#Memes

  • Digital Mark@lemmy.ml
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    11 months ago

    I say “developer” is only for code, “designer” can be any system, level, or character designer (ooh they use spreadsheets!), “artist” is only for drawing things. Marketing douchebags are “marketing douchebags”. And since I’m indie, I’m all of those.

    But some studios just don’t care and have stupid titles; as long as thy get paid it doesn’t matter to them. WTF cares what some idiot screaming in a forum says?

    • MJBrune@beehaw.org
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      11 months ago

      Sorry, but you are wrong. Everyone on the team is a game developer. Game developer is a term for those who make games. They develop the game. You can’t restrict the term “developer” to those who just write code. A developer in the classic term just someone who develops. Develops is a term to create or construct. Thus a game developer is anyone who creates or constructs a game. This can be an engineer, designer, artist, etc.

      I’ve been in the games industry for a decade and can tell you that this isn’t a debate or even up for question for those experienced in the field. It’s simply how we give credit to the whole team. A game engineer is one who writes code for the game, a developer is anyone on the team who works toward creating the game. Also, you should learn to respect marketing. Done right and respectfully, it’s a powerful way to connect to your audience. Just like a community manager.

      Overall don’t gatekeep titles. It’s not great and would be like if someone came along and challenged you on calling yourself “indie”. Overall it’s not a good feel or look.

      • d3m0nr4v3r@feddit.de
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        11 months ago

        Idk man… seems like that would make GameDev mean anything and nothing. Just for the record, I have no stakes in this discussion, I really don’t care. I just find it weird to blur a word like that. Is the game company’s canteen cook also a game dev? The person who plugged in the monitors? The CEO? The HR person? And so on…

        I agree tho that this entire discussion feels a little like gatekeeping and would prefer everyone getting some credit for the game development over pedantic hairsplitting.

        • MJBrune@beehaw.org
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          11 months ago

          A game developer doesn’t mean anything and nothing. It’s someone who works on the game. So in a typical conversation with a player, a player would likely want to ask a game developer a question, that question could be best answered by a designer, artist, engineer, creative director, or even marketing. It really depends on the question but the player is just going to request a “game developer”

      • Digital Mark@lemmy.ml
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        11 months ago

        Ooh, a whole decade! I’ve been developing games (“developing”) since the '80s. You are literally the guy I referred to, in a studio, with a stupid title. If you’d called yourself a developer without being able to write code at some companies I’ve worked at, you’d have a conversation with HR. As it is, people can get away with it but it’s not true. Words have meanings, even when savages from a fallen age misuse them.

        Actual customer service/community managers are fine, we need those; working indie that’s the worst part, not having them. But I’m with Bill Hicks on marketing douchebags.

        • MJBrune@beehaw.org
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          11 months ago

          I write code and do so well. It doesn’t matter, you seem like you are just lashing out and being very insulting. I was simply giving my insight and showing that I’ve been around enough to know. I am not trying to gatekeep the title of being a game builder from people and I don’t think anyone in our industry should. To call people savages is pretty backward to me. What if I told you games have been developed without the use of code at all? How do you make a game with zero game developers creating it?

          Also, I watched it and while Bill Hicks said he wasn’t going to make it a joke, he immediately made it into a joke. Additionally, I’m not saying put a dollar sign on everything. I would say that’s the type of marketing that doesn’t need to exist, that is the marketing that isn’t respectful. Respectable marketing is about telling people who might want to play your games, about your games. That’s all it is. You shouldn’t just release games into a void and hope for the best.

      • snowe@programming.dev
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        11 months ago

        I didn’t know job titles were gatekeeping. Do you think that a fry cook at your restaurant is also a gamedev because they happen to feed the person making the games? It has nothing to do with gatekeeping, it has to do with “words have meanings”. You don’t just get to decide you’re a gamedev because you want to be, that doesn’t make sense.

        • elint@programming.dev
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          11 months ago

          I don’t even know how to answer you because your argument is so fucking stupid. No, I don’t think a fry cook is a gamedev, and I have literally never in my life heard a fry cook identify as such.

  • porgamrer@programming.dev
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    11 months ago

    What a bunch of elitist horseshit.

    As a senior engine developer at a games company, this is how I see it:

    1. Your shitty flappy bird clone is worth less than the cheeto stain on your t-shirt as a cultural artifact
    2. I have met countless programmers who have never finished a single game, because they can’t design for shit
    3. I have met countless artists and level designers who have made commercially successful games after learning how to use 10% of a single scripting language
    4. The word “developer” predates software engineering and has nothing to with tech. We changed the meaning and now 14 year olds on reddit have changed it back. It doesn’t matter.
    5. If you were really some hot shit solo developer you would not need to look for validation in your job title. Seeing thousands of people enjoy something you designed every day would be enough.
  • MJBrune@beehaw.org
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    11 months ago

    I learned this lesson 10 years ago at my first game dev job. The lead artist called himself a game developer and I said “Well I thought developer was a term reserved for engineering.” They gave a long passionate explanation about how it devalues the rest of the industry and that game developer is “one who makes a game”. To say that engineering is the only person to make the game is completely wrong. As I could not, as an engineer of 15+ years now, 10 of those in games, could not make a game entirely myself with just my engineering skills.

    This comic hits home because anyone claiming that game developer is an engineering-only title has never worked on a team project. Anyone who goes in the credits is a game developer. Including random executives to backend developers on the game.

    • onlinepersona@programming.dev
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      11 months ago

      By that same logic, nobody can be a software developer because in order to develop a software project involving 100 people, one needs HR, managers, QA/testing, SREs, sysadmins, architects, finance, …

      Nobody can be a brick layer either because in order to build the Burj Khalifa one needed architects, engineers, glaziers, plumbers, managers, secretaries, fork-lift drivers, truck drivers, etc.

      Every team project has is multi-disciplinary. To claim one discipline doesn’t exist because in order to complete the project all disciplines are necessary, is willingful misrepresentation of facts.

      • MJBrune@beehaw.org
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        11 months ago

        No, you’ve reversed my logic. Everyone you named would be a software developer but there is only one team of software engineers. The entire point is that “game developer” isn’t a discipline on the team. It’s a member of the team. It’d be like arguing the term medical professional only means doctors.

        • onlinepersona@programming.dev
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          11 months ago

          It’d be like arguing the term medical professional only means doctors.

          That makes more sense and I agree with it. The way you wrote it (or the way I interpreted it) was like “we’re all doctors because a hospital can’t run without the rest of its staff”. I still disagree that a level designer can be call themselves a game developer. That’d be like a nurse calling themselves a doctor.

          • MJBrune@beehaw.org
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            11 months ago

            A game developer is anyone on the team which creates the game. A level designer is a game developer. A game engineer is the term you are confusing it with. This is common because of the term Software Developer but the developer part of game developer comes from the creation/construction side. Like a property developer or community developer.

            • snowe@programming.dev
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              11 months ago

              This is common because of the term Software Developer but the developer part of game developer comes from the creation/construction side

              since when? When did the software part of game developer stop being about actual code development and start being more like property or community? That makes literally no sense at all. Developer as it relates to any sort of code means the person actually writing the code. To say otherwise is just ignoring the meaning of words.

                • snowe@programming.dev
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                  11 months ago

                  You misread that.

                  is a person or company engaged in a software development process, including research, design, programming, testing, and other facets of creating computer software

                  does not mean software testers are developers, it means that software development includes testing, and a person that does software development might be involved in all of the above.

                  Notice how the next sentence includes no such title that would be confused with a person that isn’t writing code.

                  Other job titles for people with similar meanings include programmer, software analyst, or software engineer.