Quote:Original post by onyxflame
The problem is, most people on this site seem to believe that if you can't program, you're a bad game designer.

I don't think that's true at all.

However, I think that many of the non-programmer designers that come through here make the mistake of thinking that all the programmers here are just sitting around waiting for a project to come along. They aren't - they are often working on their own projects which may be full games, demos for a portfolio, engines, game related tools, or non-game related projects. In order to get them to work on your project, you have to persuade them that it's an interesting and worthwhile project to work on. And bear in mind you're competing for their attention with everyone else who's trying to set up a team.

This is why people here are often urged to 'learn to program'. Internet teams fail more often than they succeed, so learning to program enables you to avoid relying too heavily on other people to get your game made into reality.

Quote:Original post by Sandman
There is absolutely no reason why programmers cannot design games. In fact, some of most celebrated designers in the industry are/were programmers. (Peter Molyneux, Sid Meier, to name the first two that came into my head)

So basically, Warsong's opinion is wrong.

Here's my opinion, This guys totally right.

#1) Big production houses should not even enter this discussion. It's somebody elses money invested to pay people to think, not yours.

#2) It seems everyone on this board (even some of the elites) relate their game devlopment knowledge and experience with some of the biggest games in the industry. Well here's a reality check, don't compare yourself to some of the great's in the industry, I just think your insulting them, and you should be shot (whomever you are). Time to go back to planet earth and ...

#3) Back to perspective. OK so you're a small-mid developer. No one has money to pay you to write a program, we all know this. Programmers are by far the most expensive work, because the time involved and educational costs etc.. This also makes it hard to do contract work, because of the root involvement required and lack of money does not work out. So if money is not the motivator, then it usually becomes design of the end product. Programmers need a good motivator and designing a game is good enough for most people. Good enough for me.


You will notice most programmers will be the lead developers also. This is not a bad thing, the industry will not fail. Games will be made. People will be happy.