[casual_games] Game development duration, any numbers?

Mon Aug 28 12:27:00 EDT 2006

I was hoping you'd comment, Arthur  ;)

How long did Virtual Villagers take, if you don't mind..?

Ben Lewis
Yatec Games
Marketing and Sales
(225)274-1550
 <http://www.yatecgames.com> www.yatecgames.com 

  _____  

From: Arthur Humphrey [mailto:nospam1 at ldw.com] 
Sent: Monday, August 28, 2006 11:19 AM
To: IGDA Casual Games SIG Mailing List
Subject: RE: [casual_games] Game development duration, any numbers?

With Fish Tycoon, a lot of the time was spent on the framework and the game
engine. Bear in mind, also, that we already had the game in release on
PalmOS/PPC which meant less time needed to be spent testing and tuning game
balance. With Virtual Villagers we really invested time in a solid reusable
framework (which we started from scratch rather than reusing Fish Tycoon's)
that handles saveslots, screen nav, string and sprite management, etc, as
well as adding an abstraction layer that gives us almost-free Mac builds.

We feel like this is really streamlining our newest project -- maybe to the
tune of a couple months -- and hopefully all of our future products,
although it is irresistable to keep enhancing the framework.

My point is that dev time on these projects may depend very largely on the
number of [casual game] projects that the dev team in question has
previously/recently done.

Arthur Humphrey
"Last Day of Work"

At 09:02 AM 8/28/2006 -0500, you wrote:

Ah, I forgot about that point! Yeah, she did say their team was
under-qualified and they eventually fired everyone but one guy, and it was
their best decision yet. She also mentioned that the fonts took forever,
tons of sloppy code had to be removed, and Big Fish asked them to polish the
hell out of the graphics before putting it out. Moral of the story: "plan
ahead."  =)

Ben Lewis
Yatec Games
Marketing and Sales
(225)274-1550
www.yatecgames.com <http://www.yatecgames.com>  

From: Eric Lamendola [mailto:eric at slingo.com <mailto:eric at slingo.com> ]
Sent: Monday, August 28, 2006 8:54 AM
To: 'IGDA Casual Games SIG Mailing List'
Subject: RE: [casual_games] Game development duration, any numbers?

I thought that Carla Humphrey had said they scrapped all but one of their
team half way through development and finished Fish Tycoon with 1 person.

Eric Lamendola
Director of Operations & Business Development

Email:  <mailto:eric at slingo.com> eric at slingo.com
IM: EricLamendola (AIM)
        411 Hackensack Ave - 8th Floor
Hackensack, NJ 07601 

work: +1-201-489-6727
mobile: +1-201-921-4989
 <https://www.linkedin.com/e/sig/5086154/>                

From: casual_games-bounces at igda.org [mailto:casual_games-bounces at igda.org
<mailto:casual_games-bounces at igda.org> ] On Behalf Of Ben Lewis
Sent: Monday, August 28, 2006 9:45 AM
To: IGDA Casual Games SIG Mailing List
Subject: RE: [casual_games] Game development duration, any numbers?

>> Maybe, it would by useful to build a chart of estimations by genre and
features of games (or real data for well-known titles)... any volunteer? :)

Looking at my notes from Casuality Seattle, these are some dev cycles for a
few well-recognized casual games:

-Mah Jong Quest took 10 months to develop, with a team of three + contracted
artist
-Fish Tycoon took 9-10 months with a five-person team
-Luxor took only 3 months (against their will) with a 3-man team

I think it's safe to say that a game based on an "original" concept will
take significantly longer to develop than one based on an existing mechanic.
Something tells me that Luxor would've taken longer if Zuma didn't already
exist.

Also, something insanely art-intensive will just take longer if you only
have 1-2 artists on the team. I remember reading that Big Fish Studios was
able to crank out Hidden Expedition: Titanic so quickly because they piled
5+ artists on the project. Hope this helps.

Ben Lewis
Yatec Games
Marketing and Sales
(225)274-1550
www.yatecgames.com <http://www.yatecgames.com>  

From: Branislav Siles [ <mailto:siles at atomontage.com>
mailto:siles at atomontage.com]
Sent: Sunday, August 27, 2006 10:23 AM
To: casual_games at igda.org
Subject: [casual_games] Game development duration, any numbers?

Hello,

I have two questions about game development duration depending on genre,
previous experience, middleware used, etc. 

First, has anybody of you created a 3D car-racing game using Torque Game or
Shader Engine? Please provide me with any numbers (or links) on how many
coder-weeks and/or scripter-weeks it took your team to finish it. It would
be nice if you name the game or provide some other information about it
(features, number of levels, previous experience of developers or what ever
you find interesting).

Second, I am looking for ANY information about how long it takes
(coder/man-weeks) to create a typical game of a specific genre and size
(gameplay length, number of levels..). I know that this varies extremely
between particular games and programmers/developers, but this is the case in
any area of creativity and sure there are at least some numbers for many of
them.

I will be thankful for any numbers or pure estimations, so if you have some
experience in creating a small game of some genre and you know it took your
coder 16 weeks to write the code, then this information is very ok for me. 

Maybe, it would by useful to build a chart of estimations by genre and
features of games (or real data for well-known titles)... any volunteer? :)

Thank you a lot,

Brano/Atomontage
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