Practical Peace
“If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.”
Game development can be a long, difficult pursuit, fraught with creative challenges, technical problems, and financial stresses. Add in people with different personalities, points of view, hurts, and struggles, and it's impressive that any games make it to release.
A simple thing I've found to help bring peace to the process is to implement standards.
Standards are about agreeing on how we are going to do things. They are style guides for art and programming. They are organization methods for assets. What file formats are we going to use? How are we going to name our files? Spaces or no spaces? Underscores? CamelCase? What about tabs versus spaces?
Does it matter?
Details matter. Style matters. Maybe not to everyone, but enough people. And I bet at least some of those people are on your team.
Take the time at the start of the project to iron out the details. And whatever you decide, make sure to write it down. These documents will be essential for onboarding new team members and to help keep the team on course.
It will be hard to resist the urge to jump right in and start creating. I know it takes discipline but take the time. Agree upon standards. Your peace is worth it.
