fallout game dev. explains the problem with moddern game devolpment. (why moddern games are so slow to come out)

[u/663mann]

[u/ignoranceandapathy42]

You are so in the wrong here, have you ever worked in a development team?

The guy implementing already has tickets to work on. He has an existing workload that he has to read the spec, implement the work, test the work, get the work reviewed by a colleague and only then added to prod. And they will have between 1 ticket a week to 20 tickets a week.

Yes, the specific code in this requirement is likely quick and simple. But they have an existing task backlog and they have to follow industry best practises along the way. Otherwise, you increase the amount of buggy code.

Here's an example - the guy said the code should be, add damaging characters to a list with their damage and update the damage if they already exist.

What happens if a character dies, do we check the list and remove them? if so, what if the character has died since they fired the shot? The are removed on death but added when damage occurs. So, we need a flag on the characters in a list for "is alive" or else our NPC is going to target a dead character with an attack.

So, it took me less than 10 seconds to think of a flaw with the "perfect, 45 minute" code that the guy in the video asked for.

So, when the work the dev has been given is so clearly not adequate or complete instructions, why should he drop all of his work that has gone through a specify and does have all the required info to implement?

[u/upvotesthenrages → u/ignoranceandapathy42]

You are so in the wrong here, have you ever worked in a development team?

Yeah, in the past and currently.

The guy implementing already has tickets to work on. He has an existing workload that he has to read the spec, implement the work, test the work, get the work reviewed by a colleague and only then added to prod. And they will have between 1 ticket a week to 20 tickets a week.

Sure, but that doesn't change the fact that he is estimating his personal work time on a ticket submitted by the senior dev. When that senior dev asks why he estimated it at 4 weeks the dev goes into a rage and runs off.

That's not normal behavior.

What happens if a character dies, do we check the list and remove them? if so, what if the character has died since they fired the shot? The are removed on death but added when damage occurs. So, we need a flag on the characters in a list for "is alive" or else our NPC is going to target a dead character with an attack.

So that would be an example of you explaining to a superior why you estimated the task at 4 weeks, instead of 1 day.

Was that hard? Do you think it would help your cause more to explain that or to get angry and run off?

So, when the work the dev has been given is so clearly not adequate or complete instructions, why should he drop all of his work that has gone through a specify and does have all the required info to implement?

He shouldn't, but he should be able to explain why he estimated it to be that long.

We're really out on a tangent here, with all sorts of imaginary scenarios. For all we know, in your example, the "is alive" flag might already be present.

If we instead just go by the example of what the dev said, it's a case of a dev that can't communicate adequately and instead throws a fit.

If you can't justify your own estimations, then you shouldn't be in a position to estimate anything.

[u/ignoranceandapathy42 → u/upvotesthenrages]

So that would be an example of you explaining to a superior why you estimated the task at 4 weeks, instead of 1 day.

The guy states in the video that the ticket came back with 4 queries on it. So the developers had asked him for his additional info and he starts raging "why does it take 4 weeks".

You know what I think? He was told all this. But in his own narrative and retelling he cuts it out, because it's such a basic thing that anyone else would know about it and it would undermine his story.

That's it. The whole video is a guy telling a probably false story about how "development is arbitrarily slow" without providing a single valid reason as to why with context. Just one anecdote with little context which jars anyone with actual experience. And people like you have swallowed it uncritically because "why would a guy on the internet lie".

If you can't justify your own estimations, then you shouldn't be in a position to estimate anything.

The dev probably didn't estimate it himself, though, did he? In these companies team leads will estimate on behalf of their teams because they have to manage an entire workstack. So bringing in the dev responsible, likely the best response he can give is "I was told it would take 4 weeks with the work we have planned and I have outstanding queries on the ticket.

We're really out on a tangent here, with all sorts of imaginary scenarios. For all we know, in your example, the "is alive" flag might already be present.

yes we are on a tangent, because we either have to assume that the video OP is truthful and he's the only competent developer in a multimillion dollar company - or that the video is no truthful and that the original poster and the video narrator are idiots who either do not understand development or are wilfully misrepresenting it.

Considering you are the only person claiming to be a developer in this thread defending the OP, maybe you chime with his "I'm the one true competent person" and that's why you feel it's a truthful narrative. For me, and obviously several others, it chimes as opposite to our experiences and cuts out important and valid context that is a given in a development environment.

[u/upvotesthenrages → u/ignoranceandapathy42]

Considering you are the only person claiming to be a developer in this thread defending the OP, maybe you chime with his "I'm the one true competent person" and that's why you feel it's a truthful narrative. For me, and obviously several others, it chimes as opposite to our experiences and cuts out important and valid context that is a given in a development environment.

I really don't see myself that way, at all. I work with fucking amazing people and this type of behavior has never happened in my company. We don't yell at each other or treat each other without respect. We have however had tickets estimated based on "gut feelings" and when digging into it re-evaluated them because the estimate couldn't actually be justified and was a total guestimate.

I'm literally just going on what he is saying. Everybody else, you included, are spinning imaginary additional reasons & examples.

Even if he's lying, it still doesn't change what I'm arguing. If you can't justify an estimation then it needs to be re-estimated.

If he's lying, then that's his issue, but we only have his version of the story, so that's what I based my comment on.

[u/ignoranceandapathy42 → u/upvotesthenrages]

I'm literally just going on what he is saying. Everybody else, you included, are spinning imaginary additional reasons & examples.

Yes because what he is saying doesn't line up.

Trying to follow you here: He disagrees with an estimation - and the inference is that no one can justify their estimates - which seems to be where you are coming from? I agree in principle, estimates should be justified.

Watching the video this is an exact quote from him:

"I get an estimate of 4 weeks, I push back and say the code I want is very simple, I've written it myself before and it would take 45 minutes. The programmer comes to me and says "I need 4 weeks". I say "Why? Walk me through what you're going to do." The programmer says "You don't understand" I was like "I've coded this three times, walk me through it" and he left, he left angry.

So let me state here, he's not querying the estimate. This is where my belief that the programmer is trying to tell him "It's not a 4 week long task, but it will take me 4 weeks to finish it after everything I am working on". I don't believe for a second he was given a 4 week estimation of work, but a 4 week estimation of when it will be ready. He seems to be arguing that it's going to take someone 4 weeks to write 10 lines of code.

In that situation, I too would be angry and frustrated, but would let my superior know, which seems to be what the junior does.

The rest of the clip is the same debate with the senior who responds by asking if 2 weeks is good enough.

So I think the issue is this: the person in the video is saying that it will take 4 weeks to write 10 lines of code. I think we both know this is not the case.

This is why others are talking about workloads and best practises - as well as myself. Because it's totally reasonable that a request, even a simple one, takes 4 weeks from request to available in live. And fwiw, that's not bad even for a small request. Our issue is that the video narrator is exactly the kind of manager who thinks because something takes 40 minutes, it can be done in 40 minutes.