A normal project for me goes through three stages. I will summarize and review them because I'm waiting for a very slow script to finish and have nothing better to do! :D
Inspiration!
Ah! A new idea! I think I know how I could do an awesome thing, or there's a new aspect I want to try with an existing feature. Development speed is amazingly high and new ideas get thrown around. Some of it might not be perfect, and there's a significant risk of abandoning the project at this stage.
Fun: 5/5
Usefulness: 2/5
Fulfilment: 5/5
Productivity: 4/5
Motivation!
After the initial stage of inspiration, the project moves into the motivation driven phase. Features get tweaked and polished, and the overall design gets a final overhaul. Some boring things get pushed up until later, if possible.
Fun: 3/5
Usefulness: 3/5
Fulfilment: 3/5
Productivity: 5/5
Stress!
Suddenly I realize I need to finish the feature! Doubt sets in, and some deadline starts looming. Is it good enough? Is it even usable? Productivity drops suddenly, and the major motivator becomes just getting it done before the deadline. This usually leads to last minute work. Despite this, much of the work ends up being actually very good.
Fun: 1/5
Usefulness: 3/5
Fulfilment: 2/5
Productivity: 1/5
Abandonment!
Eventually, the project is considered “good enough”, or the deadline passes, and whatever is there will just have to serve as the final version. Sure, I could spend infinitely more time working on it, but new projects are either deemed more important, or some new inspiration sets in. The project is wrapped up and released.
Fun: 3/5
Usefulness: 5/5
Fulfilment: 4/5
Productivity: 3/5
Yes, I'm talking about the ender dragon fight. ;)
Oh, I think that's how EA Games are made... if the deadline is met, they don't care if the game is bugged or not xD
Yeah same goes for most major game companies. The only way to actually get good games now a days is to make it/ its indie :P
yeah, because main stream sucks and the only good things in the world are spoiled when people hear about them
Yeah a game being 'indie' suddenly gives it a totally different and higher status.
God help the gamedevelopers for wanting to go home to their wives and kids.
you gamers are all so short on attention spans anyway. My generation played Mario brothers for years.. now, you guys have a new game to play every month or so. The industry pumps out small shorter titles because frankly anything long and you guys would still move on to play the next gears or whatever.
@Smoth: Youre right. Im not exactly part of your earlier gaming generation (not much of a sidescroller fan), but every year a new COD game comes out and it out sells competing FPS games like Halo or battlefield that took nearly 4-5 years to make, which even then get a bit rushed by the higher ups, giving gamers worse and worse games. I think time needs to be put back into games and they need more long term testing, =more time and less rushed material=
What about his other post, the one entitled "Zing". I found that one rather informative as well.
Here it is > Notch.tumblr.com
ROFL!
hope minecraft doesnt go through the last two stages 0_0
Eventually everything does. That is life, when you start understanding the transient nature of things you will be much more at ease.
sad but true
as a level designer myself, I can say that crafting out an idea and start realising it is the most entertaining thing ever, but then bugfixing it, fixing all the tiny problems of the map like lighting and ai, and finalizing it is a sheer pain in the ***