Game Development
Dec 17th, 2024As innovation and creativity are paramount in game development, you may find yourself wondering if outsourcing to an external team can be helpful. Many studio heads and project managers often find themselves at the crossroads – efficiently integrating external development teams without sacrificing quality or vision. The challenges of communication barriers, differing work cultures, and maintaining consistent quality can feel overwhelming.
However, you are not alone in this journey; countless leaders have faced similar hurdles while striving to deliver exceptional gaming experiences. In this post, we’ll share 12 powerful tips that draw from our extensive experience in co-development, helping you navigate the complexities when you hire game developers externally and ultimately enhance your game development workflow.
Integrating external development teams goes beyond simply outsourcing tasks or delegating work. It’s about creating a seamless partnership where external contributors feel like an extension of your in-house team. When done right, external team integration becomes a cornerstone of successful game co-development, allowing you to harness specialized skills, scale up production, and meet tight deadlines without sacrificing quality or vision. Read more about the benefits of co-development.
The process involves aligning goals, workflows, and communication practices to ensure every stakeholder—internal and external—operates cohesively toward the same objectives. So, more than just hiring experts, integrating external development teams is about empowering them to work collaboratively within your creative and technical frameworks.
Integrating external development teams can mean both outsourcing and co-development, depending on the nature of the relationship and level of collaboration or control. Here are the main differences:
| Outsourcing | Co-development | |
| Definition | A more transactional approach where specific tasks or components of a game (e.g., asset creation, QA, or programming) are handed off to an external team. | A collaborative partnership where an external team works closely with the in-house team on core elements of the game. This might include design, narrative development, or significant gameplay systems. |
| External Team’s Role | The external team typically works independently with minimal involvement in the core creative process or decision-making. | They act as an extension of the internal team, contributing to the creative vision, development decisions, and ongoing production. |
| Your Role | You retain overall control and oversight, mainly acting as a client providing guidelines, feedback, and approvals. | You and the external teams share responsibilities, feedback loops, and even ownership of some aspects of the game’s success. |
As an experienced player in the gaming industry, we can offer some useful tips for co-development project management and integrating external development teams into game development workflows.
Schedule consistent check-ins and updates to keep all teams aligned on project goals and progress. This helps you address issues promptly and maintain transparency. By using communication platforms like Slack, Microsoft Teams, or Discord to facilitate real-time communication, you can enable quick feedback loops and reduce misunderstandings.
Clearly outline the roles of internal and external teams to avoid overlap and confusion. For instance, designate a producer from your internal team to oversee the external team’s contributions. Also, ensure that external teams possess the necessary skills for their assigned tasks, whether it’s art, animation, or programming. Clearly define their scope of work and communicate it to them for smooth project flow.
Designate a single point of contact within your internal team who will be responsible for communication with the external team. This simplifies communication channels, ensures consistency in messaging, and avoids potential confusion over who is responsible for what information or decisions. By doing so, you facilitate the process of integrating external development teams, allowing for smoother collaboration and more effective project management.
Involve external teams in the project from the very beginning by including them in initial discussions about project scope, design documents, and overall vision. This ensures they understand your expectations fully.
Managing outsourced teams in game development becomes much easier when you have project management tools in place. They provide a centralized platform for tracking progress and managing tasks, enhancing visibility, which is critical for coordinating efforts between internal and external teams, especially when working on complex projects with multiple moving parts. Popular tools like Trello, Asana, or Jira can be used. Additionally, implementing Agile methodologies allows teams to adapt quickly to changes, ensuring that development stays flexible and responsive to evolving project needs.
QA is a vital part of seamless co-development workflows as it helps maintain consistency across various assets created by different teams. Bi integrating QA processes early, you can identify issues before they escalate, saving time and resources in the long run. You must make sure to involve external teams in testing phases. Structured feedback loops ensure that all team members are aware of quality standards and can contribute to maintaining them.
Outsourcing can seem easy but outsourcing wisely is important. Instead of integrating external development teams for general tasks without clear objectives, identify specific areas where external expertise can add value; for example, VFX, localization, etc. Engage with a game development outsourcing studio, external consultants, or specialists for critical phases of development to enhance quality rather than just for addressing issues or filling temporary gaps.
Monitoring your budget is one of the most crucial best practices in outsourcing game development and co-development. Keeping a close eye on budget allocations helps prevent overspending and ensures that resources are used effectively throughout the project lifecycle. Regular assessments of resource needs allow you to adjust allocations based on current demands, which is particularly important in dynamic environments where project scopes may change.
Clear contracts that outline deliverables, timelines, payment schedules, and intellectual property rights protect both parties involved in the partnership. Regular compliance checks with industry standards help mitigate legal risks that could arise from miscommunication or oversight during development.
Establishing Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) allows teams to measure success against predefined benchmarks, providing insights into areas for improvement. Some essential KPIs you can measure are Daily and Monthly Active Users (DAU and MAU), retention rate, churn rate, etc. Also, conducting reviews after project completion helps identify what worked well and what didn’t, informing future collaborations and enhancing overall effectiveness.
An effective onboarding process is crucial for integrating external teams into game development workflows. It ensures that new team members understand their roles, the project goals, and the tools they will be using. An ideal onboarding process should contain a structured orientation program, clear documentation, buddy system, introduction to tools and technologies, and other essential resources. This helps smooth the onboarding for the external teams and familiarize them with your standards and protocols easily.
Finally, building a collaborative culture enhances teamwork and morale among internal and external members. Shared goals create a sense of community and ownership over the project, which can lead to increased motivation and better results. A collaborative environment encourages creativity and innovation, allowing diverse perspectives to contribute to the game’s development and success.
Integrating external development teams into your game development workflow has the following advantages:
One of the most significant advantages of integrating external development teams is that external teams are often experienced in agile methodologies; they can streamline development processes and adapt quickly to changing requirements. This agility allows you to launch your games faster, keeping pace with industry trends and consumer demands. By leveraging the expertise of external developers, you can focus on your core competencies while ensuring timely releases.
Hiring full-time staff for every aspect of game development can be prohibitively expensive, especially when specific skills are only needed for short periods. External teams can be engaged on a project basis, reducing overhead costs associated with permanent hires.
As project demands fluctuate, whether due to increased scope or tighter deadlines, you can quickly ramp up or down your external resources. By integrating external development teams, you can efficiently manage workloads and maintain productivity without the long-term commitments associated with hiring full-time employees.
Many game studios face resource constraints that limit their ability to take on new projects or expand existing ones. You can bridge these gaps effectively by bringing in external developers with specialized skills that may not be available in-house, allowing you to tackle complex projects without stretching the internal resources too thin.
A positive business impact of co-development in game studios that comes with collaborating with experienced external teams is the overall enhanced quality of a game while keeping overhead costs manageable. These teams often consist of professionals who specialize in specific areas such as art design, programming, or quality assurance. Their expertise ensures that high standards are met without necessitating extensive training or onboarding for internal staff.
Integrating external development teams allows you to tap into diverse markets and cultural insights that can enhance a game’s global appeal. By collaborating with international partners, you can ensure that games resonate with a broader audience, incorporating local trends and preferences into your designs.
External team integration for game studios provides access to a vast pool of talent and expertise that might not be available internally. These professionals often bring innovative solutions and fresh perspectives that can elevate a game’s design and functionality. By leveraging the latest technologies and industry best practices from external partners, you can stay competitive in an ever-evolving market.
At Juego Studios, we have collaborated with small and large brands alike, seamlessly integrating with their teams on game development projects. This experience gives us the edge at game development collaboration strategies, enabling us to co-develop or even handle outsourced projects effectively. Clearly, we can be your trusted game development company for all genres, platforms and technologies. Partner with us!
Integrating external development teams presents both challenges and opportunities. By following the game studio outsourcing best practices listed above, you can create a cohesive and efficient environment that maximizes the strengths of both internal and external contributors. Most importantly, leveraging specialized expertise and implementing robust quality assurance processes can significantly enhance the overall quality of the game.
As innovation and creativity are paramount in game development, you may find yourself wondering if outsourcing to an external team can be helpful. Many studio heads and project managers often find themselves at the crossroads – efficiently integrating external development teams without sacrificing quality or vision.
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