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Why decline in generalists leads to disjointed games and harms tool quality

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Re: Why decline in generalists leads to disjointed games and harms tool quality

#11

Post by softsound »

croes wrote: post #4

Is it even possible nowadays to be a generalist? In science something similar happened. There was a time where some people knew pretty much in every science field, chemistry, physics, biology etc. but the amount of knowledge grew and it become impossible to know enough in every field. Maybe game development isn't any different. You either become an expert in on field or your knowledge is to superficial to actually he…

What do you think most indies are? I'd consider most indies much more generalist. You can't ever know a whole field but you can know pieces of it and once you learn one system it can be easier to know another. I think for example programmers often make very good designers as they will think though problems, handle attention to detail, and work to often find multiple solutions if need be... Wait that sounds like every field doesn't it ;) code, art, design, sound etc.

The main issue is mindset, a programmer might cut short a design to save himself time, an artist might simplify the gameplay to not put in as much effort, and a musician or writer might not focus as much on the visuals because they get caught up in how it should it sound/read etc. But they certainly can take on other roles. If you have any experience with start-ups and indies or freelancing you might find yourself take over roles you didn't expect originally. On smaller teams this goes a lot further.

Re: Why decline in generalists leads to disjointed games and harms tool quality

#12

Post by grensley »

noobermin wrote: post #2

I thought this was the point of project managers, they're supposed to harmonise various types of specialist when no one generalist can do everything.

In my experience they are very limited by their lack of familiarity with the code. They might be a generalist at everything else, but that's a pretty hard ceiling.

Re: Why decline in generalists leads to disjointed games and harms tool quality

#13

Post by t-writescode »

grensley wrote: post #12
noobermin wrote: post #2

I thought this was the point of project managers, they're supposed to harmonise various types of specialist when no one generalist can do everything.

In my experience they are very limited by their lack of familiarity with the code. They might be a generalist at everything else, but that's a pretty hard ceiling.

It's the developer's job to help relay the difficulties they're experiencing to the PMs so they can all work together to reduce tech debt or weirdness.

And back when I worked at Microsoft, the PMs were call-pattern experts, too, or at least the great ones were.

Re: Why decline in generalists leads to disjointed games and harms tool quality

#14

Post by irrational »

I spent 23+ years doing front end programming, server side programming, database design, sql writing, shell script writing, etc. Recently I was moved into an integration position that primarily used Apache nifi (a gui application) to tie systems together. It is very specialized and quite boring. No code writing required. It feels insane to move a generalist like myself into a specialist position, but they were sunsetting what I had been working on and this was what was open at my same level (at least on paper).

Re: Why decline in generalists leads to disjointed games and harms tool quality

#15

Post by ooterness »

croes wrote: post #4

Is it even possible nowadays to be a generalist? In science something similar happened. There was a time where some people knew pretty much in every science field, chemistry, physics, biology etc. but the amount of knowledge grew and it become impossible to know enough in every field. Maybe game development isn't any different. You either become an expert in on field or your knowledge is to superficial to actually he…

Overspecialized teams are also a hazard.

The best design solutions are usually compromises, but when the trade-off crosses into different disciplines (e.g., mechanical vs electrical), it can get tricky.

At minimum, you need people who can even recognize when such trades exist. It's better if you can find translators: the rare person with enough expertise in relevant domains to get to get two teams to work together efficiently.

In my own career, I've often found it useful to pick up cross-discipline skills, at least enough basics to fill one of the above roles.

Re: Why decline in generalists leads to disjointed games and harms tool quality

#16

Post by Pannoniae »

cynicalkane wrote: post #10
Pannoniae wrote: post #7

This also explains the declining gameplay and immersion of many (most?) games. The art and the gameplay are simply not synced to each other, so they feel separate and disjoint. For example, the environment having similarly looking but differently behaving objects like rocks. Or how instead of designing emergent systems, most games just slap modifiers on everything and "balance" that way. +20% bow reload speed and +25…

I think this harmoniousness operates in more subtle ways, too. I'm playing through the new Zelda game, Tears of the Kingdom, and it's a lot of fun, but there's something that doesn't quite click... like the UI is a behavorial engagement layer over the game, and not part of the game itself. Like you can never be completely in the world because something outside is holding your hand all the way. The 16- through 64- bit…

Yup, games abandoning skeuomorphism and UI animations is arguably even worse than regular UIs abandoning it.

The game UI should feel part of the game (good examples: SimCity 4 and Sid Meier's Pirates) and not feel out of place.

In-game advertisements are also off-putting unless they fit thematically and stylistically into the game.

edit: your comment was much better when it was more verbose!<3

Re: Why decline in generalists leads to disjointed games and harms tool quality

#17

Post by [deleted] »

surfpel wrote: post #8
noobermin wrote: post #2

I thought this was the point of project managers, they're supposed to harmonise various types of specialist when no one generalist can do everything.

That’s the point of integration . They’re generalists who are like technical project managers and bridge the gap between teams.

[deleted]

Re: Why decline in generalists leads to disjointed games and harms tool quality

#18

Post by Aloha »

croes wrote: post #4

Is it even possible nowadays to be a generalist? In science something similar happened. There was a time where some people knew pretty much in every science field, chemistry, physics, biology etc. but the amount of knowledge grew and it become impossible to know enough in every field. Maybe game development isn't any different. You either become an expert in on field or your knowledge is to superficial to actually he…

Yes.

I'm a fella who has a smattering mix of - systems engineering, systems administration, network engineering and administration, database administration, software development, analog and digital communications systems design and administration (from the circuit level up), UI/UX design, process engineering, documentation, RF Engineering, project management, and a little bit of marketing.

The only thing I'm missing is the financial aspects of business, but from the technical, to the structural, to basically anything technology or people related - I know enough of it to step in and be competent in most situations.

To quote Heinlein "Specialization is for insects."

Re: Why decline in generalists leads to disjointed games and harms tool quality

#19

Post by jltsiren »

croes wrote: post #4

Is it even possible nowadays to be a generalist? In science something similar happened. There was a time where some people knew pretty much in every science field, chemistry, physics, biology etc. but the amount of knowledge grew and it become impossible to know enough in every field. Maybe game development isn't any different. You either become an expert in on field or your knowledge is to superficial to actually he…

In jobs that require a high level of expertise, you usually want to be both a specialist (to make you worth hiring) and a generalist (to be able to do what needs to be done). But it takes experience to get there. A lot of work in science and game development is done by relatively junior people, because both fields suffer from a high level of attrition. Those people can be specialists or generalists, but rarely both.

Re: Why decline in generalists leads to disjointed games and harms tool quality

#20

Post by softsound »

cynicalkane wrote: post #10
Pannoniae wrote: post #7

This also explains the declining gameplay and immersion of many (most?) games. The art and the gameplay are simply not synced to each other, so they feel separate and disjoint. For example, the environment having similarly looking but differently behaving objects like rocks. Or how instead of designing emergent systems, most games just slap modifiers on everything and "balance" that way. +20% bow reload speed and +25…

I think this harmoniousness operates in more subtle ways, too. I'm playing through the new Zelda game, Tears of the Kingdom, and it's a lot of fun, but there's something that doesn't quite click... like the UI is a behavorial engagement layer over the game, and not part of the game itself. Like you can never be completely in the world because something outside is holding your hand all the way. The 16- through 64- bit…

The UI for Tears of the Kingdom has been quite annoying to me in this regard but so many aspects of that game were just troublesome. It's still fun, but the story and characters make no sense, the UI is modern and lifeless. They went into the weeds of the gameplay, you can see that's where they put their energy. I've been disappointed in a lot of the directions... It's just bad furries left and right. This game would sell with most anything they put in it, but it feels lackluster and unmemorable in many areas. I'm probably a minority in thinking the voice actors are trying too hard too..

I do love the idea of being able to go up and down though it feels a little awkward to me as I normally have to go way up to go down into the underground due to a lot of level design. I kinda wish they put some more cliffs nearby to save me the time. I like the underground a lot though and find that part the most fun.

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