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OneEightHundred posted:I'm still not sure why the reversal happened. The US/Japan schemes used to be the same, up until the middle of the PS1 generation when they diverged. It's not like there's some legacy reason for it... the legacy was to leave it the way it was. I'll admit my theory as to why is purely conjecture on my part; I haven't seen anything anywhere that backs it up. It's why I'd have done it if it were my decision. One thing I'm pretty certain of, though, is that whatever the reason, it will not have been done arbitrarily.
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# ? Apr 28, 2018 14:08 |
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# ? Apr 23, 2024 07:54 |
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I'm curious about what sort of software development strategies do game devs use? Agile, Scrum, Waterfall? Do you guys do test driven development? What about code reviews?
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# ? May 1, 2018 00:46 |
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CommieGIR posted:I'm curious about what sort of software development strategies do game devs use? Agile, Scrum, Waterfall? Varies greatly by org. Agile is common, as is agilefall. Code reviews are pretty common. Tests in game code are sadly uncommon. Lots of architectural practices abandoned elsewhere years ago, like extensive [often exclusively for all state] use of singletons, is prevalent. Jira looms over dev just like everywhere else in software. Git is coming into wider use. I’m currently stuck on perforce; our rep seemed surprised to learn that our code was still managed by p4, so I expect a bunch of other groups have switched to a hybrid versioning system with p4 handling art and git handling code (p4 rep went into a whole thing on their solution at me, as they do). So basically it’s broken in similar ways as every other software shop. With the addition of perforce being the ‘legacy’ vcs instead of cvs.
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# ? May 1, 2018 02:49 |
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leper khan posted:Varies greatly by org. Agile is common, as is agilefall. Does git have issues handling non-code asset files? I'm a developer but I don't work in games, the few Unity projects I have done on my off time are all on git and it has never complained about large assets/textures. I imagine it's a little complicated handling your code and your other assets in separate version control systems.
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# ? May 1, 2018 15:32 |
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Fano posted:Does git have issues handling non-code asset files? I'm a developer but I don't work in games, the few Unity projects I have done on my off time are all on git and it has never complained about large assets/textures. I imagine it's a little complicated handling your code and your other assets in separate version control systems. Git-lfs has made it much better, but it still has issues handling lots of large binaries. For small/medium size projects it’s not a big deal.
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# ? May 1, 2018 16:16 |
leper khan posted:Lots of architectural practices abandoned elsewhere years ago, like extensive [often exclusively for all state] use of singletons, is prevalent. Can anyone expand on this? I read somewhere that ECS was the prevalent way of doing things (as opposed to MVC like most of the rest of the dev universe) and my slight experience with Unity seemed to confirm that. What are the major developer differences between games and other industries?
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# ? May 1, 2018 17:36 |
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CommieGIR posted:I'm curious about what sort of software development strategies do game devs use? Agile, Scrum, Waterfall? As with most places it varies. Agile or Agilefall as above is most common. Some where it's a 1 week 'sprint' with you and your lead saying here's whats next. (Not even Kanban just this is your focus this week.) TDD is very rare but tests are more common. If it's a mobile game or MMO tests are more common both because of the increased complexity, the clear delineation of concerns, and the type of engineer that is hired for a backend is the type that tend to write tests. However I also was chatting with a friend recently who has been in the industry for the past 18 years and he mentioned that he's never been at a place that wrote tests including his own start-ups so YMMV. Code-Reviews are almost universal but almost all are just rubber ducking. My current place does automated tooling of which I have mixed feelings. My biggest annoyance is that DI on the client isn't really a thing still in most places leading to those drat god classes. Backend wise it's far more normal though.
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# ? May 2, 2018 14:53 |
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Is there a better or more current resource for realtime tactical AI than F.E.A.R.'s papers? My impression from playing recent FPS efforts is no, but I have only worked at indie studios and so don't feel like I have enough perspective to say either way. That AI developer seems to have moved on to actual AI research, so I'm a little puzzled as to the current situation.
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# ? May 4, 2018 01:28 |
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Orikaeshigitae posted:Is there a better or more current resource for realtime tactical AI than F.E.A.R.'s papers? My impression from playing recent FPS efforts is no, but I have only worked at indie studios and so don't feel like I have enough perspective to say either way. The state of the art is captured pretty well in the Game AI Pro series. The first two are available for free, the third still costs money but will be free eventually. I haven't read the chapter but Killzone's AI is quite highly regarded for an FPS, that might be a good place to start. The Last of Us stuff I have read, and it's really good.
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# ? May 4, 2018 10:12 |
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This thread is incredible and I'm so glad I found it as I'm just starting my own dev journey
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# ? May 8, 2018 09:31 |
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I'd consider being a game designer.
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# ? May 14, 2018 21:36 |
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You're hired!
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# ? May 15, 2018 01:31 |
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KingBomber69 posted:I'd consider being a game designer. But, do you have ideas??
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# ? May 15, 2018 04:10 |
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Is there a reason why all these delay announcements are happening right now? In a big wave, I mean.
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# ? May 18, 2018 13:23 |
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Question for US game devs: How common are binding arbitration agreements in employment contracts, and how often are they successfully negotiated away when you’re discussing employment terms for a new position?
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# ? May 22, 2018 15:53 |
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Doctor Soup posted:Question for US game devs: Extremely; never tried and I imagine very infrequently. Depending on the state, the enforcement of that clause varies. Talk to a lawyer.
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# ? May 22, 2018 19:31 |
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Have any of you ever worked on a game with a famous/infamous difficulty spike or even directly on that part of the game? Not so much games like Dark Souls which are meant to frustrate, I'm thinking stuff like the shooting asteroids part of Dead Space, the parking lot tutorial in Driver or 'all you had to do was follow the drat train, CJ!'. What made it such a spike? Did you know it was going to make people struggle before it left the studio?
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# ? May 24, 2018 10:29 |
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Somewhat random curiosity: One of the FPS games I played in early testing phases recently used UE4, and had a console command that allowed you to specify your mouse sensitivity by first inputting your mouse DPI and then inputting a desired distance (in inches) of mouse travel required for a 360. This was super convenient for me (and for a lot of other players who played the game) because I really dislike having different sensitivity in different FPS games. Is doing something like this actually difficult? Why do I not see similar options (at least, for instance, displaying the required mouse travel for a 360 in the game somewhere) in other games?
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# ? May 25, 2018 04:51 |
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Anyone work at Riot? What's with all their recent negative glassdoor reviews? Are they trolls or is the studio having issues? Is that kind of thing normal?
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# ? May 29, 2018 17:02 |
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Buckwheat Sings posted:Anyone work at Riot? It's pretty standard to see negative reviews on Glassdoor. It's a useful site for sure, but it's also a place where people with an axe to grind go to air grievances. I've not worked there, but the folks I've spoken to that have worked there have had good things to say about Riot.
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# ? May 29, 2018 17:44 |
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Buckwheat Sings posted:Anyone work at Riot? I’ve never seen trolls on Glassdoor but it’s not that simple. There’s two part of the reviews. The facts and the feelings. The feelings are always correct it’s what the reviewer feels after all. Ie: the company is going down hill. People are depressed/ scared etc... then there’s the facts which oddly is usually where things are wrong. Ie: They promote from nepotism, there’s no long term plans etc... usually the people giving the reviews are QA or something and aren’t privy to the things they’re bitching about. Which is another thing. Look to the reviews written by full time employees. Preferably engineers and producers as they tend to know what’s going on.
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# ? May 29, 2018 18:30 |
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I dunno if I'd call them trolls, but I've seen reviews on Glassdoor that are almost definitely fictional. There are also a handful that are literally outside commentary from people that have no idea what goes on inside the company. (I don't work for Riot.) kznlol posted:One of the FPS games I played in early testing phases recently used UE4, and had a console command that allowed you to specify your mouse sensitivity by first inputting your mouse DPI and then inputting a desired distance (in inches) of mouse travel required for a 360. You'd need to get everyone to agree on a standard, it would probably needs to be kicked off by a third party because the incentive for every developer is, if anything, to match the sensitivity behavior of their own games. Physical distance to turn distance isn't necessarily linear. There can be acceleration curves, contextual modifiers (zoom-in), and pitch/yaw might have different sensitivities (usually less pitch sensitivity). Ideal sensitivity isn't necessarily the same for different games anyway. The whole point of sensitivity controls on gaming mice is that it's not necessarily the same in different parts of the same game. OneEightHundred fucked around with this message at 06:51 on May 30, 2018 |
# ? May 30, 2018 03:59 |
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Buckwheat Sings posted:Anyone work at Riot? Sort of. The reviews are true but a very narrow slice of what has happened. Something to consider, Riot has more than 3,000 employees and due to the heavily decentralized nature of the company, there are many parts that are amazing, and a few parts which are pretty crappy. Separately the company is trying to shift around many pieces to grow into a healthier development organization for the long term, and that is also painful. The good or bad experiences are mostly based on what teams you work with, rather than a specific discipline being good or bad. Disclaimer: I worked at Riot for many years and just recently left.
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# ? May 30, 2018 06:53 |
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Edit : but yeah, I'm sure many of them are just totally legitimate as well. I think if there's been a spike of v negative reviews from people who don't actually work there just recently that's probably related to them canceling a big community event last Friday due to technical problems. People were awfully mad and posting in glassdoor is definitely the kind of thing the League of Legends fanbase would do.
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# ? May 30, 2018 07:05 |
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Yeah, it looks like a lot of negatives were from before last Friday, so probably not related to the event cancelling. Glassdoor is a very "grain of salt" website. There's usually useful information, but it's very possible for both fake positive and negative reviews to appear, and you absolutely have to find reviews relevant to your position and location. In my opinion looking for trends is probably the most useful thing. Like, if the negatives are "work life balance sucks" and the positives mention it as well (or some sappy way to say it's actually a good thing), then you can probably expect your work life balance to suck.
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# ? May 30, 2018 07:38 |
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I'm looking to get into game development as an artist, but I'm not sure what a good/correct approach is. I have a BFA in Studio (heh) Art, but I don't have any industry experience or even really a portfolio of digital art. Right now I'm more concerned with getting a job than having my dream job, so considering I'm at ground zero, what would be a better course of action - double down on a digital art portfolio and try to apply at a larger company as a concept artist, or self-teach myself some of the modeling programs like Zbrush and Maya and open myself to work at smaller companies that don't hire dedicated concept artists? My other consideration is to go back to school somewhere where a bunch of my credits transfer and blaze through a program as fast as possible with hopes of an internship and a more career-relevant degree. (for the record, I have a second degree in art education and just quit my teaching job)
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# ? May 31, 2018 21:48 |
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RazzleDazzleHour posted:I'm looking to get into game development as an artist, but I'm not sure what a good/correct approach is. I have a BFA in Studio (heh) Art, but I don't have any industry experience or even really a portfolio of digital art. Right now I'm more concerned with getting a job than having my dream job, so considering I'm at ground zero, what would be a better course of action - double down on a digital art portfolio and try to apply at a larger company as a concept artist, or self-teach myself some of the modeling programs like Zbrush and Maya and open myself to work at smaller companies that don't hire dedicated concept artists? My other consideration is to go back to school somewhere where a bunch of my credits transfer and blaze through a program as fast as possible with hopes of an internship and a more career-relevant degree. I’m an engineer, but my understanding for artists is that your portfolio is the only thing that matters. You’ll probably have an easier time getting a job doing UI or character art or props than pure concept. Make sure your portfolio shows your best work; maybe target portfolios to positions the way you would target a resume (cut landscapes or props for character positions, etc).
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# ? Jun 1, 2018 00:39 |
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leper khan posted:Im an engineer, but my understanding for artists is that your portfolio is the only thing that matters. Yeah, strong emphasis on portfolio is how art school application worked too, that's the advice I gave to students. I also have like three different resumes I use for different job types depending on what I'm applying for, but haven't begun a real job hunt though for this situation. Everything I'd be putting together for a portfolio would be from scratch starting now so I can start targeting for those things. Wouldn't have considered UI though, that would be fun to try out, but the only thing I can think of doing to practice would be to try and improve the UI of games that are already released. For character art, mix of portrait and full-body? More completed drawings, gesture sketches, or both again?
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# ? Jun 1, 2018 01:22 |
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RazzleDazzleHour posted:Studio (heh) Art, Do you have art experience outside of school and teaching? You mentioned industry experience, just confirming if you have experience elsewhere (marketing, freelancing, etc.). As far as I've seen, portfolio is key for entry, and experience with a good portfolio shows that you can work under restrictions (usually time). I don't think you could get into a senior position, but it'd be nice if you could say "I've worked under these constraints and still produced quality art."
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# ? Jun 1, 2018 06:33 |
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Character artist in games means 3D character artist, so keep that in mind. If you're a painter, you could chase concept art, but (A) a concept artist is more of an idea/solution generator than a painter and (B) concept art is generally the single most difficult position to land in games. If you have graphic design/motion graphics/UI interests, then UI/UX are positions that are frequently in demand. Beyond that, there's very little exclusively 2D art roles in games. Even companies that are big enough to employ dedicated texture artists use photogrammetry, procedural generation, and 3d sculpting to make their materials.
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# ? Jun 1, 2018 06:49 |
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On the other hand, the mobile game industry does still use tons of 2D art, which could be a good direction if you really love 2D.
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# ? Jun 1, 2018 16:28 |
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Ah, good point.
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# ? Jun 1, 2018 20:36 |
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Look at your skillset, think of the kinds of techniques and approaches you prefer, then go find where those are being used. This takes a lot of research and independent thought. Then make a portfolio based on those contexts.
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# ? Jun 2, 2018 00:11 |
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Buckwheat Sings posted:Anyone work at Riot? Some of the negative reviews is legit..[you can usually tell, the multi paragraph ones that go into detail] even the negative reviews praise pay and benefits but there is more to a job than just that. As for issues I'll put this out there. 2000+ people in the Bundy/Olympic campus. 1 game in 10 years. League and E-sports are super strong teams but that doesn't take 2000 people to maintain/operate. They used to brag [LOL @ hungry and humble there] about being on Fortunes top places to work for list, but lately they're not even in the top 100 while "That other place" in Irvine is always on the list. That being said Riot's pay scale is better than Blizzards without a doubt. MC 68000 fucked around with this message at 06:24 on Jun 2, 2018 |
# ? Jun 2, 2018 06:01 |
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Geez you're right. What would cause all that stuff? Valve hasn't been doing much either aside from their upcoming card game. Is it just one of those fear things startups into big studios have once they're big?
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# ? Jun 5, 2018 16:35 |
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Buckwheat Sings posted:Anyone work at Riot? Back in October the leadership of the company changed (https://www.riotgames.com/en/explore/founders-lane-swap). This is in turn changing a bit of how the company runs. I don't want to get into specifics, but so far I agree with everything that I'm aware has changed, and as a result and I'm quite optimistic about the future of the studio. That said, any time a leadership shift happens it'll make people uneasy, so I think at least some of that is being reflected in the reviews. Brackhar fucked around with this message at 08:19 on Jun 11, 2018 |
# ? Jun 11, 2018 05:10 |
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I work at a creative studio of 70 people that has over the course of 20 years employed 150 - in the last 10 years we've properly in a big way fired 5 people. We have 5 reviews on Glassdoor, all negative. It's pretty clear who wrote them. Some scale perspective is always needed.
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# ? Jun 15, 2018 05:13 |
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How does locking a release date work? Is it a constant back and forth between the devs and the publisher or is it a deadline you have to hit? Do delays hit the dev or the publisher financially?
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# ? Jun 15, 2018 12:26 |
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Terminally Bored posted:How does locking a release date work? Is it a constant back and forth between the devs and the publisher or is it a deadline you have to hit? This post goes into how release dates and day one patches work: http://ramiismail.com/2016/08/patch-the-process/ Developers, the publisher, and platform companies have to come to an agreement about release dates, and parts of the schedule that affect that. A finished game that's not released literally never happens, an problematically unfinished game that is released sucks for everyone involved, so contracts frequently have milestones and checkpoints required to advance software production.
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# ? Jun 15, 2018 16:49 |
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# ? Apr 23, 2024 07:54 |
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This is a general programming question, since it has been a sore spot with regards to a certain game I like. People ask for multi-threading/64-bit all of the time with Rimworld, and I tend to brush off the whole multi-threading thing because that is a can of worms I can't currently wrap my head around, and see as unnecessary compared to the constant headache of running out of addressable memory. I understand it isn't as simple as flipping a switch on the compiler, but what I don't understand is WHERE in the process it starts to become an issue. So my question boils down to two things: 1) Why 2) What and where are the hurdles in taking a finished product from 32-bit to 64-bit addressing?
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# ? Jun 15, 2018 21:30 |