RE: I have a great idea........VERY GOOD IDEA...

["Idahosa I. Edokpayi" <stealth_ninja@geocities.com>]

Thanks Bob! About the Legal stuff, have you done that before and how much do
you know about the cost? I think it is most likely though that the first
games will be GPL and maybe later ones will be private.

Idahosa Edokpayi

-----Original Message-----
From: gameprogrammer-owner@gameprogrammer.com
[mailto:gameprogrammer-owner@gameprogrammer.com]On Behalf Of Bob
Pendleton
Sent: Monday, January 03, 2000 9:21 PM
To: gameprogrammer@gameprogrammer.com
Subject: Re: I have a great idea........VERY GOOD IDEA...




"Idahosa I. Edokpayi" wrote:
>
> Well, I'd like to help, but first i want to know what Bob Pendelton
thinks.


I've been watching quietly so as not to mess up peoples thinking. But,
it is time that I say something other than "Happy New Year!"

I think this is a great idea. I think it would be great if all the
discussion on this list was about real development projects. I like the
idea of having lots of different projects going on at the same time. And
having all the discussion taking place on this list. But, the list
should decide how much of this discussion should take place here. If
other lists are set up for specific discussions I might archive them on
gameprogrammer.com. Also, I will be happy to link to any sites set up
around projects that start on this list and would be willing to archive
finished projects. No matter what happens it would be a good idea to
post project status reports to the list to if for no other purpose that
to encourage others to start their own projects or join yours.

I will make a couple of suggestions based on running several projects
and watching several web based projects:

1) Get the legal stuff out of the way up front. If the project is
successful then in the end you will have created something of value and
greed will cause lot's of problems. I would strongly suggest that you
adopt either the GNU GPL/LGPL or the PERL artistic license and require
that all code and everything else that is contributed to the project be
covered by your chosen license. Do some research on this. You can't live
with a project where each person owns a little piece of it. If you don't
want to do an open source project then get a good lawyer with
international experience to draw up a contract and have each participant
sign the contract. The technical problems will not hurt you nearly as
much as the legal problems will.

2) Decide on a set of working rules. You must have a way to make
decisions. If you use any sort of voting must have a way to decide who
can vote. I would limit voting rights to people who have contributed to
the project. That way only people who are actually working on the
project have a say in how it is run. If you pick a leader you must have
a way to replace and override the leader. And you must have a way to
pass leadership on if the leader dies or loses interest. (It happens,
both of 'em.)

3) Decide what platform to work on. Either pick one, or pick them all.
For example you might decide to use VB on Windows, or X/C++ on Linux.
Or, you can pick something like Allegro and C or C++ and do it on
several different operating systems. Doesn't really matter as long as
you make a decision and stick too it. Don't forget Java :-) If you
decide to use DirectX and Windows consider designing so that some code
and resources can be shared by another group that is doing an
OpenGL/Linux version.

4) Art, music, and sound effects. Pick a format for each and stick to
it. One thing to consider is that art, music, and sound effects, can be
shared between several different games or between several independent
implementations of a single game design. You might want to have separate
projects to create generic art resources as well as projects to do
engine development and game development.

5) Don't forget the level editor. You will need a tool to put it all
together and the editor can be a large project all by itself.

That's my 3 cents worth. Happy New Year!

				Bob Pendleton
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The GameProgrammer.Com mailing list is for the open discussion
of any topic related to the art, science, and business of
programming games. This list is especially tolerant of beginners.
We were all beginners once

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