Avatar Trials has been a great experience. We are able to make a game at the top school in the nation for making games and instantly export our title to Xbox 360 for testing. We have a great team of 12 and two semesters to do it. However, there are great challenges in video game production.
Unless you are a giant prodigy, making games is difficult from early concept to pre-production to marketing. As the art director for Avatar Trials: Ninja Uprising, I had some tough challenges to help get this game to the Xbox Live. Project management is one of the tougher parts of this project. When I work alone it is easy for me to get in a groove and create cool stuff, but in the groove I make things only a certain way. It is tough for me to hear criticism from eleven other people and make the change. The other way around I have to make decisions and tell people things need to be changed. Artists can get a bit emotional, but that makes artists great. I tried to change my style and help others too.
Another problem is iteration. Iterations are huge in video game design. Avatar Trials went through revision after revision until we decided how we could make our game fun in the amount of time we had. I could not be attached to an idea that I liked if it was not fun. Video games should be at least entertaining. Iteration is key.
I also had issues with staying to a rigid schedule. When school, life, and work gets in the way of my video game it was important to keep everyone on task. This is harder than it sounds. Everyone is busy and no one has time. Make Time!
Finally, when managing a team communication is key. Making sure that everyone is on task and communicating with each other is vital. After 3 game projects I still have a hard time communicating and keeping everyone on the team talking to together.
To wrap up: Be ready to throw out everything and start over. Work in a team. Iterate over your game. Create a schedule you can stick to, but don't burn out. Communicate!
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