Chapter 2 Theoretical Foundation
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CHAPTER 2 THEORETICAL FOUNDATION This chapter explains information and technologies that the author will use to make “Kingdom of Pet”. It consists of agile software development method and game development process. 2.1 Agile Software Development Agile software development is a group of software development methods that using iteration and increment development. It is considered as a problem fixing for heavyweight methodology because agile software development is called lightweight methodology, which is trying to minimize the plan for the project with a large scale of detail and taking over a lot time [1]. The manifesto of agile software development is published in February of 2001 by an organization named Agile Alliance. There are four concept of agile manifesto and that are following: [2] Individual and interactions over processes and tools Working software over comprehensive documentation Customer collaboration over contract negotiation Responding to change over following a plan The meanings of the manifesto items on the left within the agile software development context are described below: [3] Individual and interactions – an organize among self effectively is important 5 6 Working software – it is easier to understand working software rather than read a lot of document to client in meeting Customer collaboration – what customer want might be change over time, so it is important to involve the customer continuously Responding to change – there has to be preparation for changes for the plan otherwise it can be irrelevant quickly Figure 2.1 Software development cycle by iteration on agile software development [4] Agile software development method splits the total of long development cycle into a lot of short development cycles which is called iteration. The iteration can take one or two weeks from one or two months. The development process of the software product is always in iteration. Firstly, from the starting of the iteration, the software developers take the requirements from their clients and after that, they planning and 7 designing the analyzed requirements. Secondly, they implement and test the software product. And lastly, the software product is delivered to the customers and getting the feedback from them so that the next iteration can be carried out. It is different with paper-based software development method because with this methodology, the customers can understand more clear and concrete by showing them the software product [5]. 2.1.1 Scrum Scrum is one of agile software development method, so that means scrum is an iterative or incremental development framework for creating a software or application. It is for small teams, especially for they who work independently so that they can work more effectively [6]. 2.1.2 How Scrum Works Basically scrum is the same as all projects at first, it has initial planning phase. At this starting point, architecture must be created inside the team. All members must act according to their role and it might be changed in the future, but they still have to develop the architecture at the first time. An Architect must be chosen as the chief architecture. Its most important job is to define all members role such as Developer and makes sure Customer is close in touch. Designing is the job for every member and because of that there is no Designer role in the architecture. Managers also acts as the supporting role and they usually not control directly to the process except in the midst of crisis. The product is controlled by Architect, while the process is controlled by Developer who Architect should have a close communication with as the “chief Developer” [7]. 8 Figure 2.2 Scrum Frameworks [8] After the initial planning, the next phase is to develop the software incrementally as many short progression of development phase which are called sprints. Usually a sprint takes one to four weeks’ time of works. At the end of iteration, the team delivers the software product to the product owner so that they can get the feedback from it. Everything can change during this meeting, the work can be added, eliminated, or reprioritized. There is a list that called sprint backlog that is a list of all team activities. It tracks all the team tasks that must be updated and reprioritized before each sprint [9]. The member, who agrees to do the task in product backlog that listing the entire prioritized product’s features, must be sure that they can complete the task each sprint. The product backlog maybe changed as more is learned about the product and its customer [10]. Each day of sprints, the team must carry out a meeting who will be led by the Scrum master. The scrum meeting should take 15 to 30 minute, but does not allow time 9 member to brainstorm the solution. Its member must answer these following questions: [6] 1. What have you completed, relative to the backlog, since the last Scrum meeting? 2. What obstacle got in your way of completing this work? 3. What specific things do you plan to accomplish, relative to the backlog, between now and next Scrum meeting? The goals of the scrum meeting are: [6] Focusing the developers on the backlog items Communicating the priorities of the backlog items to the team members Keeping everyone informed of the progress and obstacles Managing the obstacles as fast as possible Tracking the progress of delivering the backlog’s functionality Addressing and minimizing the project risk 2.2 Game Development Process In producing games, it is important to know exactly how to create a game. Not just the developer’s side that have the goal to produce a highest quality game over limits of resources and budgets, but also the publisher’s side that want to sell the best- selling game with limited risks and low costs [11]. 10 Figure 2.3Stage of Development [11] There are several phases to develop a game according Tracy Fullerton who is studied about the evolution of some best practices to produce a game efficiently. Figure 2.3 with “V” shape shows that on early phase, changes can be made with a little economic issue. Changes on the vision of the game are nearly impossible on the production phase, but it can fix some features or concepts. This can change the game play but it does not cost insignificant changes to reconstruct the game or start over the existing art and animation. Later on, when the phase is beyond the production phase, it will be difficult and expensive to change or make any modification to the game design. That is why, the prototyping and play testing is on early phase so that if there are some issues it can be found on preproduction stage and before the actual code and art is being made. The goal of play testing on the Quality Assurance (QA) phase is to find small problems and focusing the changes to it. Major or even moderate changes are usually not being allowed [11]. 11 2.2.1 Concept/Contract Concept phase is the start of the development process. This is where the developers deliver their game idea to the publishers in order to be funded. When developers show their idea about the game which is called a pitch, publishers will also consider three strong aspects about the developers. The strengths that publishers are looking are the team, the plan, and the idea [11]. The first thing publishers want to know is the developer’s team because they want to reduce the risk by looking an experienced team. It is important to the group that already works together in the past because team work is really critical. They also see how the developer’s team can deliver the product type that is being proposed. For example, if the team that is known to create a simulation game is proposing a first person shooter, they will wonder about the capability of the team to create the game because those two genres is completely different type of game. The next important point is the project plan. Project plan is also includes the schedule and budget plan. It must show every element that is being considered to create the game which are the goals of the project, the deliverables that will be made, the schedule of how long does it takes to complete the project, and also the budget for the resources. This is really important because once it is signed and approved by the publisher; the developer is legally obligated to follow the contract. The least important is the idea of the game, but it does not mean that the publisher is not interested on it. What publishers want to sell is a game that will be bought by its audiences. Publishers rely on the market data to figure the type of top-selling games; if it is not fit with it, the publisher will reconsider about the funding. 12 2.2.2 Preproduction This is the next phase to create a game after the concept is approved by the publishers. Before they work with full team, a small team will be put on this phase because it is less expensive than funding the full team. This small group will clarify the feasibility of the game ideas by creating the first playable level or the environment of the game. After that, they will create the detail plan of the design and technology. The description must be clear so that the production of the game will be more efficient. At the end of preproduction phase, the publishers will review the prototype, the design and the technical documents, and the refined project plan to make a decision between to continue the production or kill it [11].