Twig got Cut

My game did not go though Green Light this semester and while that is disappointing, I do understand why. Looking back on that presentation and the reaction to it we were emphasizing aspects that made most of our co-workers uneasy. The biggest worrier was the narrative aspect of Twig that we wanted to go into later on in development. Now before I go into why my co-workers were turned off I do what to point out on my own part that if we went through that narrative would have been ill-served. Mainly because I failed to create the appropriate onboarding documentation that would have been critical for that element of the game to come into its own. Sadly this revelation came to me three days before Greenlight so there was nothing to do but we still wanted to go on with the idea so in some way this was a blessing in disguise. The team is still trying to work on Twig in their spare time which gives an opportunity for things to flesh out properly.

However, that aside, even with documentation I still doubt Twig would have gone through due to the amount we emphasized the narrative. In my own excitement to work on narrative in games, I forgot to recognize that narrative design is still somewhat shrouded in mystery. To which our presentation did not provide any calming questions which most likely turned most people away. As we gave out the illusion that Twig would center fully around its narrative while in our heads it was more just a background element to make the game better. In the future, I should be more careful with words like “Narrative” as they may invoke larger problems in people's heads than others. There was also the problem that I and my programmer were offering to helm that aspect of the game and the idea of a Producer and Programmer writing did not bode well in people's heads either.

To summarize, next time I present a game I need to be clearer with the intentions of the game. More time should be put into convincing people why our game is worth there time yes, but also in showcasing that idea we had originally and showing that it is doable.

Now with the transfer to my new team, things have been a mixed bag. On the one hand, everyone on the team is willing to work with me and my presence does not feel like it is messing anything up. The game is also moving along at a manageable pace, people are being onboarded well, work is being made for the new people, no gears are grinding to a complete halt. However, the team does do things a little differently then what I’m used to so that adds to the confusion of finding me a place.

That overall is my biggest problem and concern with this new team, one I have already begun discussing with the existing producers. Not only were there already two producers on that team but the others have already graphed onto them. So trying to figure out where I belong on this team with a pair of functional producers is difficult. One that we are trying to hash out at the moment, but it is going to be hard. We have figured out ways to divide up work among the three of us, splitting docs apart and creating new outreach projects really helped. Yet finding my place among the rest of the team will take some time.