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I'm currently working on a game project with a group of people.
Me and...lets call him Johny, started this project.
I met Johny in game development school. I asked Johny if he wanted to make a game with me. Apparently he had already written a game design document, so we decided to go with that. After that i got a huge team of capable people together, launched a website and put alot of work into development.
Now Johny doesnt have much time, now and then he comes online to give orders and tell us how our work is not good and gives us theoretical bullshit about game design he himself doesnt even understand. I have had many hours of listening to him where he would show statistics and graphs and talk about abstract things in game design without giving one concrete example. Then he goes offline again..often staying offline to only show up at our weekly meeting and mess up everything we done in the week. Or even worse, sometimes, when i am managing the team, handing out tasks, he just comes online, tells our programmer to do something without notifying me and goes offline again, only for me to find out later our programmer is doing something that is not that important right now and his time could be spent doing more useful stuff.
Right now the entire team is pissed off and want nothing to do with him anymore, they even told me that unless i take control of the entire project that they do not want to continue working on it anymore, which is understandable.
The only logical solution seems to be to kick him out. But im the kind of guy that always thinks..what would it be for me if someone told me im not welcome anymore in something that i helped found, something that is my life's passion?
All the great leaders are people who can make decisions without second thought...but for some reason this drama seems to drag on, simply because i feel bad for this guy and cannot bring it to me to tell the truth fair and square to him.
Also, i used to think he was a friend of mine...but he lost it lately, he cannot see the forest through the trees anymore, and i want to make a god damn game, but he is just ruining it for us.
So how can i be tactical about this? I seriously think this guy is mentally not stable, and simply because of that fact i greatly fear on how he will take the news if i told him to leave the project. I seriously dont want to read in the newspaper that he jumped off a bridge or something like that, because i see him capable of doing something like that in the mental state he is in right now, but his mental state is ruining the project for everyone.
 
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On November 16 2013 03:22 SupplyBlockedTV wrote:
All the great leaders are people who can make decisions without second thought...
The great leaders are people who can weigh the pros and cons before making the decisions to make sure it's the right one. Do that.
So how can i be tactical about this? I seriously think this guy is mentally not stable, and simply because of that fact i greatly fear on how he will take the news if i told him to leave the project. I seriously dont want to read in the newspaper that he jumped off a bridge or something like that, because i see him capable of doing something like that in the mental state he is in right now, but his mental state is ruining the project for everyone.
He'll be fine, worry about yourself.
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I'm incredibly surprised you've never had to kick anyone from your team in GD school :p it litterally happens all the time on mine. People who simply do not pull their weight and/or do not work well together with the rest of your team need to change or be cut. You're building a game (in your free time?) and the process needs to be fun for everyone involved. If people are unhappy, things need to change.
It's kinda sad that it has reached this point. Conflicts can usually be prevented by just giving the right feedback at the right times. Receiving good feedback is one of the few ways you can really really improve. If anything, talking it over with him will make him realize the error of his ways (if he agrees with it or not, as that is how you feel) and will give him an opportunity to use your feedback to improve himself. Eventually he should be grateful for a (hard) lesson learned.
The best thing you can do now is talk to him. Really make him see it from your perspective and just work from there. See if you can come up with a solution that works for your team and yourself.
With that said I just wasted another 20 minutes I wanted to use to work on my own project  . Oh well, good luck with your game. Keep us updated! It's always interesting to read about other developer's endeavours
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On November 16 2013 04:13 Chezus wrote:I'm incredibly surprised you've never had to kick anyone from your team in GD school :p it litterally happens all the time on mine. People who simply do not pull their weight and/or do not work well together with the rest of your team need to change or be cut. You're building a game (in your free time?) and the process needs to be fun for everyone involved. If people are unhappy, things need to change. It's kinda sad that it has reached this point. Conflicts can usually be prevented by just giving the right feedback at the right times. Receiving good feedback is one of the few ways you can really really improve. If anything, talking it over with him will make him realize the error of his ways (if he agrees with it or not, as that is how you feel) and will give him an opportunity to use your feedback to improve himself. Eventually he should be grateful for a (hard) lesson learned. The best thing you can do now is talk to him. Really make him see it from your perspective and just work from there. See if you can come up with a solution that works for your team and yourself. With that said I just wasted another 20 minutes I wanted to use to work on my own project . Oh well, good luck with your game. Keep us updated! It's always interesting to read about other developer's endeavours
Hey!
No, i wish we could do that in GD school, would have solved alot of frustration haha :D. And yes, it is very sad it has reached this point. Right now discussing it with the rest of the group, if everyone has the same opinion the next step will be a final warning. We will be clear about what we want and what we dont want. The sad thing is, yes we are hobbyists, we work for free...stuff like that shouldnt happen when people are brought together by the same passion.
Anyway, good luck with your project! Amazed how many on teamliquid are actually into this kind of stuff :D.
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hello, i think being honest is the best solution, if he cant realize the bad impact he makes and change it, then consider firing him
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1) watch The Social Network
2) get that shit done
3) ???
4) profit
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Not telling him what's up and not kicking him off the team is not being considerate for him. If you tell him what he's doing wrong, he at least has a chance to suck it up and change himself. If you never tell him, he'll never change and the project will fail. At the very least tell him what's up, but I would probably kick him out too.
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You don't need 'a great leader' you just need to make sure that he knows he's being booted. You sound like a dick, he sounds like a dick, I doubt there's a way this ends well.
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Is this the same project that was in your other blog where that idiot pulled out an NDA?
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Pretty simple, promote 'great leader' to second in command and let him fire Johny. Or better yet grow a pair.
E: When you fire him, make sure you are firing him because of poor performance, none of this 'well the team wants you gone' bullshit. It's better that he only hates you, and not the entire team.
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You have a good team of good people willing to work on a game, yeah?
...you're building something off of his game design documents, yeah?
Way I see it, you've got two options. One is to abandon (his) ship, inform him that you're aborting the current project and starting a new one using what you've learned, and he will not be part of the team for the new project. Two is to get his written consent or some legal indicator that he's giving you the rights to anything he's contributed to the project, and THEN kick him.
I've seen this sort of thing go down before, and there is potential for him to stir up a legal fuss if his removal from the project isn't clean.
Also some of this reads as though you want/need Johnny to be wrong, but it's impossible for anyone outside to actually give you valuable insight because you've told us he's wrong and we're not in a position to challenge that claim. If you hadn't made it so clear (?) that he doesn't contribute and doesn't know what he's talking about, I'd leave an option three, which was to figure out how he can be productive and helpful without him trying to be the leader that checks in only twice a week.
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On November 16 2013 11:15 AnachronisticAnarchy wrote:
Is this the same project that was in your other blog where that idiot pulled out an NDA?
Yeap. Back then i told him that he had to chose between his contracts or my help. Guess i have been waiting to long with this shit.
Anyway, here's the project: www.goldenoakstudios.net
for those of you who are intrested, besides the occasional drama everything is going great, playtesting new builds mutiple times throughout the week .
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On November 16 2013 13:16 Staboteur wrote:
You have a good team of good people willing to work on a game, yeah?
...you're building something off of his game design documents, yeah?
Way I see it, you've got two options. One is to abandon (his) ship, inform him that you're aborting the current project and starting a new one using what you've learned, and he will not be part of the team for the new project. Two is to get his written consent or some legal indicator that he's giving you the rights to anything he's contributed to the project, and THEN kick him.
I've seen this sort of thing go down before, and there is potential for him to stir up a legal fuss if his removal from the project isn't clean.
Also some of this reads as though you want/need Johnny to be wrong, but it's impossible for anyone outside to actually give you valuable insight because you've told us he's wrong and we're not in a position to challenge that claim. If you hadn't made it so clear (?) that he doesn't contribute and doesn't know what he's talking about, I'd leave an option three, which was to figure out how he can be productive and helpful without him trying to be the leader that checks in only twice a week.
That shouldnt be a problem. I dont think he can get IP rights on this. Also part of the problem is that his design is fundamentally flawed but he does not have the flexibility to allow for changes. but yes, indeed gonna go with option 3 for now..
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WTF, dude you need to learn to communicate before making harsh decisions.
Tell him you need to talk to him, tell him the current situation, how you feel about it, and why it can't go on like this. Then you two can work it out by talking to each other. You don't just fire a guy just like that, especially if it's his project anyway and you're doing stuff based on his ideas.
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On November 17 2013 02:44 Geiko wrote:
WTF, dude you need to learn to communicate before making harsh decisions.
Tell him you need to talk to him, tell him the current situation, how you feel about it, and why it can't go on like this. Then you two can work it out by talking to each other. You don't just fire a guy just like that, especially if it's his project anyway and you're doing stuff based on his ideas.
First of all. An idea is an idea. Everyone one of us has ideas and can write them down. Who do you think is making this game, the guy who wrote down some ideas? No, its the guys that are doing concept art, programming, 3d modelling, level design day in day out.
And they dont want to deal with this bullshit anymore. This has been dragging on for very long, its not about being bad in communication or being a dick as someone else here said, its about making sure we bring a game to the market. I dont need some guy who is not involved at all to tell us how much our work sucks when he is rarely online. Sorry for that guy, but reality is a bitch, and i have the entire team behind me in this matter now. He will get one final warning, after that, sorry but goodbye.
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On November 17 2013 08:31 SupplyBlockedTV wrote:Show nested quote +On November 17 2013 02:44 Geiko wrote:
WTF, dude you need to learn to communicate before making harsh decisions.
Tell him you need to talk to him, tell him the current situation, how you feel about it, and why it can't go on like this. Then you two can work it out by talking to each other. You don't just fire a guy just like that, especially if it's his project anyway and you're doing stuff based on his ideas. First of all. An idea is an idea. Everyone one of us has ideas and can write them down. Who do you think is making this game, the guy who wrote down some ideas? No, its the guys that are doing concept art, programming, 3d modelling, level design day in day out. And they dont want to deal with this bullshit anymore. This has been dragging on for very long, its not about being bad in communication or being a dick as someone else here said, its about making sure we bring a game to the market. I dont need some guy who is not involved at all to tell us how much our work sucks when he is rarely online. Sorry for that guy, but reality is a bitch, and i have the entire team behind me in this matter now. He will get one final warning, after that, sorry but goodbye.
The real thing you should be worried about is that he probably has legal entitlement to part of the project. Depending on what contracts, documents, etc. that you have surrounding this game, you likely won't be able to just kick him without him being able to stake a claim on part of the earnings.
And if you don't settle the matter when you kick him, and your game is actually a moderate success (or more), then a lack of foresight is going to bite you in the ass when he brings a lawsuit to get his share of the money.
As you said, reality is a bitch.
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On November 17 2013 08:43 WolfintheSheep wrote:Show nested quote +On November 17 2013 08:31 SupplyBlockedTV wrote:On November 17 2013 02:44 Geiko wrote:
WTF, dude you need to learn to communicate before making harsh decisions.
Tell him you need to talk to him, tell him the current situation, how you feel about it, and why it can't go on like this. Then you two can work it out by talking to each other. You don't just fire a guy just like that, especially if it's his project anyway and you're doing stuff based on his ideas. First of all. An idea is an idea. Everyone one of us has ideas and can write them down. Who do you think is making this game, the guy who wrote down some ideas? No, its the guys that are doing concept art, programming, 3d modelling, level design day in day out. And they dont want to deal with this bullshit anymore. This has been dragging on for very long, its not about being bad in communication or being a dick as someone else here said, its about making sure we bring a game to the market. I dont need some guy who is not involved at all to tell us how much our work sucks when he is rarely online. Sorry for that guy, but reality is a bitch, and i have the entire team behind me in this matter now. He will get one final warning, after that, sorry but goodbye. The real thing you should be worried about is that he probably has legal entitlement to part of the project. Depending on what contracts, documents, etc. that you have surrounding this game, you likely won't be able to just kick him without him being able to stake a claim on part of the earnings. And if you don't settle the matter when you kick him, and your game is actually a moderate success (or more), then a lack of foresight is going to bite you in the ass when he brings a lawsuit to get his share of the money. As you said, reality is a bitch.
As i said before. His concept is flawed. And it is so generalized that there is no way intellectual property will apply to this. We also refused in the past to sign any contracts. We want to have freedom to rework the concept and make it better, because prototyping proved that it was flawed to its core, but this guy doesnt believe it is, and we cant continue on a game that needs alot of reworking to its core and not be allowed to by some guy who comes online only now and that, because that wont motivate anyone. As i said, first there will be a warning before kicking him out, the fact simply is that the project will never finish if things go on like this.
He didnt do anything useful besides make a few documents, which will need changing for 80%.. i highly doubt he will have any basis for a lawsuit.
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On November 17 2013 08:59 SupplyBlockedTV wrote:Show nested quote +On November 17 2013 08:43 WolfintheSheep wrote:On November 17 2013 08:31 SupplyBlockedTV wrote:On November 17 2013 02:44 Geiko wrote:
WTF, dude you need to learn to communicate before making harsh decisions.
Tell him you need to talk to him, tell him the current situation, how you feel about it, and why it can't go on like this. Then you two can work it out by talking to each other. You don't just fire a guy just like that, especially if it's his project anyway and you're doing stuff based on his ideas. First of all. An idea is an idea. Everyone one of us has ideas and can write them down. Who do you think is making this game, the guy who wrote down some ideas? No, its the guys that are doing concept art, programming, 3d modelling, level design day in day out. And they dont want to deal with this bullshit anymore. This has been dragging on for very long, its not about being bad in communication or being a dick as someone else here said, its about making sure we bring a game to the market. I dont need some guy who is not involved at all to tell us how much our work sucks when he is rarely online. Sorry for that guy, but reality is a bitch, and i have the entire team behind me in this matter now. He will get one final warning, after that, sorry but goodbye. The real thing you should be worried about is that he probably has legal entitlement to part of the project. Depending on what contracts, documents, etc. that you have surrounding this game, you likely won't be able to just kick him without him being able to stake a claim on part of the earnings. And if you don't settle the matter when you kick him, and your game is actually a moderate success (or more), then a lack of foresight is going to bite you in the ass when he brings a lawsuit to get his share of the money. As you said, reality is a bitch. As i said before. His concept is flawed. And it is so generalized that there is no way intellectual property will apply to this. We also refused in the past to sign any contracts. We want to have freedom to rework the concept and make it better, because prototyping proved that it was flawed to its core, but this guy doesnt believe it is, and we cant continue on a game that needs alot of reworking to its core and not be allowed to by some guy who comes online only now and that, because that wont motivate anyone. As i said, first there will be a warning before kicking him out, the fact simply is that the project will never finish if things go on like this. He didnt do anything useful besides make a few documents, which will need changing for 80%.. i highly doubt he will have any basis for a lawsuit.
Don't make assumptions when it comes to legality. Even if you are right that this guy can't win a lawsuit, he can still make life for you and your team a hell by by dragging you to court (and he certainly has a good enough claim that you won't pin lawyer costs on him). There's a reason why most civil cases get settled before they actually go to court.
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Yea, I'd talk to him. And consider a lawyer if you hope to make money off of this.
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EPT
