"Video game development is a collaborative effort and efficient communication
is very important," says Emanuel Borsboom, senior software engineer and former
video game developer. "Programmers bounce ideas off each other all the time."
If you're developing video games, you'll be working with other people.
You'll need to be able to communicate with them effectively. There will be
stressful times and slow times. Sometimes you'll need to come up with decisions,
like, now!
"Generally, you need to be in contact with the other people
you work with and be able to deal with issues quickly," says Cary Brisebois.
Brisebois is a senior programmer at a video game company.
Here is
an example of an actual e-mail exchange between video game developers (and
yes, the names have been changed!). Read it and see if you can answer the
questions below. Don't worry if you don't know some of the terms they use.
Joe
Videogame wrote:
Hey guys:
There are a couple of items I'd like to bring up for discussion. As I start
to create actual levels, I'd like to know if the way I am creating assets
needs to change.
1) Collision - My understanding
is that the ground plane needs to be convex, so that means to make anything
other than a plane requires creating multiple pieces and butting them up against
each other. I have tried this method and there seems to be issues when the
character tries to traverse these seams in the collision.
2)
Alpha sorting - Not a show stopper, would make making art easier if it sorted
properly.
Your thoughts?
Jane
Programmer replied:
1) I think I will be creating
a player class that uses better collision detection and locomotion. This will
allow us to create a standard collision mesh. In the meantime we will have
to live with the current shape collision.
2) Once
I am finished improving the raycasting interface I will be working on the
alpha sorting issues. Once that is done I will be working on lighting and
shading (toon, layered, etc).
After reading these e-mails,
answer the following questions:
A: Is alpha sorting a top priority
right now?
B: Could the game be released without fixing the "collision?"
Want
to learn more? Check out this URL to read about e-mail etiquette in the office:
Business
E-Mail Etiquette
Internet:https://www.grammarly.com/blog/business-email-etiquette/
Ready to see what we came
up with?