Programmers Are Lazy

This is a stereotype that’s perhaps unfair on the minority of programmers who actually know what a morning is, but is definitely not without some merit. General consensus was that people who had stuff to be done for Monday would be coming in over the weekend to get it done. Unfortunately, that included me, seeing as some of the levels I was overseeing were (and some still are) in a state. Fair enough, not like I had much else on (I’m working on getting a social life but it’s not easy with all these bloody work distractions!).

Saturday: Not a bad turnout, I turn up early afternoons (hey, I’m not mad on mornings either) and my friendly neighbourhood programmers are in tact. Great stuff. Eight hours later, we’ve got one level in the bag (just about), so we’re pretty chuffed. Right, time for bed, seeya again tomorrow, right gang?

Sunday: Show up mid-afternoon (I’m HAVING some sort of weekend, damnit) to a practically empty office. None of the programmers I needed have shown up. Without them, I’m pretty much useless, apart from doing my rubbishy little designer jobs that take about two seconds (placing collectibles and setting up AI paths in the editor, for example, and going through the fixlist to see what’s been done – in this case, jack shit). Trains aren’t great so I’m stuck in the office for three hours messing around with our physics engine. Can’t say I’m too impressed.

I was hoping to write a more optimistic blog this time around because I know I’ve been a miserable git so far (I’ve got one brewing – coming up next, some GOOD things about being a games designer!), but I couldn’t help but feel a little let down today. I guess it goes without saying that as a team we’re pretty much dependent on each other… maybe designers more so than others cos to generalise a lot of the time we’re just checking the work of artists and programmers to make sure everything’s as it should be. Without them we can’t really do much that can’t be done in the editor (cos, y’know, that technical jazz isn’t our area). I guess in a way we’re sort of like glorified QA at the moment – and without anything to test we’re in a bit of a dry patch really.

So yeah, today… not good. Tomorrow hopefully there’ll be some spankings administered (perhaps not literally, mind), because these particular individuals kinda let us down (it wasn’t just me, various others had come in and been able to do very little as a result). We’re all trying to get this game to alpha and it just isn’t happening if we don’t cooperate with each other. I know this sounds preachy and obvious and yadda yadda, but it’s the bloody truth. It just means tomorrow we’re all going to be in a flap because the stuff that we’d intended to do yesterday is still on the list.

Eh, never mind. I’m going to go to bed and go over the reasons I do genuinely love this job, despite everything! Hopefully I can jot some down for you for next time. Unless something bad happens; then you’re getting another rant. That’s just how it goes I’m afraid!