m64’s last blog post..The only thing better than starting small is starting smaller

m64’s last blog post..The only thing better than starting small is starting smaller

I agree with John that some devs may be afraid to scare away contributors on the "I don't want to do this" basis. Instead they may be scaring them away on the "I don't know what he wants" basis. Another problem is that some devs really simply don't know what they want. And still another sort is that which does have some vision and hopes the artists will guess what it is.

That's why I try to advocate developers learning at least a little bit about content creation - this would not only enable them to make some art themselves, but also make them aware of the way the artists work and what kind of data they may need.

Now being mainly a developer but also having some minimal artistic knowledge I know that both artists and developers have things that they would prefer to be set when they get to work. Perhaps FOSS game artists could compile some sort of a list of things they:
1. Have to know before getting to work. It's like the programmer has to know the programming language he should use or what are we coding.
2. Very much prefer to know - they are not necessary, but greatly simplify cooperation. It's like the software design documentation.
3. Have some personal preferences, but are willing to adapt to project guidelines as long as they are sensible. It's like the coding standards.

I'm happy that you got a style already planed out for your game, that will help you, help the artist create better and fitting graphic to your game(s). Sadly I don't see many devs in the small to medium game sizes that even have that. I can even say I feel that it is rare in the whole floss scene.

My annoyance was bought up by a rather big FOSS-game, I won't tell any names as I don't want to point a finger at anyone and laugh. But they have enough of a community to build one of the best FOSS-games. And not using the community better then what I have seen to this point, is a bit sad.

And thanks for your reply, I'll do a follow-up-post to this, with some ideas based on my experience.

I have a project right now and I have a very clear idea of the kind of graphics I'd like to see for it some day. I would like them to have the simple graphical style reminiscent of the Community Chest and Chance cards from Monopoly. I think that would add even more to the humor within the game. However, I figure that if I were to suggest that then any artists would either say, "I can't or don't want to draw in that style, therefore I'm not going to contribute." By suggesting something specific I'm driving away somebody who might have a good idea.

If somebody did have a good alternate suggestion and was willing to do a substantial body of work with a particular style then I could and would point to that and say, "I want something like this because I already have some existing graphics in that style." Before that point, I don't think most would feel comfortable suggesting anything.

John Munsch’s last blog post..Google Tries To Make Microsoft Completely Irrelevant