Working alone vs. partnering up

General Discussions
#21

I think this is the reason why people create “companies” and get more people into the same place, pay them money not to leave so they STAY.

But that’s a big commitment, and since we’re mostly doing this as a hobby, or just trying to make a indie game in our free time, we’re not ready to do that. Besides, you need money to survive, and you get no money from doing this.

Strangely, there seem to be a shitload of people INTERESTED in making games, but when it comes to actually putting in the hours and hard work those people just melt away like butter on a frying pan. I’ve worked with quite a few, and most of my effort went into communication, trying to keep the other party interested, trying to get replies, feedback, and then he vanishes and my interest vanishes as well. Then they reply a couple of weeks later “Hey, sorry, been busy in real life, wife, kids, job, dog…etc.”. I mean, what the f. did they expect and why the f. did they join if they have so much going on in their personal life? Game development is not like going bowling one evening, it’s a commitment for many evenings for a long period, months to a year.

#22

So very true…

#23

What works really really well is to…wait, the baby’s crying.

#24

ROFLMAO

#25

Yeah I’ll admit I have had many more failed partnering attempts than successful ones. The artist I’m working with now actually jumped ship on me for this exact same project like 3 years ago, then he randomly contacted me all fire and brimstone really wanting to get it started. And we’ve been working pretty hard on it since. I’ve had probably 4 or 5 failed team projects before this one, all with the same story as Appel. I think really it’s key to keep trying, and eventually you’ll end up working with someone who feels as passionate as you do.

#26

I do find it strange however that the people who share this experience never end partnering up. ::slight_smile: Is it a “not invented here” attitude?

#27

Good question. Remember that community project Kev proposed that led to a whole lot of ideas and zero work? I know there have been a few before that too. I think that us coders are just as likely to say “oh I’ve got a baby/wife/video game playing to deal with” as anyone else.

Also for me I’ve always got in the back of my mind that if something is successful that my team makes then I want to maybe form a company and do things full time, which is going to be difficult when people are in Europe and I’m in the US. :slight_smile:

#28

I think there are a lot of really talented people here in many different areas.

I just don’t there are perhaps any excellent “team leaders” who strive and pursue trying to get people together and able to maintain long term motivation, ambition, and ability to inspire members.

Because most of those people are probably already on a project somewhere else and people tend to gravitate towards them. Or JGO has just drawn the short straw on those people finding this place.

I have a feeling there might be a higher chance of finding those types of people in the iPhone, XNA and Flash forums though. They are just the hot ticket lower hanging fruit right now.

#29

This is SO much like the music business. Everyone wants to write/record songs or music, but just don’t realize how much actual work is involved. I think the same must be true for film-making, animation, any artistic endeavor. It seems like fun, to be “creative” but then the reality sets in. (My 5-word synopsis of the opera “La Boheme”–>“don’t quit your day job”.)

Maybe there is another type of collaboration to consider. This is something I’d be willing to consider. Have a partnership where each person is writing/developing their own game, but takes the time to really look deeply at what the other person is doing, in order to be a true sounding board. So, I would share my progress, as I code, and problems, in hopes of getting good ideas & feedback maybe some shared code, and would similarly set aside some time to review what the partner is doing. It would be “clean” in terms of financial ramnifications (each gets income from their own project), and there is less downside if the partnership ends mid-project.

One big issue, there has to be some meeting of the minds. If the two don’t have some fundamental agreements on the project direction, things will undoubtably drift. Also, drift is sometimes a passive way of expressing criticism, or of avoiding confronting the partner. Disagreements are a hard social skill to manage. Sometimes those who disagree should part company, other times, diving into the disagreement to get to the bottom of it can unearth some really valuable insights. (thesis, antithesis, synthesis)

One last point: you can’t try and farm out all the boring stuff to the partner (unless you find a partner that thinks it is interesting).

#30

Working in teams can be difficult. A common issue is around other people not working as much as you, and to be honest as long as they are bringing something I didn’t do, then I try not to care. But a similar question to this came up on Forrst recently, so rather then repeat myself I’m just going to post it here. It earned me a star, so hopefully some people will find it useful:

I’ve worked in teams that have both communicated very well and very badly. The best one I’m calling the ‘good place’, and there I always knew everything that was going on. At the worst, the ‘bad place’, I very rarely knew. These are my thoughts:

Forcing the use of communication software. Everyone must have an e-mail and messenger clients open whilst working, and that’s ALWAYS! If you are too busy to use messenger then tag yourself as ‘busy’ (so you can grab them in an emergency). Being ‘busy’ should also be respected.

Tonnes of communication. Part of this is about always communicating, and part of it is about knowing what to just ignore (because it’s irrelevant). It’s better to receive a mail and ignore it then to have not received it (that’s not to say ignoring is good, just better the nothing). For example there is no reason why two devs can’t discuss an issue over the group mailing list rather then one-on-one.

Make the most of your time. At the bad place I’ve sat through 2 hour meetings where 3/4 of it was spent by the guys in charge chatting about programming languages and what they did during their PHDs. Time spent chatting over something hat had no relevance to the product. At the good place we had a 1 hour weekly meeting: 5 minutes of messing about (usually doing stilly things with the video network) then 55 minutes of 100% pure business.

At the end of meetings at the good place I knew what everyone else worked on, and what I working on before I went in. At the bad place I’d often walk out and have no idea what anyone else, or even myself, was working on.

Finally meet often, very often! Both as a team and individually one on one. Bad place only did a weekly team meeting, and over my time there more then a third of these got cancelled. That’s why I often didn’t know what anyone else was up to.

Most of all they need to be enforced. The reality is this is all just common sense, everyone I have worked with would fully agree. But it’s amazing how often this stuff gets side tracked. I also find people tend to follow the guy in charge. If he/she doesn’t communicate, then chances are that everyone else will presume that is the norm. Again both the good and bad places I have worked at reflected this.

At the good place they also did long lunches every few weeks where one part of the department would show off what they were building on and perform a Q&A about it. There was free food, drinks, cake, etc; and the management would pretty much take a back seat. It was devs presenting to fellow devs, so it was very informal and social.

One thing to add onto that; some people have mentioned that online voice/video is not good enough. I’d fully agree it is NOT a substitute for real meetings, not even close (and it’s one reason why I don’t think people should only be allowed to partially work from home, but that is a separate discussion). But at the ‘good’ place above we had a weekly video conference between our team and another in mainland China (about 30 people in total) and several times a week I’d have conference calls with the testers in India; I got loads of stuff out of both.

Again it’s common sense. If it’s run well, like a proper meeting, then online voice/video works very well (being at a PC can even help the meeting). It’s when the other guy is distracted on StarCraft/Reddit/YouTube/etc (which I found a lot of people did during meetings at uni); that’s when it doesn’t work.

#31

Partnering up works fine as along as it’s not with the code. One programmer, one artist, one sound engineer etc. Don’t tread on each other toes then.

Kev

#32

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I would have to agree “most” of the time. However like mentioned in the previous comments about finding the right one is like dating or falling in love.

A perfect example of this is Raigan and Mare from metanetsoftware.com
They are both programmers that share in a lot of the responsibility and managed to work together for the last 10+ years. 2 person team.

There are tid bits scattered around their blog and in other interviews how they work together.

I would love to find my partner in programming like they have.

#33

I made serious effort on one team project; a Star Fox clone. I was doing the level editor. I was pretty green at the time with respect to gui coding. I put in a lot of work on it using the decided upon ‘non standard’ gui library. When I showed my progress all I got was criticism from the other team members who’d done nothing. That was a motivation destroyer.

It is a tough problem. I’ve often thought of developing skill in the area I lack ie graphic design slash art and going from there. I don’t really have an interest for that though so never did. Seems like another aspect is the ‘I’m not as good as I think I am’ nature of software developers; most coders suck, but don’t know it and think they’re great. Present company excepted of course :slight_smile:

Very tough problem indeed.

#34

We should establish a Java GameCoders “Dating Service”. Fill out a form of strengths, weaknesses, experience, and desired attributes in a partner. Read through same of prospective partners.

Any way to implement on JGO? Or should it just be via individual initiative? Which area should such postings occur? Not sure “Community & Volunteer” is the right place if the goal is a for-profit collaboration. But the speculative nature makes it dubious for “Jobs & Resumes”.

It would be nice if they were all on a single thread. One can always update one’s “seeking” post in terms of availability or experience or desired strengths/weaknesses of potential partner.

#35

I would propose a time-share idea that I think has a better chance of catching on. Here people list their projects and then pledge 2 hours of their time to each other. If there is mutual interest then a match is made and each person promises to spend 2 solid hours reviewing a certain portion of the other’s game and providing constructive criticism.

This could go further all the way down to the code-review level.

A short time commitment and a win-win situation for both parties. It might even lead to longer-term pairings.

#36

I don’t get the point of that. It seems like you just lose time? Or are you thinking that it will eventually cause one of them to abandon their project to work on the other one?

#37

I think it would be a good idea if there was a big demand on that . But if you think about it, how many people will actually fill up that form ? Not many, I guess.
I believe individual initiative would save Riven’s time and have same results .
In my opinion “Community & Volunteer” would do. There is not much activity there anyway so nobody will complain if you’re “ruining” the forum purpose.

#38

Well, might work, but honestly, I’m always a pessimist about fluffy ideas.

No, I believe that the people capable of putting together a game are ninjas, and they are pretty much busy already saving the world, on their own.

#39

Best way…make your own match.com

So true, I mean look at Ninja Gaiden…pure awesomeness already.

#40

I’m working on a very little game from a while.
And i do it alone (except for sounds for wich i work with a sound designer).

If at this time i prefer to work on solo, it’s because i can work on my spare time like as i want.
When you build a team, even if it’s an amateur team, you must manage your work like (or near) a real job.
You must engage on some deadlines or objectives to each others.

You should really consider theses commitments before to choose to join or build a team.
In the other part, it’s true that someone else on the project help you to keep your motivation and you have someone to show your job :stuck_out_tongue:

(sorry for my poor english).

Séb.