PRODUCTION

Chamfer Studios is a group of 25 university students that share a common goal of producing their first 3D RTT video game for the subject Project III.

About Our Team

The team consists of one producer, three leads, one for each department, and three departments: ten programmers, seven designers and four artists. Make sure you head over to the Team tab to get to know all of us!

Producer

The role of the producer is to make sure the process and progress of the game’s design, development and release happen. They are in charge of the management of the project by keeping the team moving towards deadlines, working collaboratively and sticking to the same creative and technical vision during its progress.

Leads

The leads’ role is to direct, guide, and organize their department in the different stages of development. They are also in charge of communicating their progress, decisions and opinions to the producer.

Departments

Each department is in charge of a specific area on building the video game. The three are important and necessary to reach our end goal.

Methodology

The methodology Chamfer Studios followed through the design and development of the game is the scrum framework, consisting of short sprints inside several milestones. At first, the team worked specifically by departments, but as the product evolved, they started working in different scrum teams.

Sprints

There were a total of 16 sprints during the whole development of the game. Sprints started every Tuesday and ended Monday night, therefore lasting an entire week.

As for meetings, every department had to meet daily, at 20:30, to discuss and update their lead of any progression or difficulties they encountered. Then, the leads with the producer met at 21:00 to update the producer about the situation in every department. This facilitated communication and ensured a good cohesion between departments.

Sprint meetings occurred weekly, at the start of every sprint. The leads and the producer planned out the entire week for the members.

Scrum Teams

A scrum team is a group that was in charge of a specific design element, like the UI or a level. The idea is that, since one element may have several tasks from different departments, the scrum team would consist of at least a designer, a programmer and an artist (this changed depending on the necessity of the element). Each scrum team had a scrum master that was in charge of organizing and leading the team, ensuring they followed the scrum framework.

The scrum master was a role that rotated weekly, giving everyone the chance of being the scrum master at least once. Preferably, the scrum masters were volunteers.

The reason why we worked with this method was because it facilitates communication, organization, motivation, and encourages working with other people.

Tools

HacknPlan

The team used HacknPlan to manage the scrum framework, using the different sprint boards organized by milestones. This allowed the team to organize the tasks not only by sprints and milestones, but also by design elements, departments and tags, which was very useful to ensure clarity and efficiency.

Tools

Google Drive

Where the team was able to keep track of all the different documents, such as reports and documentation, as well as assets, calendar, and other useful elements. In our Drive, the producer provided a series of templates that ensured organization and clarification.

Tools

Calendar

Where all the important timestamps were displayed, such as the sprint week, the milestone deliveries, as well as out of the ordinary meetings that we organized.

Tools

Hour Log

Where every team member, daily, noted down how many hours they spent working in order to keep track of the time invested as well as the longevity of a task.

Tools

Scrum Teams

Scrum teams were made, and there was a template that represented each scrum team, as well as the taskts needed to be done by everyone for the sprint.

Tools

Scrum Masters

There was as well a table that represented who were the scrum masters for the sprint.

Tools

Attendance

The producer noted down who came to class every day in order to keep track of the implication each member has to the project, as well as their schedule.

Tools

Evaluation

In every delivery, the producer had to send an evaluation to the teachers with an analysis on the progress and impact every member of the team was doing. This included their attendance to class, to our meetings, how many hours they worked, if they were scrum masters (because it was evaluated positively), the tasks done, a grade from their lead, as well as additional comments from the leads. These comments that came from the leads were crucial for their grading, since at the end of the day, they were the ones that knew in a detailed way how hard each member was working, and their level of motivation for the project. Using these reports, the teachers could have an understanding on how everyone was performing, which greatly influenced their grades.

Production Tools

Google Drive

Google Drive is a file storage and synchronization service developed by Google.

Google Docs

Google Docs is an online word processor included as part of the free, web-based Google Docs Editors suite offered by Google.

Google Slides

Google Slides is a presentation program included as part of the free, web-based Google Docs Editors suite offered by Google.

Google Sheets

Google Sheets is a spreadsheet program included as part of the free, web-based Google Docs Editors suite offered by Google.

Programming Tools

Visual Studio 2019

Microsoft Visual Studio is an integrated development environment from Microsoft. It is used to develop computer programs, as well as websites, web apps, web services and mobile apps.

VS Code

Visual Studio Code, also commonly referred to as VS Code, is a source-code editor made by Microsoft for Windows, Linux and macOS.

Github

GitHub, Inc. is a provider of Internet hosting for software development and version control using Git.

Git

Git is software for tracking changes in any set of files, usually used for coordinating work among programmers collaboratively developing source code during software development.

Design Tools

Inskcape

Inkscape is a free and open-source vector graphics editor used to create vector images.

Unity

Unity is a cross-platform game engine developed by Unity Technologies.

Blender

Blender is a free and open-source 3D computer graphics software toolset.

Figma

Figma is a vector graphics editor and prototyping tool.

Machinations

Machinations is a visual language for diagramming game economies, and a tool for drawing, and above all, simulating them without writing code.

Audacity

Audacity is a free and open-source digital audio editor and recording application software.

Photoshop

Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe.

Artist Tools

Audacity

Audacity is a free and open-source digital audio editor and recording application software.

Maya

Autodesk Maya, commonly shortened to just Maya, is a 3D computer graphics application.

3DS Max

3D Studio Max, is a professional 3D computer graphics program for making 3D animations.

Adobe Audition

Adobe Audition is a digital audio workstation developed by Adobe Inc.

Adobe Illustrator

Adobe Illustrator is a vector graphics editor and design program developed and marketed by Adobe Inc.

Adobe Premiere

Adobe Premiere Pro is a timeline-based video editing software application developed by Adobe Inc

Adobe Photoshop

Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe.