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[Nialscorva]

I'm still in solo mode because all of my usual contacts have "jobs" and "families" and "a life".  I'm curious how people put together their teams?  Classmates, existing friends, online meetups, etc?

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

i met the people i've worked with on games in the ohrrpgce community, and on livejournal

[Hima]

online art community, then meeting irl at the comic market.

I also meet people on various game dev communities.

[Flying Roosters]

At our day job They are still working there but I'm leaving at the end of February. We'll see what this bring out for us I guess!

[TeeGee]

My current "core" team consists of two artists, one additional coder and one musician. The rest are contractors.

- First artist is just my girlfriend so it kinda doesn't count. She's already here, she can draw, she has good imagination, so she helps me with concept art and sprites since forever.

- The second artist, who now works full-time with me on our projects, I've met during my work in a small game studio. We became friends, and she caught the indie gaming bug, so after we found ourselves unemployed, we decided to go full-time indie and form MoaCube.

- The coder I've met during working on Magi. He really wanted to help me with beta-testing. Then, when I started developing ArcMagi, he insisted on helping me with coding as well. I was reluctant at first, but having little free time to code myself, I gave him a go and we ended up working together. I even invited him to come to my place for few summer weeks once (he's from Norway, I'm from Poland). Was fun.

- Rob, the composer, joined when we were developing Magi. I was a starting indie dev in need of music, he was a starting composer in need of portfolio work. Since then, I hired him for every our project, including some I did back at my day job. Trustworthy contractors are a treasure.

So I guess the answer is: "Do something cool, perhaps get a game dev job, and they will come".

[Nialscorva]

online art community, then meeting irl at the comic market.

I also meet people on various game dev communities.

What are some other good game dev communties?

[Nialscorva]

At our day job They are still working there but I'm leaving at the end of February. We'll see what this bring out for us I guess!

Best of luck!  So you're blazing the trail for them to follow in the future?

[Nialscorva]

My current "core" team consists of two artists, one additional coder and one musician. The rest are contractors.

- First artist is just my girlfriend so it kinda doesn't count. She's already here, she can draw, she has good imagination, so she helps me with concept art and sprites since forever.

- The second artist, who now works full-time with me on our projects, I've met during my work in a small game studio. We became friends, and she caught the indie gaming bug, so after we found ourselves unemployed, we decided to go full-time indie and form MoaCube.

- The coder I've met during working on Magi. He really wanted to help me with beta-testing. Then, when I started developing ArcMagi, he insisted on helping me with coding as well. I was reluctant at first, but having little free time to code myself, I gave him a go and we ended up working together. I even invited him to come to my place for few summer weeks once (he's from Norway, I'm from Poland). Was fun.

- Rob, the composer, joined when we were developing Magi. I was a starting indie dev in need of music, he was a starting composer in need of portfolio work. Since then, I hired him for every our project, including some I did back at my day job. Trustworthy contractors are a treasure.

So I guess the answer is: "Do something cool, perhaps get a game dev job, and they will come".

Hope your girlfriend doesn't read this forum and see the "doesn't count" remark.

Sounds like you've got a decently rounded team.  What type of work do you end up contracting out?

[randomshade]

Currently have 2 partners in my FT job. One I worked with at a previous employer (mainstream game developer) and the other partner was a sort of loose acquaintance from some years earlier. Of our two FT employees, one was also from a previous employer and the other was met through personal references/mutual friends.

[J-Snake]

I get skilled people by contacting them and just randomly telling them how bad they are, that I expect higher quality standards. Most of them cannot escape their ego and try to proove you wrong, that is the point where you trap them. It winds up they start to work for you, hehe.

[Nialscorva]

I get skilled people by contacting them and just randomly telling them how bad they are, that I expect higher quality standards. Most of them cannot escape their ego and try to proove you wrong, that is the point where you trap them. It winds up they start to work for you, hehe.

I've heard that about you, that you're pretty bad at generating high quality client/server physics synchronization code.  The only way you can hope to repair your reputation in my eyes is showing me that you can.  Preferably with the server side in Erlang and client as portable C++.  Get to work!

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

What are some other good game dev communties?

each game engine or platform has its own dev community built around it. for instance, there's the xblig community, the game maker community, the rpgmaker community, the interactive fiction community, the mmf community, the unity community, the flash game community, and so on. i think that's probably the most important community, because they are people who are using the same language and/or engine that you are using, and can help you the most directly since they know how to use what you are using. so i'd recommend that whatever you are using, being a member of the community of people who use the same thing is important

if you're using something generic like c++ that might be more difficult, the closest there is to a 'c++ game development community' is gamedev.net, and even that seems split between the directx community and the opengl community

there's also the 'indie games as a business' community which centers at indiegamer.com (this forum is more of the 'indie games as a passion' community)

i'd also suggest local communities depending on where you live. if you live somewhere where there are very few game devs then that'd be a problem though, but if you live somewhere with lots of people chances are there's a few game developers besides you in your city, so it'd be good to find out who they are and setup meetups

but that's just for programmers. if you need a musician, you could join music communites like the ocremix forum. if you need an artist, hang out around artist communities like deviantart. if you need a writer, hang out at writing communities/forums, you get the idea

[J-Snake]

I get skilled people by contacting them and just randomly telling them how bad they are, that I expect higher quality standards. Most of them cannot escape their ego and try to proove you wrong, that is the point where you trap them. It winds up they start to work for you, hehe.

I've heard that about you, that you're pretty bad at generating high quality client/server physics synchronization code.  The only way you can hope to repair your reputation in my eyes is showing me that you can.  Preferably with the server side in Erlang and client as portable C++.  Get to work!

Dude, I can even perfectly syncronize Neuman/Mankowsky network-strings for parallel mass-processing to simulate highly cognitive A.I. in pure assembler. Get your facts straight:P

[Nialscorva]

I get skilled people by contacting them and just randomly telling them how bad they are, that I expect higher quality standards. Most of them cannot escape their ego and try to proove you wrong, that is the point where you trap them. It winds up they start to work for you, hehe.

I've heard that about you, that you're pretty bad at generating high quality client/server physics synchronization code.  The only way you can hope to repair your reputation in my eyes is showing me that you can.  Preferably with the server side in Erlang and client as portable C++.  Get to work!

Dude, I can even perfectly syncronize Neuman/Mankowsky network-strings for parallel mass-processing to simulate highly cognitive A.I. in pure assembler. Get your facts straight:P

That's not what I need right now, though.

[J-Snake]

It is more than you need

Ok, let's leave it on topic that way

[TeeGee]

Hope your girlfriend doesn't read this forum and see the "doesn't count" remark.

Sounds like you've got a decently rounded team.  What type of work do you end up contracting out?

Well, it doesn't count as in: bedding people is not the recommended way to get them to work for you. At least I hope it isn't .

As for contracting -- it depends on the project really. Recently we were pitching a bigger non-indie (externally funded) game to a friendly company. If the project would get green lighted, we would have to hire additional artists, small animation studio to do the cutscenes and a junior designer to help me with the workload.

In our usual indie projects, we outsource music (albeit almost always to the same person), and currently we're also working with a writer who is not a core part of our team (though I hope he becomes one). If we ever need voice actors or proofreading, I'm obviously going to contract these out as well.

[Uykered]

I'd love to work with other people in the same room, see what its like.

[Fallsburg]

Boston Indie Group.  We met at the first meeting I went to, and we have very similar interests in games (both in the kinds we like to play and the kinds we like to make).

[Subtle Stone]

met my team in high school

[Manuel Magalhães]

I'd love to work with other people in the same room, see what its like.

Me too. It must be an awesome sensation to work on a game with a group of people by your side.