Path Of The Indie - Processes and Pipelines

CEO of Rummy Games creating Saturated Outer Space proceeds to share his experience with other independent developers

Greetings!

For newcomers here is the first post about me and reasons why these articles might interest you.

Disclaimer: I’m not going to tell you how to make video games properly. Instead, I am sharing my personal experience and training while managing an indie team following the Path.

Management is nothing more than motivating other people

Lee Iacocca

So why do we even need any regulations instead of just being creative and enthusiastic? Wouldn’t those frameworks limit our imagination and kill all the creativity? I have no idea. I think every team has its own path. We chose one with sequenced processes and some SCRUM methodology implementation.

From the very beginning I tried to organize at least a partly functional system of efficient processes. To make the game creation transparent, understandable and simple. I tried to found some basic planning, foremost for the team, not for myself. I understand that it could sound like overthinking but systematisation is my passion. And as I couldn’t develop a game myself my options were:

1. Learn how to do it and do everything by myself. Not my case. 
2. Find someone who could do it. Draw them in. Simplify processes for them. Systematize everything.

I will tell in this post how our work is regulated to make the information circulation easier and with minimum distortions.

№ 1 Necessity and Sufficiency 

It was essential not to overload everyone with planning and reporting. But it was also important to keep an up to date task list of every team member. At first I took it all on me, created Jira for the team, created projects there according to development fields: code, game design, art, administrative work etc. Our task tracker is not a manager’s whip. It’s just a task list divided by type, deadline, responsable, priority and other useful categories. At first it was me setting tasks, and in the majority of cases it was also me closing them, even for actual executors. Now it’s our project manager’s job. What is in it to the team? Every member has a personal task list with priorities. Everyone knows what has to be done now and what to do next. It helped us to eliminate unhelpful questions like “I don’t know what to do” or “it’s not my job”. We don’t insist on closing the tasks, the priority is to accomplish them.

Along with the task tracker I also started to use Confluence, not only for the project documentation but also for follow-ups, logging all important decisions made. 

Apart from those two programs we soon felt the need in a version-control system which was acquired not by me this time but by our programmers. We had been using Git from the very start. For cloud storage we used BitBusket but soon moved to GitHub.  

In my opinion, those three instruments are the necessary minimum for any team. You can option to use Trello and Notion instead of Jira and Confluence if you like. I know that there are also Google docs but it’s a must have anyway, I don’t even consider our work without them.

№ 2 If it’s not written down it doesn’t exist 

As our team has more than 3 people the information needs to be stored somewhere separately from our own heads. That’s why we have the rule to write down everything on Confluence: decisions on game design, lore changes, objects or units changes, tables of characteristics, assets, content plans, pipelines, marketing strategy etc. Some things aren’t well suited for Confluence, then we attach the link to the following document or resource. If something isn’t written down with the text or link then we surmise that we didn’t discuss it at all and therefore it doesn’t exist. 

Apart from keeping the important information we gain another benefit: everything not written down is thrown away without overloading our backlog. It means it’s not important enough and can be dismissed. 

№ 3 Create and use pipelines

The power of an indie team is in its flexibility. But when in every development sector, in level design, for example, there are few people participating, then we have to regulate it somehow. Otherwise everyone will pull it in different directions. At first we tried to create pipelines in table form with deadlines. It was a failure, no one followed it. Then we tried “simple” pipelines on Miro explaining the place and interactions of every employee. It simplifies onboarding and administrative work as there’s no need to explain the existing order of things every time. 

Pipelines are not being followed by 100% but it’s always better to have some plan than nothing. 

№ 4 Unified communication environment 

It’s important to agree from the start on the platforms for communication and information exchange. We use Telegram for general chat and a few thematic ones: level design, art, marketing, programming. Project manager makes sure that all commitments with their deadlines find the responsible employees in time. 

№ 5 Constant feedback collecting and communication flow 

At first we had only one conference call a week to follow our progress and distribute the tasks. Like a real week long sprint. I tried to make everyone tell about their accomplishments and plans, or complications if they needed help. But it became clear quite soon that people felt it like a burden and the efficiency was low. Then I took on myself the responsibility to keep a status meeting every week. My method is to follow task tracker and to gather information from everyone. I tell our weekly results on team calls, show graphics and prepare next milestones. 

Weekly calls evolved too, so now we have several calls per week, all devoted to certain fields of work: general meeting for the whole team and specific ones where different team members are gathered: level design, art, marketing and content with game design.  

I’m grateful to our programmers who did such a good job in organizing their working processes that I don’t really need to involve myself in their work. This is a perfect case when a department doesn’t need to be regulated by administration. 

So I named all the most valuable instruments which help us keep track of the tasks and the information. 

I think that’s enough and involving more administrative instruments could be excessive and even unproductive. People have some actual game development work to do too. In the perfect world only PM has to work on all those resources closely, when other team members only use it as a unified wiki of the project.

* * *

This part covers the time from February 2019 to October 2019.

The moral of the story: team leader, administrator / PM is not a person who demands from everyone the work to be done. It is a person who makes their life easier, organizes the processes and makes the tasks and deadlines clear for all. It’s the light at the end of the tunnel, not a train behind you. 
What have to be done to lead the development in a team:

1. Established work structure helps to keep a unified information field for the team
2. Unified communication environment, constant logging and updating the data minimize the information distortion 
3. Feedback and communication are needed for everyone to feel they are part of the project. Creativity is growing on the information exchange, that’s how new ideas and inspiration are born.
4. Systematization demands certain management skills and at least two administrators who can back each other up