Where are the programmers?

#41 Bah! Almost every good Amiga game ever made came from Europe! That's probably why most PC folks don't know much about European game companies. They worked on the superior gaming computer of the late 80's and early 90's :)

#42 Based on what my programmer has told me, you really do need to sell yourself and your project to the programmer. They understand that their talent is valuable, so they can afford to be picky. Be as professional as possible. Have a solid design drawn out. My design isn't complete in terms of technical description, but I have a fairly extensive description as to how my game will play, and my programmer respected that. So you gotta show them just how serious you are by assuring that your game is planned out in detail. Not only gameplay descriptions, but also timelines, deliverables itemizations, lifecylces, everything. Not all programmers are gonna demand pay. Many of them will, but there are still a few hobbyists out there that will do it for a learning experience. Make sure your project shines above the rest, and probably most importantly, make sure that your project offers them a learning experience. Because if they aren't working for money, they better atleast come out of your project knowing a lot more than they did coming in.

#43 I can see this a a kind of "chicken and egg" thing. Take the project I am leading as an example. 3/5ths of the people involved are in the desert right now about to kick some Sand Monkey's butt if we go to war so they are effectively out of the game picture until they return to the States. That leaves myself and another guy in CA to work on the project. That guy is attending college, working, and running the college TV channel, basically leaving me to do useful work. Now you may ask why don't I kick them out of the project. Well, once a person is a part of the team it takes a majority vote (4/5ths in this case) to flush them out, and they also take their work with them. So here I am by myself, I don't know the first thing about C++, couldn't make a texture if I tried, and can't script since Torque uses a C++ type script. So the only things I can do are design vehicles, buildings, etc. (I have some killer vehicle designs BTW); write, and lead. I have made one complete model so far but since I can't skin it's just a boring grey model. How many people would be attracted to a project with a bunch of unskinned models?? None probably. To make matters worse, I just started modelling so my models are probably crappy compared to a *real modeller's* work. So, how does one attract people (programmers, mappers, 3D artists, etc.) with little or no examples?? As for myself I can safely say that I want to see some work, whether it be on paper (which we have A LOT!) or computer, of a team's designs and ideas if I'm going to join their project.

#44 Jeremy T: You summed up perfectly what I couldn't without being cynnical :D I was trying to summarize why 99.9% of the people sought after by this thread wouldn't be interested

Its comments like this:
"If I step back and look at it from your side, I'd be wondering what have I got to lose? I just don't understand why there are not more applicants...has projects on GG developed a reputation for burning you for joining a team? Is this why you guys are so cynical?"
that re-affirm my point...

The fact people are looking for programmers and staff is great, but its people that EXPECT them (read the quote above?), and compalin why why why won't they join my my my company.

Charles, I apolagize for belittling your company also...
The fact is I thought you were a sole propriatorship or partnership, started for 10 bucks and a signature. The fact your a corporation adds to my confusion in other areas though...like why you can't get/don't have financing to hire programmers...

If your a corporation you have stockholders...the people that appointed your board of directors, who appointed yourself and others as the officers. I could be wrong but I assume the board and officers are the only stockholders...which is all good and well, but why then form a corporation? The only reason I could think of is to neutralize your monetary risk... not lose more than you invest... and all that, but it dosen't appear much is being invested. Corporations can get low interest bank loans...especially right now...

So I'm just perplexed as to why your asking for help as the president of a corporation instead of as just another indie guy, when your offering the same thing in return (royalties). Throwing the company name and title in there is cool I guess...but it makes people like me (and surely some of the people your seeking) curious about your company and want to ask some questions like I have...And I would feel less secure providing my services to a corporation with no money than to a likeminded indie fellow...

I really am being serious, and I apolagize for being cynnical last night, but can you answer these in a way that makes sense?

#45 Hmm.. interesting.

As a programmer, I look for projects where they have people ready to do great artwork, have a good sense of humour, and are generally doing a project in a genre I'd enjoy.

Oh, and also not to have too much baggage.

Let me explain the last bit. Essentially for any indie dev team to "make it", it has to make a profit. For you to get that profit, you have to produce enough games that youre sales outweighs the costs :)) obvious so far.

Well, I'm not convinced that any indie project can actually support the 10 man teams of "designers" or "writers" Ive been seeing. Essentially, I'd say the sweet spot for indie games is 3-5 people. With that number of people, you stand a chance. Even then its a long shot.

People trying to get teams of 20 people to try and make the next big thing arent interesting to me (for a number of reasons).

I really enjoy taking a back seat from a lot of the hassle a lot too, so if someone can organize the whole thing thats great. But in the end, I think it boils down to trust. Do you feel you can actually trust these guys? do people actually work? do they deliver? even if they need a push thats ok.

As others have said, dont act like its them joining YOU, its a partnership, if you act like theyre "applying" for youre "job" when in effect theyre in the same boat as you. Well, I'd never consider working FOR anyone for "free" or "royalties".

Phil.

PS: plenty of good european games, but theyre never sold in america properly, so you'd have never heard of em.

#46 Germany has produced alot of game software aswell as austria and france. New zealand is also saturated with talent. But all these guys are building off of silicon valley's lead.

#47 Don't forget Serf City by Blue Byte =)

#48 I have no programer for my game, but can't pay them. Wonder why I'm having problems? (he says in clueless voice)

#49 I agree with Phil on this one. Indie successes are going to come from partnerships of like minded people that get to know each other, learn to trust each other, then finally make a game together. I don't think making a "company" first, then trying to fill in the rest will work.

IMHO, Orbital's past should lend some credibility, but not enough to swoop into a community and try to "hire" people. Hiring means you will pay for work done. Partnering comes into play when everybody is taking the same risks, i.e. working for future success and sharing in that success.

Until your company is successful enough to actually pay wages for a job, don't try to come across as a big comany. Instead, say you are looking for programming partners (or other skills such as design or map making or ???). It does not do your credibility any good to try to look big and corporate. For instance, don't call yourself CEO of a company that has no revenue or was incorporated last week.

I'm not trying to put down Orbital here, but it is just an example of a mistake that I see made over and over. Phil is right, this is much more like putting together a rock band than trying to set up a large company. If you have huge ideas that cannot be made with a small team, at least work small and tight until you can prove to the world that your project is worth signing up for.

Jeff Tunnell GG

#50

Quote:. . . I also take offense at the statement that "mappers" (Which I assume is a Quake/UT/Half-life term) . . .

you know what they say about assumptions don't you ;)

if you don't know where the term 'mappers' comes from you definitely don't even begin to concieve of what it takes to write real usable code, I am not talking about people that hack at existing code, but programmers that actually create code from scratch like mappers create enviornmnets from scratch.

As a programmer and 3D artist, I learned WorldCraft inside and out, just for one simple reason, so I could talk to other mappers intelligently and gain their respect, so I could know what was doable what wasn't, what was reasonable and what was not reasonable to ask for and just how long it should take to get it done if it was doable and reasonable.

Get over yourself, the other posters are correct, coders have nothing to learn from someone who is a "level designer" they only have something to learn from other senior coders.

As such I have had very little problems finding people wanting to intern or work for reduced wages just because they CAN learn something about coding and architecture from me.

But unfortunately the only thing you can offer to a coder right now is dead presidents.

Quote:. . .Of all those companies you listed, I've only ever heard of these before the year 2000:
Bullfrog - Dungeon Keeper 1&2
Team 17 - Worms Armageddon
Digital Illusions - Imperium Galactica 1&2 (working on 3)

And this one, was it Gremlin Interactive? If not, I don't know it.
Gremlin Graphics . . .

your ignorance does not mean that you are right, it just means you are ignorant.

Back in the "day", and I mean the early '80's early '90's most of the GREAT games came out of Europe, the Apple][, C=64 and Amiga were the original computer gaming platforms.

If you are ignorant of the history of the computer as a gaming machine, and don't know who the Bitmap Brothers are, you are definitely not qualified to lead a team :)
I think I played a practically every game everyone of those people that you never heard of made. Team17 made Amiga games for years before the PC was every able to display more than 8 colors and still only had 640kb!

#51 I don't think a post like this is likely to inspire people to flock to you. :P

You're being a whiny crybaby. YOU need to sell THEM on YOU. You aren't doing a very good job of it. The proof is in this thread. If you were doing a good job of selling yourself, your leadership, your intelligence, your vision, then this thread would be much more positive. Obviously, you can't manage to do that. Why should anyone trust you enough, based on what they can see about you, to put in hours upon untold hours of hard mental work for your vision? First of all, they need to see your vision for the game, be inspired by it, like it enough to work towards its accomplishment. Then, they MUST -- this is the most important part -- they MUST believe that it isn't going anywhere, that it will turn out PROFESSIONAL, that they will be proud to have worked on it, and most of all, that people will like it enough, or play it enough, or see reviews of other people that played it, so that they can feel that their work is being appreciated.

How the hell are you going to provide that sense of permanence if you provide information that is sketchy at best? Hell, it's a big enough problem to flesh out a game idea that people think is worthwhile; are you making the design doc for this game available? You don't need to be a programmer to compile a very worthwhile, concise design document. What about all of this content that's all ready to go? Where are the reams of screenshots? The concept art? If you want to attract people, presentation IS important. I am not saying that you lack a good idea, that you lack content, that you lack leadership -- but I'm saying you aren't doing a very good job of demonstrating those things to potential programmers.

#52 Never mind....if any of you heard a loud pop, that was me pulling my head from you know where.

#53 From an earlier post, if I'm not mistaken, Delphnine produced a very good game called FlashBack.

Anyway regarding this topic about not finding qualified programmers to your team, I would like to relate a little to my own experience and add a few points to it.

Reading your post, it reminded me of a project leader that talked me into programming a university simulation game nearly half a decade back. The project leader had a team of artist, writers, and scripters (nearly 20 people). They provided me a 300 page script, 2 sketch books of character design/documentation, and a rough draft of the game system (and minigames) of what they claimed to be a killer game. What they lacked was a programmer, and they wanted me to fill that void.

Since they seem very well, prepared, I've decided to help them out. Since they were not an official company or such, they could not pay me, so I ended up doing work voluntarily in exchange for a promise of royalty after the game can sell. If you have guessed it correctly, the game was never completed and I wasted nearly a whole year practically doing nothing.

The project leader didn't pay anyone, and promised everyone that they will get a share if the game suceeded big-time. That was okay in the beginning, but when the game development continued on, there was many problems. First of all, since there was no pay involved, there was little incentive for the team members to work hard. Since there are no incentives except a "promise of riches" after the game was finished, team morale was rock bottom after every setback we faced. The requirements kept changing, so it was hard to code and I couldn't get anything substantial done. The Team Manager was quite arrogant, and demanded all the team members to do it his way or go the highway. So things fell apart soon afterwards - most people left the team, and I learnt only afterwards when I submitted the scripting engine and a limited functional prototype for the game of the last design.

Turns out that most(all) of the members lack experience, and the Team leader had a major attitude problem, and managed to isolate most of the personnel in the team. So without much doubt, the game wasn't completed, and I've wasted alot of my time - and get paided nothing in return except an expensive lesson.

The major problem is that many project leaders do not adequately understand most of the processes in game development. Many of them have a dream, and a belief that they can manage a game project without actually working on one. Well, to work with these people is close to suicide, because we all know, that it takes at least 10 tries before we can get a game right :) That is why the project leader is someone that is very important, and should be someone that can gel the group together and have adequate knowledge of the game development process.

So because its hard to find good project leaders, I've decided a little later to gather a group of friends and manage our own little game production group.

Our setup is an informal one. First of all, we are not a company. The first rule is that you should never set up a company unless you are sure that you have a solid business plan that you can execute. Game Development isn't exactly the best business plan you can have. I'm sure most indie game development studio face the same problem. If you do come with a solid one, you need to have a substantial amount of money. Who will finance the group? What are the terms? These are just a small part of the questions that a project leader must ask themselves.

Since we didn't feel that it was possible to earn a living professional as game developers, all our members have day jobs or are students. We didn't have to go for financing because we all state that "we are not a company" - but a hobbyist group. We make games for fun, and we don't want to be pressured by external deadlines, requirements, and financial obligations.

We don't think we can make professional games like CS anytime soon, so the talk of money is still quite low. However, if somehow a complete fluke happens and the game manages to sell, most of the team members trust in me to handle the financial details.

The reason why that is possible is because all of the members know each other. We are related with each other in some way - friends, friends of friends, acquaintances of each other, and most of them located in a close vicinity of each other (most of them in the same city).

Because of that, the good part is that all our members understand that we DON'T PAY FOR THEIR WORK - because we CAN'T :P

So what we eseentially had was each other's contact no, a messaging client, and a website. The website has to be paid, the core members collectively pay for the hosting which is usually raised when we collectively do freelance jobs, and chip a percentage of it into a sinking fund.

We do have a surplus to run our website for over half a decade and some money to spend on tools and other stuff (like how we bought Torque), and it keeps the group running without too much of a liquidity crunch where the team leader has to pay all the expenses or the group falls under.

Though we like to call each other in fancy names such as CEO, CIO, COO, and other cooperate buzzwords, the underlining fact is that we are not a company, in dealing with people we do not pretend we are, and we are honest we are just small time amateurish game developers - with a number of games under our belts.

Now after this long and long rambling with little relationship with the topic(excuse me but I sometimes talk on and on), I would like to point out a few points to our poster why its hard to grab a good programming:

1) Why should the programmer take your idea instead of someone else's? Anything to differentiate?

2) Are you doing a a commercial or a free hobby project. If its commercial, you need to face the programmer and explain about the financial details. If its a hobby project, it would be easier to convince. In your case, you own a company so people expect you to produce a commercial product with lots of financial obligations.

3) If you own company, why not pay the members? This is a classic question that sprung up because of over-expectation on your status. Now since you are a company, how can you persuade the programmer that you are not taking advantage of him by making him work for free, and then pay him a meagre sum when finished? Many people have a distrust of companies and think the company owners are seriously trying to pay them the least for the most work done.

4) If its a Company, where is the business plan? Surely a company must have a business plan. If there is a business plan, there must be projections for revenues and expenses. If there can be projections of revenue, then that could clearly explain more in detail to convince that they will ultimately get paid after they finish the project.

5) How can you make the programmer trust and work for you? Programmers won't jump into your project unless they are either a newbie (who would work for anyone), or there is some aura that drives them to you. That aura could easily be defined as a payment or the programmer believes in your judgement and believes your project will succeed.

6) You have mentioned that you worked in many game development groups before starting your own company. During the past experiences, are there anyone who has good programming foundations who could train themselves to be a Torque programmer? I'm sure that you have extensive contacts, and it would be easier to persuade people you know and work with to work with a more voluntary basis.

7) What about trying programming it yourself? Though it won't be that good, but the fact is that most game development groups are underfunded and staffed, so it would be quite normal someone has to take an extra job that they are actually well versed in.

8) If you have found a programmer, how much support can your current group offer them? A programmer may not want to be involved with trival issues not regarding programming. Some issues may include like how to get your story in the game. The programmers shouldn't be screaming in frustration trying to explain the scripters to code in the correct format :)

9) How to define the difference from Royalties and Free Work? The reality is harsh. A failed game project means no money and no royalties. How can you show that to people that don't know you the difference? (Go back to observation 2)

10) If you are so sure your game is going to succeed, why are you not putting a substantial amount of funding up? This is quite an interesting question because its related with payment with royalties issue. If you're not sure, then the royalty payment method doesn't look attractive :-/

I think by clarifying these points clearly it would be easier for you to find a qualified Torque Programmer to help your project out.

Good Luck :)

p.s. Please forgive me for my long rant, just can't seem to stop it...

#54 duh!
Pisal what happens??? did you see the lenght of your post??? :o)
Whoo, I don't know if I can read that ;)

Anyway Charles I'd really like you to inform you on game, I don't know how you can make an RTS without knowing the Bitmap Brothers!
What a great team!
Now take Team 17, Worms was a revolutionary concept, over 1 million of sold game (can't imagine how much it has been hacked too). This game is known by tons of ppl, even non-player.

Delphine software has also made Little Big adventure, and the Moto racer series. Ok, 2 and 3 are not so good, but the first one was great.

Bullfrog, pff, but Bullfrog was GREAT! Don't forget Syndicate, this game was great, they understand far before eveyone the potential of this kind of game. Diablo come from this game.

Recently you've got also Taketwo interactive (hidden and dangerous), Pendulo studios (the game to come: Runaway) and of course Pyros studios from Spain too who made Commandos.
And what about Rayman, yup it's french! Alone in the dark too.
You've got also the adventure games by Cryo, Atlantis was good.
We got lots of difficulty to survive, cause we don't have as much money as USA or Japan...

I'm always happy to see a game having succeed in the world, even the best-sellers, cause there's already been lot of french studios closed, and about 2000 ppl fired...
Good luck all ;)

#55 Just a quick comment based on my own experiences.

I have big games in development. The idea behind the deelopment of these games is to compete with industry giants by advancing beyond their own standards. This is hard, true, but impossible, hell no. I base my ideas what would not only sell in a game, but would be more appealing to the intended gamers. This takes alot of work, so much in fact that I've been working on my many titles for over 10 years. Joining GG, I only plan to succeed. I hope to bring in like minded developers to not only help in developing the games, but to gain experience in their own field of development as well as be proud to have been part of a successful project. Having said that, ALL of my projects will have me seeing them to completion. With or without help, but without will take much more time.

Now, I have lent a hand in many projects here at GG and at other dev. sites/teams. I offer my experience and devotion to those without any expected return other than experience and appreciation.

I hate any ranking system and I always consider those around me as equals. I believe people should work together to accomplish their own goals by contributing and therefore being contributed to.

So far, it's still been just me on my own projects, with a very few exceptions though they are very appreciated.

I will continue to persue my dream. I hope you do the same. If you could use any help I could offer, I offer it with good intentions and restricted only by my personal lifestyle and my lack of industry professonalism.

- Christopher Dapo ~ Ronixus

(Sorry, could not resist. For those of you who think you have rank advantage doing code, though you are definitly not alone, you are mistaken. That's all I'll say to that.)

#56 Ok, so we generally have 2 types of programmers, those that give reasonable and logical things they look for when looking at a dev team to join, and those that think all develoeprs that are not programmers are utterly incapable of successfully building and managing a game dev team, and they are all beneath programmers as far as a social standing. Brilliant...

I appreciate those who've been insightful in their posts, I've learned quite a bit, and gained much from creating this post. My request is still out there, I've gained one programmmer now that's familliar with Torque. One more would be nice, but I can make due with what I have if neccessary.

Thanks all!

#57

Quote:
Ok, so we generally have 2 types of programmers, those that give reasonable and logical things they look for when looking at a dev team to join, and those that think all develoeprs that are not programmers are utterly incapable of successfully building and managing a game dev team, and they are all beneath programmers as far as a social standing. Brilliant...

Sorry to burst your bubble... but that type of comment is WHY many developers (Be it Programmer, Writer, Tester, Artist, etc) are not joining other teams and are instead working on their own.

Everyone is looking for specific things when they look for a team to join. Some developers, like myself, aren't looking for a team, nor are they working on their own projects. They're just here to help and/or learn.

But you seem to have gotten a bit indignant over the fact that no one replied to your job posting that was made on March 2, 2003. Hell that's only been 9 days now, you waited all of a week before complaining about it. People have lives, and for most of us, this isn't the primary focus, so a week or more away from the forums is common.

#58 I meant to imply that type one was good. Anyway, I've gotten what I need and wanted, and some learned some things I wasn't looking for, but found valuble anyway.

Good luck to you all!