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Pricky8:
I would also like to learn more about your
development process. Do your break into teams to
handle aspects of the development? Do you focus on
a component for a few weeks? How the heck do you
track all these changes, wish lists, impossible up-
dates? That has to be one heck of a white
erase board.
dStahl:
Every member of the team is scheduled
individually with tasks related to their specific dis-
cipline. Content Designers work with Environment
Artists and the Writer to make missions and mission
locations in the game. Systems Designers create new
items, new enemies, new ships, new officers and an-
ything else that goes in your inventory or power tray.
Software engineers work on the underlying game
engine, the editing tools we use, the user interface,
and the interaction between the database and the
client software. FX Artist design colored lights and
flashes that comprise weapon fire, animation hits,
and screen FX. Animators create emotes, ship move-
ment, and attacks that characters, ships, or enemies
perform. Character Artists design new enemy models
and new uniforms and costumes, including all the
customization settings. Audio Engineers do all of the
sound FX and music in the game. Ship Artists create
the models for the starships in the game. Produc-
ers manage schedules, reviews, feedback loops, and
releases. QA manages the testing of the game, plus
anything new along with build stability with each
release. At a total team size of 50, we have a couple
of each discipline mentioned above.
Because it requires so many different disciplines
working together, MMOs are considered one of the
most complex types of computer games to build and
maintain. Not only do we have to build the game,
but we also have an entire support infrastructure of
network engineers, graphics programmers, database
analysts, and tools programmers. On top of that,
there is also the publishing arm at Perfect World that
manages marketing, community, customer support,
and the billing infrastructure.
How do we track all of this? Lots of whiteboards,
massive excel spreadsheets and lots of scheduled
reminders for each employee that lists what they
should be working on each day. Everything that is go-
ing to be in each season is determined ahead of time
and once the team starts working on a new season,
they have a schedule that shows exactly which com-
ponents they will need to deliver and when.
Xceptionzero:
Why was the reason for giving the
Veterans program away as a perk for new “lifetime”
purchasers? Is there any plans to add more rewards
to monthly subscribers?
dStahl:
Once you purchase a lifetime subscription,
the game believes that you have been and always
will be a subscriber to the game, and so from a back
end perspective, the game considers all lifetime
subscribers to have been playing since day one. We
finally made the decision to stop withholding Vet-
eran Rewards from lifetime members based solely
on the date of their purchase, however we only did so
after month to month subscribers had reached a pos-
sible 1000 day mark. We feel this was a reasonable
compromise for both sides of the complaint. Month-
to-month subscribers get their 1000 day rewards
and Lifetimers finally start getting rewards as if they
were truly a “lifetime” member.
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