Game On: How Agile Practices Can Level Up Your Game Development

Creating games is not an easy process, You need to be creative, work well with others, and change your plans quickly when things go wrong. You also need to make sure that your games are fun, engaging, visually stunning, and compatible with all devices. In order to deliver high-quality games that meet player expectations and market standards, game developers need to adopt some special ways of working which are Agile practices.

What are agile practices?

Agile practices are a set of principles and methods that emphasize iterative, incremental, and collaborative development, with frequent testing and delivery of a working software. Agile practices can help game developers to improve their productivity, quality, user satisfaction, and innovation.

In this article you will explore the technical aspects of agile game development. You will learn how to apply agile practices to create, test, and deliver games that are fun, functional, and engaging for your users. Agile development requires everyone to work together and communicate effectively throughout the project. Developers and designers should open up a direct channel of communication as early as possible, and share knowledge across disciplines. Getting involved in the concept and design phases will help developers and designers to validate both the visual and technical aspects of the project together, and save time and effort later on.?

Let’s dive deeper into the agile methodologies and how they can enhance your game development process. We will explore some intriguing questions and try to answer them with clarity and insight. Are you ready to learn more? Let’s begin!

Agile projects need management tools, but they should be simple, clear, and suited to the needs of the project and the team.

What is the best management tool and why??

For Agile project tracking, you can start with something simple and possibly free like Trello , or Airtable . These are basic Kanban boards that you can create user stories, backlogs, and sprints on without having to train your team on complex software. If you end up needing something more powerful, go ahead and make the jump to Jira .

What to expect from Agile Game Developers?

Agile game development is based on iteration, which means the code base will be updated frequently and needs to be able to handle changes without major overhauls. Developers should write code that is modular, clean, and flexible, and avoid unnecessary or complex features that can make the code base messy or hard to maintain. They should use design patterns and principles, such as storing global variables, creating wrappers, and using debug helpers, to make the code base easy to modify and expand later on.

A good book to learn more about Agile development and clean code is Clean Code: Agile Principles, Patterns, and Practices by Robert C. Martin.

What is premature optimization and how to avoid it?

Premature optimization is when you spend too much time and effort on making your code perfect or ready for future features, instead of focusing on the immediate goals and tasks of the project. It can waste your time, distract you from the real problems, and make your code more complex and hard to maintain. Agile development is about making your code flexible and adaptable, but not over-optimized. You should only optimize your code when it is necessary and useful, not just for the sake of it.

Determining velocity is crucial in Agile development!

Velocity is a metric that shows how much work an agile team can do in a sprint, based on how they weigh user stories and tasks. Velocity helps to plan and improve the sprint goals and tasks, and it should be consistent and realistic. Velocity is established by setting a baseline in the first sprint, which is usually 30% of the total available working time, and then adjusting it based on the performance of the team in each sprint. After five or six sprints, the team velocity will stabilize and reflect the team’s capabilities and work style.

Why is testing a vital part in agile development?

Testing is a vital part of Agile development, and it should be done regularly and continuously as part of the sprint tasks, not as a separate or optional task. Test-driven development is the best way to test a project. Testing should not be left until the last minute or after the game is mostly finished, as this can cause technical debt and missed deadlines.

A good book to learn more about testing in Agile development is Agile Testing: A Practical Guide for Testers and Agile Teams by Lisa Crispin and Janet Gregory.

How can Agile methodologies be used in Game Development?

Now you'll explore how game developers can leverage Agile methodologies to enhance efficiency and creativity, ensuring successful and dynamic game projects.

Scrum

Scrum is an agile practice that organizes the game development process into short periods of time called sprints, where a team works on a set of features or tasks that are prioritized by the product owner. It helps game developers to deliver working prototypes frequently, adapt to changing requirements, and improve communication and collaboration within the team.

For more in-depth insights on Agile Game Development with Scrum, check out this informative article Agile Game Development With Scrum: Teams

Extreme Programming

Extreme Programming is an agile practice that emphasizes coding practices that improve the quality and efficiency of the software development process. Some of the coding practices are pair programming, test-driven development, continuous integration, refactoring, and collective code ownership. Extreme Programming helps game developers to reduce errors, bugs, and rework, increase productivity and performance, and foster a culture of learning and improvement within the team.

Rapid Prototyping

Rapid Prototyping is an agile practice that involves creating quick and simple versions of a game or a feature to test its feasibility, functionality, and desirability. Rapid Prototyping helps game developers to explore different ideas, experiment with different options, and get feedback from users or stakeholders early in the game development process. Some of the benefits of using Rapid Prototyping in game development are saving time and money, avoiding unnecessary work or rework, and enhancing creativity and innovation.?

Conclusion

Agile methodologies, such as Scrum, Extreme Programming, and Rapid Prototyping, are vital for game developers. They offer a flexible structure that fosters teamwork and innovation. By implementing these methods, you can create high-quality games that adapt to changes and continuously improve. Agile practices are essential for crafting games that not only entertain but also excel in terms of quality and creativity.