Another great thing is writing small addons for MMOs. I wrote some for Warhammer and WoW. They use LUA, which is super simple, and you can see results on the screen. You know the game, cause you're playing it. So it's not boring. Just an idea.

Very nice. I agree with a lot of it. A company is well defined from within and the product is just a result of the team working together.

Here at 1p we have a very similar way of functioning. From constantly moving our desks to be close to our new projects, to the mentality and importance of hiring the right person. I think some people take this lightly, but its all about the right mindset and work ethic that is compatible with the rest of the people in the company. Who brings more to the table with their expertise, but also has the ability to adapt and take initiative, and i think that's a big keyword. People that take initiative and are driven by learning and pushing the boundaries and capabilities not only in art, but through tech. I think someone that is not afraid to mess around in code, to learn it and make it better brings better results. I believe in Epic they have this mindset.

Apart from that i do wonder how some of the projects are sprung to life, and managed. Here the big boss commands some of those, but is driven by what we want to work on and how we can make it work. But i can't grasp how they would fund a project without deadlines. I guess it helps that their games are generating lots of money all year round generating a good cash flow until the next game is done. Because seriously, when valve is done with a game its the day it comes out. No warnings or anything haha

Anyways... I like that most of the people here at polycount agree that this kind of management is more preferable, or that we debate and argue ideas with rational thinking and not what makes the most money. At some point we will mold the next generation to this kind of thinking, and that is when change happens. I can see it happen already with teams like Double Fine or Valve.

Sneakiest spam ever^^^^^^^^^^^
edit: there was spam above my post

I wonder how many people at studios after reading this were like "hey we should do this and that because thats how Valve dose it in there book".

Originally Posted by Dan!

Sneakiest spam ever^^^^^^^^^^^

It is almost getting to this point...
http://xkcd.com/810/

great read

GameIndstry.biz just posted a small interview with Gabe Newell that reveals a bit more about the structure at valve and a bit about how the handbook was "released".

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/article...european-daily

Newell details origins of Valve's internal culture.
Experiences at Microsoft and release of Doom informed Valve's approach to organization.

Gabe Newell, managing director of Valve Corporation, has detailed the role of Microsoft and id Software in the formation of the company's internal culture.
Newell, Valve's managing director, spent 13 years working at Microsoft, much of it as a producer on the the early versions of Windows. Towards the end of his time with the company, an investigation into consumer behavior yielded startling results.
"What was so shocking to me was that Windows was the second highest usage application in the US. The number one application was Doom, a shareware program that hadn't been created by any of the powerhouse software companies," he told Bloomberg Businessweek.

"It was a 12-person company in the suburbs of Texas that didn't even distribute through retail, it distributed through bulletin boards and other pre-internet mechanisms. To me, that was a lightning bolt.
"Microsoft was hiring 500-people sales teams and this entire company was 12 people, yet it had created the most widely distributed software in the world. There was a sea change coming."

The example set by id Software led to Valve's decision to dispense with formal marketing and sales departments, instead asking its individual developers to engage with measuring and improving customer satisfaction directly.

This tailored approach became key to the formation of Valve's entire culture: define the areas in which the company had to excel, and building from there.

"We realized that here, our job was to create things that hadn't existed before. Managers are good at institutionalizing procedures, but in our line of work that's not always good. Sometimes the skills in one generation of product are irrelevant to the skills in another generation," Newell continued.

"Our industry is in such technological, design and artistic flux that we need somebody who can recognize that. It's pretty rare for someone to be in a lead role on two consecutive projects."

The Valve employee handbook was uploaded to the internet without permission last week. The culprit had requested a copy after hearing Newell mention it during his appearance on the Three Day Cooldown podcast.

To view the handbook, click here.

Great read mark.

The Valve employee handbook was uploaded to the internet without permission last week. The culprit had requested a copy after hearing Newell mention it during his appearance on the Three Day Cooldown podcast.

Way to blackball yourself ha