/digipen/ - DigiPenitentiary

Producer = "I have an idea for a game and I want to manage others doing it while doing nothing other than telling others what to do."

There are some legit producers at DigiPen who "get it" and are actually good at managing people, but I had a roommate first semester who kept trying to be "producer" on his game team despite being BSGD, and being unable to provide any code or art assets or anything else a GAM 100 game needs. Needless to say, he dropped out, but it seems like many people who are just like him have been more lucky.

Once again, props to the legit producers, they have their shit on lock and succeed at DigiPen despite there being no real degree program for them, but all the other "producers" can fuck off.

But why are so many people interested in doing it? Everything I have heard is that the industry just isn't looking for producers who have no industry experience.

As far I I know and have heard of there has only been a handful of GOOD producers that came out of DigiPen. I feel like it is just a bad idea to try and be a producer at our school, especially since there is no formal track for them to get better at it. Let alone know what a producer ACTUALLY does.

>>1134
You seem to think that people are actually smart. This is not the case.

Anyone who has ever hung around amateur game development forums has seen post after post like "Looking for programmers, artists, and musicians to make this game awesome! I'll be managing everything and maybe making particle effects or something idk". These kinds of people who happen to have rich parents ended up at DigiPen. End of story.

You are 100% right that a.) DigiPen has no degree program resembling anything that a producer should be and b.) few (but some!) people are looking for producers in the industry. DigiPen doesn't care, though; if you told an admissions person that producing is the thing you want to do, they would do anything but turn you away. They'll be happy to take your money while you struggle to figure out whether producing is actually what you want to do, or whether you just want to pay for a semester or two of classes and then drop the fuck out.

Generally people want to be the guy who goes "I have the best idea for a game ever and together we can do this" for whatever reason.

I've been put into the producer role before DigiPen, and naturally fell into it for GAM100. For GAM150, I tried to let someone else be producer and he fucked it up so badly that I had to step in and take over. GAM200, I joined a team that already had a producer, and it was alright, but I had some major conflicts with her management style and work ethic. If you want something done right, I guess you have to do it yourself.

I wish that there were more information for students who aren't producers at the moment but may have to be at some other point. Everything I've learned about being a producer has been trial-and-error, and I've had to learn new techniques with EVERY team member on a project I've produced.

Never have I been on a team where the 'Producer As Idea Guy' archetype has been true. Most producers in my experience are BSGDs or RTISes who aren't particularly good at design or code, but do have middling-to-good interpersonal skills (extroverts, mainly) and a good big picture sense.

>>1138
Well then you had a pretty awesome first semester. I was on a team with someone who ended up being a prominent member of the student body eventually, but was a total "ideas man" first semester. I ended up quitting the team and never looked back. Glad you were able to avoid such a situation.

>>1140
>Producer
>First semester
what you on m8

>>1145
Again, it's not me who has this mentality, it's at least three people I've known and lived with that do. Of them, one is a prominent member of the student body, one is a poor designer, and one dropped the fuck out.

I see what you guys are saying but I honestly just don't like it. The school used to be about small teams making cool shit.

Now we have teams that are large so they can justify a producer (and I am sure there is some art bullshit in there too.) there are too many people here that just aren't producer material, and the few that are don't have the experience to be a producer.

A dude that dropped out who became a producer at the start of the year even did a guest lecture thing for a COM class and even he said its a bad idea to try and become a producer with only DigiPen under a persons belt.

Calling Digipen team producers producers is an insult to real producers.