Rant: Programmers vs. others

I agree. In my experience the programmer is always the one pulling the load. I was once the lead programmer (actually the only programmer) in a team. Other guys were supposed to be the designers and artists, but they did nothing! I started to design the beginning of the game (it was a RTS) and programmed the basic tile engine. I also had to draw my own "placeholder" tiles. After about a month nobody else had done anything, so I dropped the project and I''m sure the plane crashed into the mountain after that. If you''re talented enough, you''d probably be better off doing the whole project yourself, at least if your only means of communication with a team is via the Internet. People are too flaky. On the other hand, if you know your team members in person you might actually get something accomplished...or you might just end up drinking beers and joking around all night, as would probably happen in my case.

Alex

Artists and musicians do provide the look and feel for the game. But to quote Shakespeare, "The play''s the thing" Programmers have to make the decisions about what is feasible including the setting limits on the artists.
It''s only when you have pluggable components that fit together to make a game that artists will be the leads. That''s why artists can dominate mods and level-design. There are limits set out in the game engines by the programmer. The nice thing is that artists are capable of stretching those limits to the max and very often beyond. Usually to places unforeseen by the programmer who''s usually concerned about just making it work and adding features. The final result between a well-designed, open engine and the artists is much greater than the sum of the parts.


ZoomBoy
Developing a 2D RPG with skills, weapons, and adventure.
See my character editor, Tile editor, diary, 3D Art resources at
Check out my web-site

I agree programmers are Gods!

Hey Game Designer dont count, they don''t really have any rules at all that they have to follow. They can do that however, on the back of napkins or whatever. Programming has to work, Game Design can be done by everyone thats grown up with console and more. Basically they are like Publishers and Executives and Managers and stuff, they dont do squatt! Besides, the programmer has to filter everything they do anyway

Why can''t we all just accept the fact that a game project works a lot better with all the roles filled and cooperating with one another, rather than re-hashing the same arguments over and over in favor of one member of the team?

-Ironblayde
 Aeon Software

Everybody has their place. Nobody is better at their job when it is somebody who is doing a completely different job. Harmony people, Harmony...

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
-Chris Bennett of Dwarfsoft
"The Philosophers' Stone of Programming Alchemy"
IOL (The list formerly known as NPCAI) - A GDNet production
Our Doc - The future of RPGs
Thanks to all the goblins over in our little Game Design Corner niche
          

quote:

---

Original post by Ironblayde

Why can''t we all just accept the fact that a game project works a lot better with all the roles filled and cooperating with one another, rather than re-hashing the same arguments over and over in favor of one member of the team?

---

I''m sure everyone agrees with that statement, the argument is that the only role that consistently produces is the role of the programmer. Everyone else usually sits on their bum and thinks of other ''k3wl projekts'' to do.

I really oppose this type of elitism... Yea, I''m a programmer (been doing it for 22 years, since the age of 13) and I''m a game designer (been doing that for the past 10 years). Which one does that make me? I consider myself a Game Developer. Oh, and did I forget to mention that I''m a musician?

C''mon let''s keep this kind of wack-o talk off this board, the world has too many things in place already to divide group a from group b... let''s stop this now, please.

Dave "Dak Lozar" Loeser

Well I''m a programmer and I don''t really see myself carring the team to game release (I would have a hernia and die before that happens, plus no game would be released without 350 pound programmers :-). I have always noticed it as a colabrative type thing. The game desinger tells you what the hell to do and then you do it! that is all...While I''m coding in my happy cubical the modelers are making the levels and characters...that''s it! Or that is how it should be.

*sigh* why is it you all have to jump to conclusions about things like this? You dont know enough people to make the assessmant that because all people are different. Here is my theory. ALL members of the team need to be in on the meetings about what to put into the game. What the artist''s think is good for a certain scene or wha the musical personal beleive a certain scene should use or what not. Programmers are artists too so they have ideas just like everyone else in the team. givin, they seem to do more work but to beleive that a programmer can do an entire game by theirself and have it work right and be good is to me, ludicrous. It takes all those arguments and bloodly gorey fights to make the final design doc work. oh well I look at it from a very organized veiwpoint. There is no reason that the programmers should be holding up the team. If thats the case then the game wont be very good because of the lack in content. am i wrong here? is it not the imput of the whole team that makes the game good?

"Why does my life have to be so hard in every world?"

Nanami Jinii