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Comment by cotelletta | Hacker News Reader

Yeah and because art has vastly different constraints from coding, wanting to swap out artists is just counterproductive.

Then again, the older I get, the more I think the same should apply to developers. You should never lock knowledge inside one person's head, but the idea that you can take over a project without its original creators doing a years long hand off is naive, and leads to all the expected pathologies.

I remember a new $250k CTO saying he was amazed our code didn't have abandoned parts nobody wanted to touch ... this is how professionals are supposed to work, not something they discover "late" in their career.

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> wanting to swap out artists is just counterproductive

You're saying this like this was one of his design goals from the very beginning when he started 25 years ago. No, it's become a requirement because of how unreliable freelancers can be and how difficult it is to find a replacement that is able or willing to stick to the previous style. Thus generic fantasy stuff has become his solution to this issue that is unavoidable, regardless of whether people agree with him or not.

Perhaps. Or maybe freelance artists are frustrated working with someone who doesn't seem to understand what they like to see in good work, and what gives them a sense of satisfaction in a product they have worked on.

I mean the guy seems incapable of comprehending style if this is what he's putting out 25 years in.

Maybe. Doesn't change the position he's in though. Let's say he is incapable of comprehending style. What do you suggest he's supposed to do now?

I see all this criticism here and I don't see any real solutions that would, on a realistic, concrete level, help him in any way improve his business.

I don't really see the problem. If you're not a visual person, and you don't want to be, you shouldn't make visual decisions. He's already hiring freelancers, so he obviously gets this point. The problem is, he should just give a freelancer a broader brief. Like, 'pick all the colours the game will use'. Or even, 'do the art'. I don't see what the difference is between hiring a freelancer to do direction, and hiring somebody to do a couple of sprites.

Direction is usually a continuous process. Freelancers, as he states, are rarely continuous as they move on to other project etc.

It's common in the advertising world for a company to be paid to produce a design document, that specifies stuff like writing style, colours, photograph guidelines, and so on. The idea is to create a guide for making media that fits the brand. Doesn't need to be complicated - from what I saw of his games, it would be a night-and-day improvement if he just had a decent palette.

I think everyone is missing the point. This was not a call for help. It was an explanation of why things are the way they are and why they will not change. Guy's found a way to make a living with the skillset he has and I say power to him.

> I mean the guy seems incapable of comprehending style if this is what he's putting out 25 years in.

It looks worse than his previous games, so he's gotten worse with time.

> Yeah and because art has vastly different constraints from coding, wanting to swap out artists is just counterproductive.

It's actually really common. Most games take years to make and in my experience at least it's very unusual to ship with the same team that started. Art is also the side of things that most readily gets outsourced, either through bought and modified assets or through freelancers and outsourcing companies. Maintaining consistency is something that has to be managed.

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