Independent Study Update #1

In order to document the progress of my independent study, I have created this blog, and I will update it every week to everyone an idea of how the research is coming along. So here we go!

When I first started as a producer at the ETC, I had no idea how to effectively run a team of video game designers. My first BVW world was an abject failure in every sense of the phrase, and my first ETC project had a lot of problems. I learned a lot from these experiences, but I wish that I did not have to learn them the hard way. I really wished that I had some sort of condensed tome of producer knowledge that could have guided me through those times, especially one from the perspective of an ETCer. Unfortunately, there was no such thing, so I have decided that I will help future ETC producers by making a pamphlet that not only incorporates my experience, but also has the tips and advice of industry professionals.

In this pamphlet, I will share what these experts have to say about to properly motivate and manage your team, what did you learn from your worst project experience, as well as incorporating some lessons learned from game postmortems that I will read online. These will be condensed into the do's and don'ts of being a producer not only in the ETC, but also in the real world, and I sincerely hope that it will prove helpful to someone in the future.

So far, I have reached out to friends I have out here in the San Francisco/Silicon Valley area, and as of the time of this post, I have one confirmed interviewee for the project, Karin Ray of Secret Identity Studios, and we will have our chat this coming Thursday at noon. Hopefully, more people will respond and agree to be interviewed, but the semester is still young, and there postmortems to read.