers idea of processing or working can in some instances make the team incredibly reclusive to the rest of the company as well as clashes in team to how information is processed or meetings / communication is done etc.
One example is that the team initially presented a sprint based system where the lead engineer complained that we were stopping them doing there job and that he didn't need to know or care what the other staff were doing which resulted in the sprints not efficiently working and in the end stopping. As well as this, the project communication stopped other than via word of mouth which caused issues; TMs normally work on multiple projects at one time which means digital communications are the best to keep up to date. With the project now turning into word of mouth, no one understood what was happening at times which caused delays and heated conversations as decisions where Chinese whispered. Suffice to say, the project hit the deadlines but that is due to the staff working late nights for a long duration of the project.
Working in a project consists of multiple points that are needed to be done / kept running to ensure the project is ran efficiently:
- What is required,
- What strong points are in your team
- And keep communication flowing.
Without this a project can come into disarray and can fail quite easily.
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