Meetings…
February 29, 2008 Game Development No CommentsSo, I’m not a big fan of meetings. Actually, I like some meetings, just not most. For example, when we get talk about cool shit like weapons and give input on how they feel, that’s a good meeting. Hands on meetings, where you get to play the game, those are awesome.
The problem is that most meetings I take part in aren’t typically about cool shit. They’re usually about addressing on-going problems. That’s all good if we actually get to the root of the problem. What isn’t good is when people have to leave at a certain time, but we “have to get through this” before they leave. Those kind of meetings tend to waste peoples time.
I’ve been reading a lot of Joel Spolsky’s book called “Joel on Software.” If you haven’t read it and you’re in the games / software industry, you’re missing something huge. Anyway, one of the core points he drives home is to fix code before moving onto something new. The idea is that if you’re working on some problem, and you encounter some bugs, it’s better to deal with them now instead of having to relearn the problem later which takes way more time from polishing the game or adding new features. It hits home for me since I’ve been through that many times. The other nice thing is that you get an awesome, stable base to build things on. Also, if you have to cut some features because you ran out of time on the schedule, at least what you have is solid.