[project1dev] state of the union
- From: eric drewes <figarus@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: project1dev@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 15 Nov 2009 14:03:48 -0500
here's my official opinion of the situation:
we have a ton of really great creative talent, a brilliant coder and a
really awesome premise. we have a ton of people who love gaming who want to
produce a quality classic. My dream for this game is for it to be a
masterpiece of sorts that maximizes its potential. but there are some
problems...
by default alan and I are in charge, but neither of us are experienced as
project managers and neither of us are really good in that job. We have
tried at various times to keep with weekly updates, etc. in order to keep
everyone (including ourselves) on track and the game progressing... these
attempts have failed for one reason or another, and in my opinion its
because there's nothing really to hold any of us accountable, there are no
checks and balances, no consequences to blowing off
assignments/projects/etc. and lets face it, this is an unpaid gig and we're
all busy people and often times we have to make sacrifices, the game thus
far has been something easy to push aside... With the talent we have on art
team, the three options alan presented shouldn't even need to be exercised,
I really think we have the people to get the art done, if properly motivated
we could get all of milestone 1 including the temple completely finished art
wise by the end of the month, we just need a driver to keep the talent
(myself included) producing and on track. The problem is, we need someone
with experience and knowledge to fill that executive producer role and I
have failed at it, I am just not good at being the person who keeps
schedules and keeps things organized, its not in my disposition to be the
boss in that respect. I'm not a supervisor. It was sort of my job by
default and i suck at it.
things have been frustrating - frustrating for everyone, and tempers have
occasionally boiled over because when things aren't going the way we want
and we try to look for where the problem is, people get angry and it erupts
into these things. If you want to say that the problem is me for not
keeping the game moving, well I am guilty, because like I said before, by
default I am the only one to blame. We need someone besides me to step up
or we need to bring someone in who can manage the game and take on that
authority, someone who can tell me when I am not giving people what they
need or producing the way I need to, someone who can prod people who have
assignments to finish them, someone who can make sure everyone is doing what
they need to be doing to keep the game alive. I can write, design, draw,
model, I can direct but I can't do that part, its just a role i am competent
in. I think we could probably do this by committee instead of having one
head guy in charge, where we structure things like this:
we'll list everyones current assignments, if people are missing a task, we
can add those as well. Every single person will give a time estimate for
when they think their current project will be finished and we as peers will
hold people accountable for not finishing projects by their deadlines.
Obviously things come up or things take longer to do that originally
estimated (we'll account for that as long as there is an explanation) but
with strict weekly updates and time estimates it'll be easier for people to
say "oh yeah, i need to get that done" - the deadline pressure is a great
motivator! We could also say if something lingers without progress for 2
weeks, we could offer the project up for reassignment, so that if someone is
busy/disinterested/dead their task doesn't just not get finished. We need
to really be strict on this otherwise things will break up into chaos like
they are now.
Basically we're all new to this, its a huge learning experience and we're
all in it together, we all have a common goal. When things are going well,
we will forget this blip in the system but unless we make this change,
things will never ever ever go well. But i think WITH an executive producer
running things and/or a peer-driven system of checks and balances, we can
really get this done... and do something amazing.
anyways, those are my official thoughts on it. Lets open the field for
thoughts/concerns/questions and then tomorrow put together a list of what
everyone is working on, what they need, their time estimates and sorta
"start over" with a winning plan.
Thanks,
eric
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