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Our way into Scrum
In my group (as in other groups as well I believe) it became obvious, that only the ones with design as a minor had knowledge about the Scrum framework when this course started. Not that we were experts in any way, but we had at least read about it in the previous course. The project managers started to learn about it now in their minor, but since both courses started at the same time, at least my project manager felt it was hard to support the group in a method she did not know enough about. Our solution to that was that the project manager and I had a couple of meetings just the two of us, where I could help her get on track and plan the meetings that we needed for the group. I feel that this was time well spent, because after this there was a distinct change in how the project manager took her role in the project.
Where we are now
For each week, the project manager in the group is setting up all the necessary meetings and then leads them in a clear and efficient way, benefiting the group and the development process.
When we got this running, with the sprint plan meetings Mondays, the daily stand up meetings Tuesday to Thursday, and the sprint review in the end of the sprint (Fridays), we have followed this strictly. We believe that it is good not to do exceptions or changes now when we have just barely learned how this work, so we have followed this meeting routine every week.
Personal thoughts about Scrum
As a designer (with design as my minor that is) I have appreciated working inside the agile Scrum framework. For me, I would say this has helped me grow into my role as a lead designer in the game development team.
I guess it has helped that this way of thinking really suited me as a person – both the clear guidelines about how we can plan the project (user stories, meetings, reviews), and also the agile part, absolutely. It has been super interesting to follow the work of the team each week, from the Monday meeting where we have set the final design for the tasks for the week and then see how much code and art can be produced in a sprint. After every sprint review I have then refined the user story or stories for the next sprint.
Working this way, starting with a general understanding of how the game is supposed to be, and then letting it grow and change for each week, depending on both the performance of the team but also… I can see that I make new design decisions now in the middle of the game, because there are things in the game that I could not have seen when we started, and this will make the game better than if all the decisions were made before we started to build the game. For me as a designer to be, it has felt like freedom inside a safe box of guidelines.
My comment for this week kan be found at:
https://thephantommenaceisnotthatbad.wordpress.com/2018/02/22/scrum-and-user-stories-user-stories-and-scrum/comment-page-1/#comment-4
About Anna Malkan Nelson
2017 Game Design
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