[Release Date: August 30, 2022] Game development is often a creative collaboration among people with very different skill sets, passions, and worldviews. What does it mean to treat the people you’re working with in projects like these as a part of a team? What does it mean to respect one another? What can be done when interpersonal conflict inevitably arises?
SHOW TRANSCRIPT
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Shlomo Sher: All right, let’s do it alright welcome everybody we’re here today with Casey o’donnell and associate professor in the department of media and information at Michigan State University.
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Shlomo Sher: His research examines the creative collaboration work video game design and development, the research examine that cultural and collaborative dynamics that occur in both.
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Shlomo Sher: AAA organizations and formal and informal you know indie game development communities, it was researcher span given development companies from the US to India.
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Shlomo Sher: His first book the developers dilemma is published by MIT press and he himself, he is an active game developer releasing oC in 2011 against the gradient 2012 glitch.
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Shlomo Sher: 2013 sparks of eternity in 2014 and other games that can be found on his website and will give you his website at the end of the episode cases work has also been funded by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Health Casey or Donald welcome to the show.
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Casey O’Donnell: Thank you for having me thank you for having me.
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Shlomo Sher: All right, Casey Okay, I know one thing that I left out of this that we were talking about before That to me is super interesting.
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Shlomo Sher: Is you also bring an anthropological lens to studying video games, can you explain what that means what anthropology is how it could be approached us as an approach to video games.
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Casey O’Donnell: Sure, no, I mean I think that’s a that’s an interesting question because I mean I certainly get at the moment I also you know, try to talk to folks and say hey i’m an anthropologist and I want to study you and they’re kind of like what what does that that mean.
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Casey O’Donnell: And so yeah i’m granted anthropology has a long history and I come at it more from a perspective of cultural anthropology right because, with an anthropology you also have.
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Casey O’Donnell: folks that literally excavate giant sites and and find artifacts and things like that physical anthropology is its own field and so there’s all of these different veins even with in anthropology, and so I sort of fall into the camp of being a cultural anthropologist.
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Casey O’Donnell: My advisor was Kim fortune she’s actually the department chair at the University of California Irvine in their anthropology department so.
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Casey O’Donnell: But, for me, I mean, I think the kind of one of the core pieces of anthropological work is participant observation right and it is actually sort of joining a community.
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Casey O’Donnell: The Community that you want to study and being a part of them, and not just you know.
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Casey O’Donnell: it’s not like a reporter who gets dropped in, for you know, a couple hours or a day and instead it’s like you know and it’s not even like Oh, you know i’m going to be here for a couple of months it’s like oh i’m going to spend two years here.
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Casey O’Donnell: and getting to know the the the common senses talk to people right so usually you know you do formal interviews where you’ll sit down and like.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know, ask people questions and record those and then later transcribe them, but the core.
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Casey O’Donnell: sort of I think methodological piece of anthropology that is so important is participant observation and that’s spending time with developers day today like for the boring stuff right so stuff that isn’t exciting.
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A Ashcraft: you’re like you’re like the Jane fossey of the game Development Community.
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Casey O’Donnell: So let me tell you a funny story, so I was at vicarious visions of from 2005 until 2008 studying them.
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Casey O’Donnell: Through you know interesting period of their time and they literally they they made sense of me by being like where your gorillas right.
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and
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Casey O’Donnell: Like.
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A Ashcraft: I came into office one time and they had put.
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Casey O’Donnell: potted plants around my desk.
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Casey O’Donnell: Like was like.
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Casey O’Donnell: Some of them actually came to my dissertation Defense and they gifted me a PIC that right so.
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Casey O’Donnell: yeah so.
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Casey O’Donnell: It is kind of how they they make sense of my presence is I was there.
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A Ashcraft: Right so dian fossey right.
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Shlomo Sher: So So what does that mean, I mean you’re you’re living so let’s have to get a triple A you know game development team yourself.
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Shlomo Sher: A.
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Shlomo Sher: You know, have a background in you know in programming but i’m assuming you’re not working as part of the team.
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Casey O’Donnell: Sometimes, sometimes you wind up working i’m like.
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A Ashcraft: Really kidding yeah there was somebody in my in my building that.
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A Ashcraft: Was had a programming background and I needed that programmer.
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Casey O’Donnell: be like hey well you know what can, what can I do to help like you know even as a person, just like i’m gonna get bored you know just sitting around all the time, so.
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Casey O’Donnell: Right, when I was at vicarious I did a lot of work on like kind of helping sort of facilitate conversations between.
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Casey O’Donnell: teams and particularly sort of different disciplinary groups, so we might get to that in a little bit, but.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know, there was always this joke about like you know that artists and programmers just spoke totally different languages and did like didn’t know how to talk to each other and so.
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Casey O’Donnell: They were like well Can you help us get better at this, and so that was like one of the things that I sort of offered back.
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A Ashcraft: that’s great.
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Shlomo Sher: Alright, so I guess, let me start with the with this, because we’re talking about creative collaboration and the ethics of doing this as a team, and when people like me, and when I say when people like me, I mean.
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Shlomo Sher: You know, regular folks that are not like Andy that don’t really know a whole lot about how games are made right when we think about how games are made.
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Shlomo Sher: We think of game developers and say the artists that they work with and programmers those are kind of like the the three groups right, but obviously there’s lots of other people involved in any sort of production process right, I mean you’re going to get management finance people marketing.
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Shlomo Sher: Major HR right.
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Shlomo Sher: The seems to require collaboration with lots of people who see the world very definitely my God HR they ever see the world differently than we do.
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Shlomo Sher: And, and they see the project that they’re working on as maybe serving very different ends, especially in a creative projects where a lot of egos can be involved.
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Shlomo Sher: I don’t want to ask you the obviously The obvious question, though, we will really how can they successfully work together so.
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Shlomo Sher: You know, because this is the ethics of video games podcast so I want i’m going to try to stick to a more ethical perspective on these things, though honestly will kind of get to the same thing because.
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Shlomo Sher: They relate, so one of the questions of ethics is the question of flourishing right What do people person need to personally flourish right to.
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Shlomo Sher: do well to become their best self right in an environment like this, so that they’re living a better life so, can you tell us about that what sort of things that people need to flourish in an environment like this.
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Casey O’Donnell: Right well so that was I spent a lot of time, you know you gave me some of that you gave me some of the prompts ahead of time, and so I had some time to think about it and.
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Casey O’Donnell: And I actually really liked the idea of flourishing, as this kind of the goal, like the ethical sort of ideal right that everybody has an opportunity to flourish.
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Casey O’Donnell: And sort of move themselves towards a better life and, like so I really liked that i’d like that framing um.
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Casey O’Donnell: But, like my first thought and i’d like mean I hate to go there, like right away, but I was like work written late global clap capitalism and I don’t know how much flourishing as possible.
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Casey O’Donnell: So.
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Casey O’Donnell: What I wanted to say after that okay so but Okay, knowing that we’re sort of framed.
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Casey O’Donnell: In this space where flourishing is kind of frowned upon unless you know you’re the 1%.
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Casey O’Donnell: How could we at least still sort of have that, as our cool right for those people around us and I really liked that frame okay so like Okay, given the fact that i’m going to be cranking and be like is flourishing even possible.
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Casey O’Donnell: So then say okay yeah but that could still be our goal.
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Casey O’Donnell: and
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Casey O’Donnell: And and right, so I think some of the things when I was thinking about it’s like the opportunity to work on things that like you want to work on.
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Casey O’Donnell: Not just what you’re told to work on and that becomes really hard when you’re thinking about it as a job that’s one of the reasons why like I loved studying hobbyist game developers and indie game developers because.
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Casey O’Donnell: they’re working on stuff and hobbyists in particular I gotta say like they’re not doing it for money they do it because they want to do it and because it’s fun and they love it and so.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know, one of the things that i’ve tried to sort of carry into like my teaching practices as a professor is helping my students it’s like.
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Casey O’Donnell: You don’t necessarily have to get a job, making games, you can get a job doing other stuff and then just love this and make stuff you love.
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Casey O’Donnell: Rather than letting it sort of be subsumed by that giant company, but by the same token, a lot of my students like want to go to work for blizzard or work for wizards of the coast and so i’m also trying to help them get there, too, so but ya know I really liked that question about flourishing.
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Shlomo Sher: um well, what about the other people your team right so right you’re working the team, you know, obviously, you need what it is the you need to become your best self what can people do to help you know their teammates become their best self.
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Casey O’Donnell: yeah that’s, so I think one of the things that I was thinking about for this and I hear it a lot like paid say it from my students but also from other.
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Casey O’Donnell: Adult developers that ought to know better, just like I need an artist and what they want to do is hire somebody they don’t really want to like have them be a part of the team, and so, when I think about that from an ethical perspective i’m like what you do you know.
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Casey O’Donnell: Do you really want somebody to.
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Casey O’Donnell: become part of your team and allow them to flourish like within that context or.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know, are you looking for a cog and, and so I think one of the things.
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Casey O’Donnell: I also tell my students all the time and I try to do this with my students, as well as like this other person is a whole person they’re not.
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Casey O’Donnell: A cog they’re not just an artist you you can’t objectify somebody that way they’re a whole person, and you know, think about all the baggage that we have like they have it, too, and so, allowing for.
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Casey O’Donnell: Everyone on a team to be that whole person like.
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Casey O’Donnell: With their hang ups and the perspectives, but that’s also like what they’re bringing to the table.
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Casey O’Donnell: Like you don’t want somebody in spite of being a whole person you want them because they’re a whole person and they’re going to bring with them, those experiences and that’s a good thing and sort of learning to embrace that I think is a really important part of it.
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A Ashcraft: yeah that’s interesting.
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A Ashcraft: i’m pretty sure that I need to include that into my into our curriculum.
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Casey O’Donnell: In the.
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A Ashcraft: In the game design department.
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A Ashcraft: About about that specifically because that’s a really good point like when we when we think about all right, what do we need this game right, we need this, we need this, we need these skills we need these skills we need this this this expertise.
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A Ashcraft: What we can meet our people.
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Casey O’Donnell: Right, and so they can come together and so that’s one of the things that i’ve been really interested in, as I study what I call making games differently, is looking at you know, a game collectives right.
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Casey O’Donnell: places that people come together and they work on things that they want to work on together and.
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Casey O’Donnell: They don’t necessarily have power over each other in the same way that, like a commercial game company has.
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Casey O’Donnell: And you know, like you said you know for teaching students is like you know you’re not just you’re not just a cog, and how can you come together and bring.
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Casey O’Donnell: The perspectives ensure skills right that everybody has but also like so that you know back to this this idea of flourishing allowing everybody to feel like they’re having a meaningful impact on what you’re making.
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A Ashcraft: yeah and especially since, in most cases, you when you get hired on to a team you’re going to be working on your projects yep like I was.
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A Ashcraft: Well, I spent you know anytime that my entire career in the gate in the video game industry.
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Casey O’Donnell: With I don’t know other people’s stuff.
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A Ashcraft: whatever kind of the people stuff I would pitch some I would pitch some ideas periodically, and I would get to I would get to take ownership of aspects of other people’s ideas.
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A Ashcraft: But I did not work on my own ideas.
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Casey O’Donnell: So there’s a hilarious story about this, while I was at vicarious right was that vicarious editions there was a small team that.
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Casey O’Donnell: Just independently like because they had you know it’s like Oh, you get like four hours on Fridays to work on a personal project.
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Casey O’Donnell: And they started working on this game at some of this is in a paper, I wrote called mixed messages which was about Nintendo homebrew DS, but this is connected, I promise, so they started working on this project for the Nintendo DS and it was kind of this party game.
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Casey O’Donnell: and
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Casey O’Donnell: So, like when you first started playing it on the bottom screen, it would say you know either please use the keyboard to type a phrase or to draw a picture.
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Casey O’Donnell: And when you were done you’d close it you hand it to somebody else.
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Casey O’Donnell: And they would open it and it would do the reverse of whatever was before, so if, like somebody had drawn a picture, they had to type something and became this kind of game of telephone right where you’re passing it from person to person.
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Casey O’Donnell: And like a so hilariously like it was three three developers a belief as an engineer an artist and designer that we’re working on it and.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know they basically finished it and it went up the chain at.
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Casey O’Donnell: activision and they’re sort of like couldn’t figure out how to brand it it’s like Oh, maybe if we put Barbie on it, it would work.
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Casey O’Donnell: Like but they didn’t know what to do with it, because it was sort of too weird and so I got shelved for a couple of years when Nintendo went to launch the Nintendo DS store.
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Casey O’Donnell: It at mixed messages actually became a launch title.
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Casey O’Donnell: For that platform, because it was like Oh well here we’ve got something on the shelf, but those three guys were like you know, everybody told me, I would never ever get to work on my own project and holy crap I got to work on my own project.
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A Ashcraft: In the space right.
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Casey O’Donnell: triple A studio.
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A Ashcraft: But, in some ways, really, really rare.
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A Ashcraft: yeah it was like a hobbyist game just happened to take place in a in a big studio environment.
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Shlomo Sher: But, but that was because they gave them the time to do that, so they actually gave him like here’s a part of the day of part of the week, where you get just get to work on what inspires you yep.
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Casey O’Donnell: and eventually they liked it, they just became this really small team that ran with it like.
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Casey O’Donnell: full time for a little bit.
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Shlomo Sher: So I want to go back to I want to go back to the idea of a team because it’s it’s interesting right this idea of you know, potentially, you need someone with a certain skill right.
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Shlomo Sher: And you can think of that person, as you know, you called it a car great I would think of that.
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Shlomo Sher: you’re treating that person as essentially a thing to be used, you know for some some sort of end would be kind of the more the ethics speak of kind of talking about that and it’s really interesting because you know.
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Shlomo Sher: Immediately I think of it a very practical terms, you know, are you is that person just an independent contractor, or are you bringing them as part of the team, but it really made me think instead of.
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Shlomo Sher: What do you how do you think of as what makes for a team right in the kind of best sense of what we mean, you know as, as you know, included whether, whatever your HR statuses right.
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Casey O’Donnell: Right yeah so I mean.
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Casey O’Donnell: This this you know back to kind of the earlier statement it’s hard when people are forced in two teams, because you know, a company, you know at its level of understanding, people are kind of cogs red.
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A Ashcraft: And they’re.
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Casey O’Donnell: they’re objectified right like to their an object, you know it’s an artist it’s a programmer you know it’s.
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Casey O’Donnell: A Community manager, like all of these jobs so it’s like we need this person to fill this role.
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Casey O’Donnell: Which like I totally get, but I think the best teams are teams that have people that come together, because they want to work together.
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Casey O’Donnell: And so you know full disclosure anarchist and.
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So.
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Casey O’Donnell: yeah so.
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So.
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Casey O’Donnell: Voluntary associate voluntary voluntary association is a big important piece, you know of that.
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Casey O’Donnell: puzzle it’s also mutual aid and all of these other things, but you know voluntary association is like do I want to do this thing and.
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Casey O’Donnell: If somebody is telling me like hey you need to do this to get your paycheck so you can keep your health care, so you can stay housed and so you can have food like that’s not voluntary association that’s coercion.
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Casey O’Donnell: But.
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Casey O’Donnell: I think one of the greatest things are when people do come together voluntarily and are like let’s work together let’s do this thing and and you know, which is a reason why i’ve studied game jams right because people who submit themselves to artificial.
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Casey O’Donnell: timelines and events where they’re like okay let’s make a game together but that’s a chance to voluntarily associate, and so I think for me that’s a really important part of a team is.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know that it is something you get to choose.
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Casey O’Donnell: I was thinking like when I say that so sometimes my students are like because I make them read valves employee handbook and.
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Casey O’Donnell: Some people be like Oh well at valve you know you can like move your desk around and be part of any team and, like you know you get to choose what you work on and i’m like well but can you really can you really work on anything about like.
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Shlomo Sher: or any company work.
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Shlomo Sher: That way.
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Shlomo Sher: exactly right and.
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Casey O’Donnell: yeah so like to me that’s where I mean I think game collectives.
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Casey O’Donnell: and communities of developers where somebody is like hey i’m really interested in X right now and somebody like that sounds amazing i’d love to be a part of that can we work together and then you start that that dialogue and to me that’s where the best teams come from.
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Casey O’Donnell: Are from people that are passionate about something, and so you do actually get that at some organizations, because you know.
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Casey O’Donnell: it’s like oh hey you know we work on a lot of marvel games and so a lot of marvel nerds will be like hey sweet, I want to work there.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know same is true at some place like blizzard where people have an idea of what the kinds of stuff they’re going to work on, so you do get to choose to some degree.
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Casey O’Donnell: But it’s not the same as you know, like hey I want to make a game about trees and somebody was like cool let’s make a game about trees.
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Right.
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A Ashcraft: Right what’s gonna happen in the hobbyist industry.
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Casey O’Donnell: Exactly and that’s why, like, I find it such a fascinating space.
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A Ashcraft: Right, do you find a lot of difference in the because you studied both so you know how different Are they in terms of like well let’s go back to the idea of flourishing.
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Right.
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A Ashcraft: Or the how well do people flourish in each of those environment.
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Casey O’Donnell: It maybe depends on where you are in a project right so.
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Casey O’Donnell: That was one of the things that when I first you know went from AAA where there’s crunch and people’s marriages and because of.
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Casey O’Donnell: The projects and all that stuff it’s it’s clearly not flourishing, you know, and in this broader sense, the projects are successful and the company is successful, you know but.
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A Ashcraft: Some of the employees right some people do flourish in that environment but but yeah it’s not for everybody.
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yeah.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know, but even in like the indie game space you go to these sessions at the game developers current conference or gtc and you listen to a couple of indie developers like ruin their lives to make a game and so they’re doing the same thing to themselves.
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Casey O’Donnell: And so, like trying to figure out so like that even doesn’t happen, I do find that like hobbyists and you know pirates and renegade people are actually like more respectful when you know when somebody is like look i’m mom busy something’s going on with life or can’t work on this.
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Casey O’Donnell: People are understanding they know that it’s just one of many things that you do.
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Casey O’Donnell: And so, in these more informal like or more formal even game collectives there’s this dynamic of people talking about like what how much time they’ve got and.
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Casey O’Donnell: How much they can put in it’s like okay well i’ve got you know you know six hours a week or some you know, like, I can dedicate X to this, and so.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know, I was thinking about right this ethic it’s like being honest is is an important piece of you know.
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Casey O’Donnell: How you we can relate ethically together, because if we can’t be honest about like our abilities or our time and you know that that’s thing in organizations, you have to be honest to like.
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Shlomo Sher: Can can can I want to get into into this with things like crunch, so it seems to me that there’s two kind of parts of this right, one part is.
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Shlomo Sher: How honest are the people it working for so let’s say we’re talking about it, you know just triple A company right they’re working on a big game.
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Shlomo Sher: How honest can the people who are working in that game from the various departments be about the time commitment that they think that they signed up for and, reciprocally.
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Shlomo Sher: Is there something.
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Shlomo Sher: This honest about crunch itself.
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Shlomo Sher: You know, or I don’t know if that would be fair at all right, but but about the fact that you’re hired to do it just seems to me that work in the video game industry is really different than almost every any other industry.
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Shlomo Sher: In the way that you can work on a project, and you can have a kind of regular work work life balance and suddenly it could be, you know months of.
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Shlomo Sher: intense work.
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Shlomo Sher: Are companies upfront about that, and how that works, you know, so it seems to be that you know for for our teams, to be honest with each other, both people have to come on to this right in an honest way of what sort of things actually happen right.
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Shlomo Sher: In the real world.
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Casey O’Donnell: yeah so I mean yeah i’m.
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Casey O’Donnell: idealistic when I say you know hey we should be honest and oftentimes like it.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know I mean, I think the biggest lie is that crunch even works, because all the research, all the studies show that it doesn’t work and yet.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know, it becomes part of it that’s so the biggest lie is that crunch actually accomplish something and now somebody will be like Oh, but you know I crushed on X and y for like two days a night.
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Casey O’Donnell: And then I was like yeah and then you were exhausted, and you were worthless for three days.
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Casey O’Donnell: So yeah.
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Shlomo Sher: So you’re actually the anthropologist that is observing this process, as it has so have you observed quench badly.
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Casey O’Donnell: Oh yeah oh yeah, and I mean, and I think the thing that’s really sad, is that you take people that really do sort of love and respect each other and and want to work together and because they’re exhausted, you know it does create interpersonal dynamics that suck.
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Casey O’Donnell: yeah and you know, and if you’re living at work as well, it also changes like.
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Casey O’Donnell: Your idea of you know what kinds of other human relationships are possible, because you know you don’t have time to have friendships that are outside of work or relationships and.
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Casey O’Donnell: And so, then you do get these sort of weird interpersonal dynamics and it’s you know, in part because there’s no other option, and people are stuck and.
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Casey O’Donnell: So.
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Casey O’Donnell: But to the other point which is.
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Casey O’Donnell: So when I think about it right, so in that organization where upper management has made promises that they can’t keep and so.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know who does that ultimately sort of fall on to and it’s the the folks that have to sort of meet those those deadlines and that’s there was sort of a fundamental dishonesty.
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Casey O’Donnell: But there’s also that the question of power right so within those organizations like the people who have made the the dishonest promise have power over the folks below them, and you know but.
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Casey O’Donnell: And you know even within those teams, you know if somebody is making promises you know if your your engineering lead is you know saying hey we can do X in two weeks and everybody else’s being like no it’s gonna be four months, like.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know, but that, but that lead has power over and so like that’s the promise that gets made and that’s bad that’s really bad you know but.
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Casey O’Donnell: We do that too right like will over commit ourselves and be dishonest to ourselves about what are bandwidth this like you know being like oh yeah I could totally squeeze this in here, you know.
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Casey O’Donnell: yeah i’ve got time for zoom this afternoon, like um so so it isn’t to say that they’re bad it’s just we’re all really kind of fundamentally bad arm at.
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Casey O’Donnell: being honest.
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A Ashcraft: And and and honestly we’re really just we’re we’re fundamentally bad at estimating time.
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Shlomo Sher: Right and.
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A Ashcraft: We really want to see his honesty, I think.
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A Ashcraft: It isn’t just about our inability to estimate how much time things are going to take yeah.
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Casey O’Donnell: Well, I mean, are you were sort of I mean so back to the point earlier about viewing somebody as a whole person.
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Casey O’Donnell: we’re bad at that because, like we are.
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Casey O’Donnell: Our brain tries to be efficient right it’s easier to say I need an artist than to be like I need a whole person that can be part of my thing and have some.
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Casey O’Donnell: Artistic skills and you know we have a mindmeld a very it’s just easier, but you know we do our brain wants us to have these kind of mental shortcuts yeah and.
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Casey O’Donnell: yeah they’re totally right.
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Shlomo Sher: Though our brain oh so you know I mean you know tells us, you know.
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Shlomo Sher: We want to be able to do this quickly and efficiently right, so the the lead engineer that’s like oh yeah we could do this in two weeks right might through confirmation bias let’s say right.
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Shlomo Sher: You know, think of all the reasons why the team can get this done and ignore all the reasons for you know the roadblocks that could happen and think that they’re being honest.
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Shlomo Sher: But Israel like let’s say deceive themselves.
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A Ashcraft: So it makes things.
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A Ashcraft: happen.
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A Ashcraft: Yet, because the thing that we think can have that.
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A Ashcraft: can happen.
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Shlomo Sher: So wishful thinking plays a role here.
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Casey O’Donnell: Oh totally.
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Casey O’Donnell: I mean, I think, ideally, we want things to go right we want them to go well and, and I mean we’re also kind of hopeful creatures.
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Casey O’Donnell: Right like.
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Casey O’Donnell: Like we don’t we don’t I mean there are days, where like i’m not getting out of bed there’s nothing hopeful.
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Casey O’Donnell: But mostly we’re like okay man, you know, maybe we can maybe it’ll get better you know, but then you open Twitter you’re like nope not better.
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A Ashcraft: Right all right.
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Shlomo Sher: Let me walk.
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Shlomo Sher: walk us back a little bit to let’s say we’re working in a colossal triple A game right the next assassin’s creed right um what are some of the challenges of working as part of a group working on a project like this gta six.
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Casey O’Donnell: yeah right, so I think one of the things that’s been fascinating right so.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know my time at some of these big companies like.
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Casey O’Donnell: what’s interesting one of the things that interested me was you know Okay, so if you’re working on spider man three or marvel ultimate alliance to like.
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Casey O’Donnell: You may not actually sort of get the source, like you might not get the source code or the assets or the things from the first game and like game companies have this really bad habit of well, we have our internal tech, or we want to use this and so there’s a lot of reinvention.
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Casey O’Donnell: That goes on.
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and
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Casey O’Donnell: You know and and projects will move from studio to studio.
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Casey O’Donnell: And so there’s not always sort of a cohesive vision.
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Casey O’Donnell: And if you are working on.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know.
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Casey O’Donnell: Intellectual properties that have a history right like you don’t want to screw up the assassin’s creed like you know, like they don’t want to do it wrong because the fans, you know, but also making sure that you know you do have that.
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Casey O’Donnell: That that perspective, and so the fact that projects move around, so I think one of the downsides is they got off on the wrong foot, because every place does it differently.
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Casey O’Donnell: But you know that’s not any different than restaurants.
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Casey O’Donnell: Like every restaurant runs differently and so it’s just I think sometimes it’s viewed like.
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Casey O’Donnell: Oh you’re working on a sequel that’s just easy right you’re going to take the old thing and you’re going to do some stuff and slap it together and it’s it should.
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Casey O’Donnell: be easy, and I think this idea, it should be easy or like making games like when I tell you know it’s like one of the things that I love making our conversation games and it’s like Oh well, conversation game that’s got to be pretty easy right and like you say.
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Casey O’Donnell: turns out it’s actually really hard um.
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But.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know the same is probably true for a lot of professions hey i’m a brewer oh that’s got to be easy you throw some yeast and stuff like some hops in a thing and look i’m i’ve got a business like I don’t think you know.
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Casey O’Donnell: Right so even the things we view as easy, but you know if somebody is like I make toys used to be like.
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Casey O’Donnell: You make toys like there’s a it’s easy to kind of dismiss some of these things and games happen to be one of those things that I think it’s like Oh well, that’s easy because games are for kids and so, if you’re making things.
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Casey O’Donnell: For kids they’ve got to.
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be simple.
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A Ashcraft: So, yes and that’s not necessarily untrue, but making things simple can be difficult.
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Casey O’Donnell: yeah oh yeah.
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Shlomo Sher: So to go back to the question right about thinking about the challenges of working as a group right with this colossal project So where do we get the kind of the group dynamics that are making this challenging.
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Casey O’Donnell: wow that’s a good question, and so I think, for me, one of the biggest pieces and and you know it probably doesn’t help that i’m coming from science, technology studies.
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Casey O’Donnell: which has a field is really interested in i’m going to use one big word which is epistemology which just is how you know what does knowledge mean like and what is legitimate knowledge.
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Casey O’Donnell: And so I think one of the biggest breakdowns and so in in what you sent me do you had the word lots of places talk about respect and and I really liked the idea of unpacking respect because it’s.
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Casey O’Donnell: It it means everything and nothing and so so being unpacking it which I really like, and so one of the big pieces, for me, is like well, what does it mean to know something right, and you know, an engineer.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know, software engineer, you know, and even then that’s a really broad category do they do graphics do they do audio you know, are they you know building tools or whatever right so.
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Casey O’Donnell: But they’re.
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Casey O’Donnell: braced taught.
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Casey O’Donnell: grew up looking at you know problems from a particular perspective that of a software engineer, and so what counts is knowledge to them is very specific and it’s the kind of knowledge that helps them get code written and make those things happen.
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Casey O’Donnell: But for an artist right like color theory is important to them, and you know how to make good models and you know ideas about.
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Casey O’Donnell: what’s aesthetically pleasing and, and so they have their own a pistol Milan their own way of knowing and thinking and sometimes they come into opposition and that’s where your group dynamics get funny because they might not be speaking the same language anymore.
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Casey O’Donnell: And you throw into that you know your systems designers.
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Casey O’Donnell: or level designers and they’re all thinking a little bit differently, because the level designers like hey I need to be able to do X and y to make my levels work well and flow well and.
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Casey O’Donnell: And the systems designers like well I need to change like this, or we need to be able to add, you know these things and I need to relate them in these ways and so those interpersonal dynamics start to break down when I think there’s.
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Casey O’Donnell: A lack of desire to understand where the other person is coming from and.
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Casey O’Donnell: Like wit when they’re saying when an engineer says no like.
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Casey O’Donnell: there’s knowledge under there, and so, but.
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Casey O’Donnell: The artist because they’ve been trained that and in part by their paychecks that the engineer, is this really smart one and the artist is not so smart but i’m like no you’re just different smart.
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Casey O’Donnell: For that artists to say, well, when you say no, can you tell me why or like what about this is going to be hard and and being able to have a productive conversation.
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Casey O’Donnell: Where.
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Casey O’Donnell: There is.
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Casey O’Donnell: Communication and collaboration across those those ways of knowing and.
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Casey O’Donnell: That can be really hard.
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Casey O’Donnell: And it doesn’t help that engineering culture is full of you’re the smartest person in the room, and everybody else’s dumb and.
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Casey O’Donnell: Right you’re the one who gets stuffed on like.
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A Ashcraft: Right there’s a there’s a moment when when when that communication breaks down and one group or maybe in some cases, both both sides, think that the other side is not negotiating in good faith right where they’re they’re not trying to understand.
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Right.
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A Ashcraft: Now.
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Casey O’Donnell: For me, that like back to this like the importance of honesty.
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Casey O’Donnell: But.
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Casey O’Donnell: You know uh but yeah.
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Shlomo Sher: guys so so let’s return to the idea of respect here right because right this this idea of it’s easy to say right, the members of the team should respect each other.
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Shlomo Sher: Right, but what is the respect you know respect in terms of a general concept of general respect people in life is is kind of one thing it’s another thing right you got.
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Shlomo Sher: people working on something that they’re intensely committed to that they have a lot riding on what does it mean to respect people in members of the team, and in these collaborative situation.
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Casey O’Donnell: Right, I mean yeah so like like I said I love the idea of trying to kind of pull.
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Casey O’Donnell: pull it apart, a little bit more on, and I think.
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Casey O’Donnell: I mean.
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Casey O’Donnell: Sometimes I feel like risk right respect is well you know we allow each other to coexist.
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Casey O’Donnell: But it’s.
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Casey O’Donnell: it’s more than that it’s actually.
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Casey O’Donnell: Like embracing.
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Casey O’Donnell: it’s turning towards it’s it’s like.
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Casey O’Donnell: Listening to and valuing the other person it’s not you know, again, not that they’re just here to serve a purpose, but instead like an important part, and like wanting to work together and come together.
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Casey O’Donnell: and go ahead.
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A Ashcraft: I was gonna say there’s a there’s sort of a an idea that i’ve heard from from different people in different in different groups that i’ve worked with where the respect is you can do your job better than I can do your job.
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A Ashcraft: Right that’s that’s yep that’s that’s where you generate respect you do your job better than I can do your job.
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Casey O’Donnell: yeah and I think that can be hard for people.
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Casey O’Donnell: To you know, particularly there are there’s a subset of folks that you know do it’s it’s their vision is the only proper vision and it becomes really difficult to work.
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Casey O’Donnell: Or, I think one of the most difficult ones like so in.
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Casey O’Donnell: In the context of collectives where somebody issues a block and so it’s like Okay, you know this, you know this somehow violates our vision and values or whatever, and so, how do we work around this thing that we haven’t we’re having a serious disagreement about.
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Casey O’Donnell: And still like valuing and caring for each other, as you navigate that that process, even though it’s likely going to be fraught.
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Shlomo Sher: So so you’re saying when you say reach the block do you mean where there is a point in the project, where someone is really objecting to where the project is going.
394
00:44:09.480 –> 00:44:12.930
Casey O’Donnell: Sure that’s that’s definitely I think the biggest one right or like.
395
00:44:14.550 –> 00:44:14.940
Casey O’Donnell: You know.
396
00:44:15.840 –> 00:44:21.960
A Ashcraft: you’re gonna want to like a feature within the thing that’s just like somebody says this feature is absolutely wrong idea.
397
00:44:22.770 –> 00:44:30.750
Casey O’Donnell: Well, so I worked, I worked in learning games for a while I owned a learning game company and there was a meeting where.
398
00:44:32.460 –> 00:44:41.910
Casey O’Donnell: I was quite upset because the the the learning sciences folks that were there, because the learning sciences folks are supposed to be there because they prove whether or not.
399
00:44:43.440 –> 00:44:48.840
Casey O’Donnell: People actually really learn because haven’t learning can’t happen unless they say it happened.
400
00:44:52.110 –> 00:44:52.500
Casey O’Donnell: i’m.
401
00:44:54.420 –> 00:44:54.750
A Ashcraft: Sorry.
402
00:44:55.410 –> 00:44:57.690
Casey O’Donnell: hey look i’m being disrespectful.
403
00:44:57.780 –> 00:44:58.170
A Ashcraft: With that.
404
00:44:59.100 –> 00:45:03.420
Casey O’Donnell: Because we have different epistemological frame, so we have different ideas of how things work.
405
00:45:04.560 –> 00:45:07.050
Casey O’Donnell: But yeah I believe the line that I uttered was.
406
00:45:08.100 –> 00:45:11.640
Casey O’Donnell: And you complete me if you want to just like if you put a fucking quiz and my game I quit.
407
00:45:12.660 –> 00:45:15.840
Casey O’Donnell: And right so, for you know, for me, there was this.
408
00:45:16.950 –> 00:45:26.340
Casey O’Donnell: moment where it’s like no like this, this is a big nope and So how do we come around for nope and continue to work together.
409
00:45:27.540 –> 00:45:27.960
Shlomo Sher: um.
410
00:45:29.910 –> 00:45:40.260
Shlomo Sher: Alright, so let’s now you mentioned weirdness in interpersonal interaction so let’s go to there for a second right so interpersonal ethics right, can you give us a couple of examples of.
411
00:45:40.560 –> 00:45:49.950
Shlomo Sher: People working together as a team that face some sort of ethical problems so let’s say this is going to be something about you know their values are different.
412
00:45:50.610 –> 00:46:02.250
Shlomo Sher: They they think let’s say something is wrong and offensive what other people think it’s fine etc they think something’s disrespectful what other people think it’s it’s not let’s say to to the members of the team.
413
00:46:03.300 –> 00:46:13.440
Shlomo Sher: Right so they’re working together as a team to face and ethical problem in terms of how they should relate each other or maybe face a conflict of personal responsibilities when working with each other.
414
00:46:13.830 –> 00:46:22.980
Casey O’Donnell: yeah well, so I, I also wanted to say I love So when I when I talk to my students about ethics oftentimes it’s about what I would call like kind of.
415
00:46:24.090 –> 00:46:36.600
Casey O’Donnell: Does design ethics like outcome ethics right thinking about what you’re making, and so I really loved the framing of interpersonal ethics, because I was like man, I need to actually think about this more and and talk more about it.
416
00:46:38.160 –> 00:46:41.160
Casey O’Donnell: And so I think like i’m like.
417
00:46:42.660 –> 00:46:50.940
Casey O’Donnell: it’s hard right, so you know let’s say somebody on your team believes that you know LGBT Q plus folks.
418
00:46:52.290 –> 00:46:58.350
Casey O’Donnell: You know shouldn’t exist or you know are wrong or bad because.
419
00:46:59.820 –> 00:47:02.370
Casey O’Donnell: because their sky deity tells him so.
420
00:47:03.930 –> 00:47:08.550
Casey O’Donnell: that’s that’s that that’s one of those blocks that I don’t know how you get past because.
421
00:47:09.750 –> 00:47:16.140
Casey O’Donnell: Somebody is you know it’s like you shouldn’t be here and that’s a different thing than.
422
00:47:17.700 –> 00:47:34.290
Casey O’Donnell: You know somebody you know people saying Oh well look like the way we’re portraying women in this is, you know it’s not right or somebody saying you don’t have you notice that all of the people of color in our game are bad guys right should we think about that.
423
00:47:36.060 –> 00:47:42.750
A Ashcraft: And so, those are these things so together right yeah like like if they’re if the beliefs never got mentioned.
424
00:47:43.890 –> 00:47:46.050
A Ashcraft: If they never came up and convert and in.
425
00:47:47.250 –> 00:48:00.720
A Ashcraft: In in in risk in respect to the game you’re working on or the work right, then it wouldn’t be a big deal but it’s likely that that the person who doesn’t believe the LGBT Q I people exists is.
426
00:48:01.170 –> 00:48:15.480
A Ashcraft: Is is proffering a block about a character in the game that somebody else wanted to put in, who is LGBT Q, a right and so that’s the that’s the block that has exposed this difference between people yep.
427
00:48:15.870 –> 00:48:21.630
Casey O’Donnell: And, and for me that that like that is where like it’s important for the organizations.
428
00:48:22.140 –> 00:48:29.790
Casey O’Donnell: Or the teams, or the companies to have you know vision of value statements that are like no look like this is important to us.
429
00:48:30.480 –> 00:48:42.060
Casey O’Donnell: We can point to this and say look that block doesn’t fly, but the block around you know giant cleavage on this character, that is a block that will like common address.
430
00:48:43.530 –> 00:48:43.860
Casey O’Donnell: But.
431
00:48:45.720 –> 00:48:48.000
A Ashcraft: that’s where that’s a real top down approach to.
432
00:48:49.260 –> 00:48:56.550
A Ashcraft: To how How would you do that, within a within a smaller group that where everybody’s more or less co equal right.
433
00:48:56.580 –> 00:48:59.790
Casey O’Donnell: Well, for me, it’s I don’t want to work with that person.
434
00:49:02.190 –> 00:49:09.510
Casey O’Donnell: Or you know can can we, you know that I, you know, often I would not choose to associate.
435
00:49:10.890 –> 00:49:26.820
Casey O’Donnell: On you know work on a project but also sometimes you do collaborate with folks that you don’t necessarily agree with, and so you have to sort of be honest and say you know here’s where we’re disagreeing um let’s let’s talk through it.
436
00:49:28.080 –> 00:49:31.230
Casey O’Donnell: And you know I, personally, I struggle with.
437
00:49:32.910 –> 00:49:34.830
Casey O’Donnell: certain kinds of Blocks over others.
438
00:49:36.090 –> 00:49:37.560
Casey O’Donnell: You know, might my response as well.
439
00:49:38.790 –> 00:49:39.540
Casey O’Donnell: Just screw it.
440
00:49:41.430 –> 00:49:48.660
Shlomo Sher: But you know I I think I first of all, let me say, I really liked the two cases that that you brought up and how different, they are.
441
00:49:49.230 –> 00:49:51.990
Shlomo Sher: right because right the so one cases just have a.
442
00:49:52.290 –> 00:50:08.040
Shlomo Sher: Fundamental acceptance right and and To me it seems that there is reason to think that this idea of who is fundamentally accepted what is funded fundamentally accept it.
443
00:50:08.280 –> 00:50:08.580
Right.
444
00:50:09.660 –> 00:50:20.130
Shlomo Sher: really does need to be a sort of top down or again if you’re working in a small group, the Group needs the group, like the whole right needs to address that.
445
00:50:21.030 –> 00:50:31.260
Shlomo Sher: In a very kind of clear way because to me things like this are just the most fundamental elements of a society right who’s one of us.
446
00:50:31.650 –> 00:50:33.120
Casey O’Donnell: I, I think that goes back to.
447
00:50:33.180 –> 00:50:43.020
Casey O’Donnell: Your your use of the word flourishing right because not existing is not flourishing or needing to be hidden it’s not flourishing allowing.
448
00:50:43.590 –> 00:50:54.330
Casey O’Donnell: Lots you know all different kinds of people to flourish in their way you know I think the important bit is your flourishing stops where my flourishing is.
449
00:50:54.420 –> 00:50:54.900
Casey O’Donnell: You know.
450
00:50:55.800 –> 00:51:06.960
Casey O’Donnell: And so, like if your flourishing demands that I be invisible or my partner invisible um that’s not okay.
451
00:51:07.230 –> 00:51:20.730
Shlomo Sher: Though notice right if we’re talking about like you know uh you know I don’t want to work with any gay people or I don’t want to have any gay characters right that could be really like a a block where flourishing doesn’t get even the start.
452
00:51:21.090 –> 00:51:37.710
Shlomo Sher: Right right because you’re blocking that, but the other example where let’s say a we over sexualized thing you know our female characters right are we using a racial stereotypes right, and you know in our villains um.
453
00:51:38.250 –> 00:51:46.290
Shlomo Sher: it’s interesting about you know, first of all how much of that is you know my flourishing versus your flourishing.
454
00:51:47.490 –> 00:51:55.980
Shlomo Sher: Or you know it’s interesting because the person that raises, first of all, the the person that raises that point it’s interesting because they’re raising a conflict.
455
00:51:56.370 –> 00:51:58.260
Shlomo Sher: yeah or at least a potential conflict.
456
00:51:59.310 –> 00:52:11.520
Shlomo Sher: And it may be a conflict of values or may be, it may be, not a conflict at all, as the team kind of recognizes oh yeah we didn’t we didn’t realize that.
457
00:52:12.060 –> 00:52:23.250
Shlomo Sher: And it’s it’s kind of an interesting position to be in because you know and i’d imagine, this is really different with different teams and you probably know how people are going to react to this right.
458
00:52:23.790 –> 00:52:35.730
Casey O’Donnell: Right, and this is, this is the thing that I think is is quite difficult is the person that’s going to bring up those issues as often going to be a person that is in that marginalized group.
459
00:52:35.970 –> 00:52:37.290
Casey O’Donnell: Right so it’s going to be.
460
00:52:37.320 –> 00:52:50.040
Casey O’Donnell: By PLC person that brings up the issue of race, you know they they might they might have you know, an ally within their team that they’re like hey can you bring this up so it’s not me.
461
00:52:51.480 –> 00:53:02.580
Casey O’Donnell: But you know or it’s it’s a woman or it’s a trans person who’s like hey our portrayal of this character is really awful like it often falls on.
462
00:53:03.630 –> 00:53:07.680
Casey O’Donnell: The already marginalized person to then put themselves in a position that.
463
00:53:08.880 –> 00:53:22.710
Casey O’Donnell: You know, they could be retaliated against depending on that other that broader structure of the organization and I think that is, we see a lot of that in big standard game industry.
464
00:53:22.950 –> 00:53:34.290
A Ashcraft: And I want to point out that that retaliation in this point in this case may be something really horrible and physical or it may be something as subtle as just feeling outside of the group.
465
00:53:34.740 –> 00:53:39.660
A Ashcraft: them right that that kind of retaliation like being put in a position where they’re.
466
00:53:40.170 –> 00:53:44.340
Casey O’Donnell: they’re not part of they’re always so difficult they’re going to bring that up.
467
00:53:45.600 –> 00:53:45.810
Casey O’Donnell: yeah.
468
00:53:46.260 –> 00:53:48.780
A Ashcraft: That is a form of retaliation that were that.
469
00:53:49.260 –> 00:53:50.790
A Ashcraft: Can I mean this is insidious.
470
00:53:51.120 –> 00:53:56.460
Casey O’Donnell: yeah I mean folks will talk about micro aggressions and the way that the.
471
00:53:57.990 –> 00:54:07.110
Casey O’Donnell: way that they’re treated and internal organization changes sort of unalterably overnight because of that one email or that one meeting.
472
00:54:07.170 –> 00:54:11.370
A Ashcraft: yeah did you see any of that happened in the in the in the groups that you studied.
473
00:54:12.840 –> 00:54:15.150
Casey O’Donnell: So um you know.
474
00:54:16.290 –> 00:54:27.390
Casey O’Donnell: If I carry us like the big project that I was there, predominantly for was spider man three and vicarious had a name for a long time, making a lot of.
475
00:54:28.860 –> 00:54:39.000
Casey O’Donnell: titles for gameboy advance right like kids titles right so it’s like shrek games and, and so they actually had because of the kind of variety of games that they were working on.
476
00:54:40.080 –> 00:54:41.160
Casey O’Donnell: They didn’t have.
477
00:54:43.470 –> 00:54:53.670
Casey O’Donnell: as much of a kind of like bro culture or like hardcore gamer culture, because you know, like their first sort of game.
478
00:54:54.750 –> 00:54:58.980
Casey O’Donnell: That you know that wasn’t a licensed title that they’re working on.
479
00:55:01.200 –> 00:55:17.640
Casey O’Donnell: was a space exploration game, and you know I mean it wasn’t this kind of hardcore like they were never a really hardcore gaming company it’s been interesting like they are in charge of destiny to now and so it’s been interesting to watch that but you know.
480
00:55:18.990 –> 00:55:24.390
Casey O’Donnell: But they’ve also done some different stuff So the answer I mean yeah there were some dynamics that were not good.
481
00:55:26.280 –> 00:55:26.820
Casey O’Donnell: But.
482
00:55:29.160 –> 00:55:37.500
Casey O’Donnell: largely I mean it was a different kind of company in some ways, and so I didn’t see I.
483
00:55:38.580 –> 00:55:46.170
Casey O’Donnell: didn’t see it in the same way that you know, but like I said it could have just been my position or you know what I was seeing because.
484
00:55:46.380 –> 00:55:48.510
Casey O’Donnell: There was certainly stuff that I wasn’t privy to.
485
00:55:49.710 –> 00:55:50.910
A Ashcraft: This team so.
486
00:55:50.940 –> 00:55:51.540
Casey O’Donnell: yeah.
487
00:55:51.630 –> 00:55:54.120
A Ashcraft: there’s only so much you can see, even if you’re in the middle of it.
488
00:55:54.390 –> 00:56:01.740
Casey O’Donnell: yeah when I when I started doing my work there, I think they were at like 75 people and by the time I left they were over 175.
489
00:56:01.830 –> 00:56:10.590
Casey O’Donnell: And so, like and they moved offices and so you know and like I was largely part of the spider man team once once it got going.
490
00:56:11.490 –> 00:56:23.100
Shlomo Sher: um let’s uh let me ask about that, so one of the things that your research looks at is cross cultural elements and obviously companies have different.
491
00:56:23.640 –> 00:56:31.530
Shlomo Sher: Cultures right it’s interesting when we talk about cultures and most of my classes, the assumption is cultures are identified with countries but.
492
00:56:31.560 –> 00:56:33.390
Shlomo Sher: You know, every organization right.
493
00:56:34.350 –> 00:56:47.850
Shlomo Sher: Every family has its own culture right and companies definitely have company’s culture and companies based in different countries, often in corporate the values of those countries into the corporate cultures, can you tell us about some of the ways.
494
00:56:48.930 –> 00:57:06.540
Shlomo Sher: Of what does seem to be respectful behavior to other people might differ between different countries companies let’s say that you looked at, whether in the US or India, whether you want to compare cultures within companies or you know across countries sure.
495
00:57:06.750 –> 00:57:17.670
Casey O’Donnell: Well, so I mean one of the things that was really interesting about my time in India and I actually haven’t written a whole lot about my my work in India, but you know I.
496
00:57:18.960 –> 00:57:21.090
Casey O’Donnell: I think one of the things that was interesting is.
497
00:57:25.770 –> 00:57:29.550
Casey O’Donnell: Within video games in India are.
498
00:57:30.780 –> 00:57:36.630
Casey O’Donnell: They brought your brain right there’s this broad cultural understanding that like video games are just worthless and.
499
00:57:37.560 –> 00:57:42.180
Casey O’Donnell: they’re not good right and they’re going to rot your brain and your kids shouldn’t play them and so.
500
00:57:43.080 –> 00:57:52.170
Casey O’Donnell: it’s like that’s kind of the dominant narrative whereas like in the US video games, you know, in part because of people by age and a little bit older.
501
00:57:52.650 –> 00:58:04.770
Casey O’Donnell: Like we’ve kind of normalized video games as just one of the many media activities, you know occasionally someone’s going to come along and be like video games and we’re like you mean heavy metal they’re like no video games okay well whatever.
502
00:58:06.330 –> 00:58:06.630
Casey O’Donnell: But.
503
00:58:08.100 –> 00:58:24.450
Shlomo Sher: You know, it makes me I don’t know if you heard about the 108 people were arrested and bandwidth this for playing pub G so but Bangladesh like band pub G right along right with very much kind of the attitude, this was a think last week.
504
00:58:24.810 –> 00:58:40.440
Casey O’Donnell: Right, I mean yeah so I mean so different cultures view video games and different ways, and so the moment you know somebody in India was like hey mom and dad i’m going to go work for a video game company right it’s like Oh, we failed like.
505
00:58:40.890 –> 00:58:43.530
Casey O’Donnell: You know, but if they got a job at Google or Microsoft.
506
00:58:43.950 –> 00:58:45.330
Casey O’Donnell: That would be good and.
507
00:58:45.990 –> 00:58:51.900
Shlomo Sher: they’re like are you know Center does an engineer yay work in a video game company.
508
00:58:53.040 –> 00:58:54.240
Casey O’Donnell: yeah so like.
509
00:58:54.600 –> 00:58:59.610
Casey O’Donnell: And so, one of the things that was interesting as like, particularly when my time in Chennai.
510
00:59:01.920 –> 00:59:15.270
Casey O’Donnell: It was super weird inversion most of the engineers were women most of software engineers were women and, in part because it was totally respectable for them to get a crappy engineering job.
511
00:59:15.930 –> 00:59:26.070
Casey O’Donnell: And because, as soon as they got married like they were likely going to leave their job and so it’s okay to just have a job and I was just like.
512
00:59:26.850 –> 00:59:39.510
Casey O’Donnell: It floored me that, but that did create this total inversion right because the the software engineers like that were you know the macho software engineers, they did go to Microsoft and Google and.
513
00:59:40.890 –> 00:59:45.030
Casey O’Donnell: Wherever and and they may you know made mom and dad happy.
514
00:59:46.950 –> 00:59:48.150
Casey O’Donnell: And you know oh.
515
00:59:49.230 –> 00:59:57.600
Casey O’Donnell: You know my my other kiddo like it’s fine they’re working at it they’ve got a job, but you know they’re it’s temporary until they find somebody and so.
516
00:59:59.100 –> 00:59:59.280
Casey O’Donnell: What.
517
00:59:59.430 –> 01:00:12.780
Shlomo Sher: Was the culture so we’re talking here right a you know, an engineering culture right for software development was it a dramatically different because it was a you know female majority.
518
01:00:14.100 –> 01:00:15.900
A Ashcraft: It might have been more different just because it was.
519
01:00:16.830 –> 01:00:17.100
Casey O’Donnell: yeah.
520
01:00:17.130 –> 01:00:19.890
A Ashcraft: I mean, it was considered a temporary position.
521
01:00:19.950 –> 01:00:20.850
Casey O’Donnell: Was it was it was.
522
01:00:20.940 –> 01:00:23.610
Shlomo Sher: john do you know I mean all three of these like.
523
01:00:23.640 –> 01:00:24.150
Shlomo Sher: yeah like.
524
01:00:24.450 –> 01:00:36.810
Casey O’Donnell: Stability that’s that’s exactly the point I like I think there was massive cultural difference, and I mean it was also difficult because they are working on a Nintendo DS title and.
525
01:00:38.190 –> 01:00:41.280
Casey O’Donnell: They didn’t really have folks on the team that had done.
526
01:00:43.770 –> 01:00:45.900
Casey O’Donnell: game development for the Nintendo DS.
527
01:00:47.010 –> 01:00:59.790
Casey O’Donnell: And I mean i’m probably breaking some nda but the the SDK that the Nintendo DS used like actually has encoded into it lots of ideas about how you’re supposed to make games.
528
01:01:00.090 –> 01:01:07.740
Casey O’Donnell: Right so like things that you learn in a software engineering program which is like Oh, I can kind of allocate memory, Willy nilly.
529
01:01:08.610 –> 01:01:19.050
Casey O’Donnell: On consoles you don’t want to do that, because if fragments memory and it makes the game slow and it crashes, and so there’s these this idea of.
530
01:01:19.590 –> 01:01:33.210
Casey O’Donnell: What are called memory pools I don’t want to get too technical but anyway, but it’s this idea that’s encoded in the very software that you’re making you’re using to make the games and but it’s not a skill that’s really taught in computer science programs.
531
01:01:34.140 –> 01:01:41.700
Casey O’Donnell: And so anymore yeah yeah so right, so you know these students are coming in, you know they’ve been trained largely in like c++.
532
01:01:42.660 –> 01:01:50.010
Casey O’Donnell: And Java and so they’re hitting this different very different development, environment and um.
533
01:01:51.150 –> 01:01:55.680
Casey O’Donnell: And not really having the resources or tools.
534
01:01:56.820 –> 01:01:57.210
Casey O’Donnell: You know.
535
01:01:58.440 –> 01:02:00.390
Casey O’Donnell: And how to come at that and so.
536
01:02:01.680 –> 01:02:14.190
A Ashcraft: Just some of that with some of that have been some of that would be this sort of like pass down or knowledge that would accumulate if if if an engineer was somebody there who had been there for 15 years.
537
01:02:14.700 –> 01:02:18.390
Casey O’Donnell: But we’ve got nts, and so we can’t share information we can’t talk about things we can.
538
01:02:18.930 –> 01:02:19.440
A Ashcraft: I mean like.
539
01:02:19.530 –> 01:02:26.190
A Ashcraft: Like like like because, but there are other engineers are women and they’re not and they’re only there for maybe three or four years yep.
540
01:02:26.370 –> 01:02:27.300
Casey O’Donnell: And they’ve never.
541
01:02:27.600 –> 01:02:42.780
Casey O’Donnell: nobody’s ever worked on this device before, and so I mean after that experience I went back, and I was giving an iga talk international game developers association talk in Albany and lots of the developers.
542
01:02:44.250 –> 01:02:53.340
Casey O’Donnell: There were working on Nintendo DS titles and I was like Okay, how many of you have had to make your own xml purser or you know or use tiny xml or whatever.
543
01:02:53.850 –> 01:03:00.840
Casey O’Donnell: In your project, and they have like raise their hands, and then they looked around the room and realize that they all had to do the same.
544
01:03:01.380 –> 01:03:15.000
Casey O’Donnell: job because they couldn’t share it because they were sort of locked in by these non disclosure agreements, and so they couldn’t even share if they wanted to write you couldn’t you know of course now we’d have some private discord or whatever, but.
545
01:03:15.570 –> 01:03:18.210
Casey O’Donnell: You can’t you can’t go Google that stuff right.
546
01:03:18.960 –> 01:03:22.920
A Ashcraft: Right right and so everybody has to relearn it yep every time.
547
01:03:23.370 –> 01:03:24.960
Casey O’Donnell: bad news yeah.
548
01:03:26.520 –> 01:03:28.170
Shlomo Sher: Andy i’m doing a time check with you.
549
01:03:28.530 –> 01:03:30.030
A Ashcraft: Oh yeah yeah we are.
550
01:03:31.860 –> 01:03:33.870
A Ashcraft: Maybe five minutes out from an hour.
551
01:03:34.230 –> 01:03:40.230
Shlomo Sher: Okay, from an hour okay damn it so okay so get the idea was to go to 45 so i’ll pop up probably cut.
552
01:03:41.970 –> 01:03:42.780
Shlomo Sher: OK so.
553
01:03:44.310 –> 01:03:44.970
Casey O’Donnell: i’m a talker.
554
01:03:45.030 –> 01:03:45.870
Shlomo Sher: i’m a talker here.
555
01:03:45.930 –> 01:03:48.390
A Ashcraft: We barely scratched the surface, to, we need to have you back.
556
01:03:49.200 –> 01:03:59.040
Shlomo Sher: Casey so i’m going to ask you two questions so The first one is a seventh one I sent you and then i’m going to ask you kind of to give us a you know your final final say so.
557
01:04:00.120 –> 01:04:06.990
Shlomo Sher: So Casey you mentioned in our earlier email conversations that you try to be honest with these students about the realities of working in game development.
558
01:04:07.560 –> 01:04:23.370
Shlomo Sher: What does that mean to you, to be honest with your students about that it’s it’s interesting because you know every game design department, essentially, you know, wants to encourage its students, you know, wants to.
559
01:04:24.510 –> 01:04:30.150
Shlomo Sher: Well, we also want more students all right, we want to make them think that right, this is a practical.
560
01:04:30.960 –> 01:04:44.580
Shlomo Sher: You know, career job So what does it mean to you to be really honest about about this and do you think that people going into that game development have misconceptions of what the work is like is it unusual as a field and doing that.
561
01:04:45.780 –> 01:04:47.370
Casey O’Donnell: Right, so I mean.
562
01:04:48.720 –> 01:05:01.500
Casey O’Donnell: It doesn’t help that I think the easiest way that game design and development programs get marketed is it’s like you like to play games, you should make them and i’m like just because you like food doesn’t mean you should be a chef.
563
01:05:02.730 –> 01:05:07.050
A Ashcraft: By the way, that’s the same way, they market QA jobs right.
564
01:05:07.680 –> 01:05:13.410
Casey O’Donnell: yeah and and and QA workers are some of the most exploited ones in the game industry.
565
01:05:14.640 –> 01:05:15.540
Casey O’Donnell: which you know.
566
01:05:15.840 –> 01:05:21.060
Casey O’Donnell: Far yeah so that that that’s that’s a whole nother ball of wax.
567
01:05:21.330 –> 01:05:22.260
Shlomo Sher: Can can can you can you.
568
01:05:22.320 –> 01:05:23.760
Shlomo Sher: Take a minute just on that.
569
01:05:24.210 –> 01:05:25.230
Casey O’Donnell: Sure, I mean.
570
01:05:25.290 –> 01:05:26.250
Casey O’Donnell: Just you know so.
571
01:05:27.750 –> 01:05:38.370
Casey O’Donnell: He so i’ve certainly been criticized like in my research, because I tend to I have tended to focus on, you know engineers artists designers and those folks.
572
01:05:39.180 –> 01:05:50.670
Casey O’Donnell: But QA isn’t a really important aspect of game design and development, I mean I put that up there with like game audio people don’t talk like they’re like artists and that’s like the modelers and things, but what about audio.
573
01:05:51.240 –> 01:05:53.220
Shlomo Sher: Can you explain what QA is to those of.
574
01:05:53.400 –> 01:05:54.450
Casey O’Donnell: Sure yeah so.
575
01:05:55.950 –> 01:06:02.130
Casey O’Donnell: So some people might think QA is like question and answer but QA is quality assurance and they’re the folks that.
576
01:06:02.400 –> 01:06:09.930
Casey O’Donnell: play a game over and over and over again, and try to do the things that you’re not supposed to do to break the game, and then they have to figure out how to.
577
01:06:10.200 –> 01:06:21.600
Casey O’Donnell: Take that knowledge of how to break the game put it in a format, so that other people within the team can go back and try to figure out why that book happened and.
578
01:06:21.990 –> 01:06:33.420
Casey O’Donnell: You know, when we see all these kerfuffle around you know game X launched and it crashed and they’ve got a zero day patch and all of this stuff that comes down to QA.
579
01:06:34.440 –> 01:06:37.530
Casey O’Donnell: And QA takes time and.
580
01:06:38.580 –> 01:06:40.680
Casey O’Donnell: money and energy and people and.
581
01:06:41.940 –> 01:06:42.240
Casey O’Donnell: You know.
582
01:06:42.570 –> 01:06:45.030
A Ashcraft: Can I add, can I add some nuance to that.
583
01:06:45.060 –> 01:06:45.420
Casey O’Donnell: Please.
584
01:06:45.480 –> 01:06:52.320
A Ashcraft: Is there’s there’s there’s there’s also sort of two different routes of QA there’s the QA that work for developers.
585
01:06:52.800 –> 01:07:00.750
A Ashcraft: And they are tend to be better jobs and they tend to be more experienced and they tend to be with the developers for longer periods of time for longer term.
586
01:07:01.740 –> 01:07:06.780
A Ashcraft: And they are the ones who will play the game and help help the engineers, help the developers figure out.
587
01:07:07.200 –> 01:07:19.020
A Ashcraft: what’s what what things need to be fixed and how to go about fixing them and and then there’s the QA that work for the publishers and their job is just to make sure that the game doesn’t have any bucks.
588
01:07:20.040 –> 01:07:20.400
Shlomo Sher: hmm.
589
01:07:20.910 –> 01:07:34.260
A Ashcraft: And it’s different like there’s a nuance difference that that I had to learn the hard way when I was working as a as a producer on a video game that these people are the people at the publisher were not there to help me.
590
01:07:35.100 –> 01:07:38.670
A Ashcraft: They were there just to make sure that the game wasn’t buggy going out the door.
591
01:07:39.180 –> 01:07:42.390
Casey O’Donnell: yeah I mean that was like nintendo’s lock check program and.
592
01:07:42.660 –> 01:08:03.300
A Ashcraft: yeah yeah yeah so there’s and those people are very, very misused, they are usually temp workers they get hired in on mos in the in the in you know in like the late, you know fall because all these Games are coming out at Christmas time and and then they get laid off the Christmas.
593
01:08:04.440 –> 01:08:10.800
A Ashcraft: And they work they work 80 hours for minimum wage and get laid off at Christmas time that’s terrible.
594
01:08:11.460 –> 01:08:15.720
Shlomo Sher: How can you get, how can you work 80 hours a bit of a wage without the overtime.
595
01:08:15.750 –> 01:08:19.980
A Ashcraft: Kicking in yeah well, I mean they overtime would kick in and yeah I mean it would.
596
01:08:20.460 –> 01:08:23.730
A Ashcraft: make the most of them are working on contract.
597
01:08:25.980 –> 01:08:28.110
Casey O’Donnell: they’re not actually employees to so.
598
01:08:28.410 –> 01:08:30.030
Casey O’Donnell: there’s an hourly rate.
599
01:08:30.090 –> 01:08:31.320
Casey O’Donnell: yeah so.
600
01:08:31.920 –> 01:08:38.550
Casey O’Donnell: yeah that happens that happens on like for artists on big game Dev teams.
601
01:08:38.580 –> 01:08:39.150
A Ashcraft: When.
602
01:08:39.600 –> 01:08:51.240
Casey O’Donnell: A studio will ramp up and they you know, have to hire a bunch of artists or bunch of modelers and texture folks, and so they get them on contract, so that they can throw much a work item and then, when that’s done the contracts over.
603
01:08:51.840 –> 01:09:00.030
A Ashcraft: Right and then and, by the way, this is not the way the rest of the rest of the software industry handles QA the rest of the.
604
01:09:01.590 –> 01:09:02.910
A Ashcraft: rest of the software industry.
605
01:09:03.150 –> 01:09:08.100
A Ashcraft: treats QA like a legit like respected position within the team.
606
01:09:08.490 –> 01:09:13.860
Shlomo Sher: It is really interesting so to go back to the very beginning and think about it as a team right.
607
01:09:15.090 –> 01:09:25.650
Shlomo Sher: It seems that if you’re hiring you know, a bunch of temp workers and having them work at like an extreme pace as independent contractors.
608
01:09:26.010 –> 01:09:27.390
Casey O’Donnell: They aren’t reading them like a car.
609
01:09:27.600 –> 01:09:43.200
Shlomo Sher: Right treated like a cog right they’re not really part of the team and and it’s interesting thinking about the two different ways that and he talked about quality assurance right where the first the you know, the first one really did seem like you’re part of the team.
610
01:09:43.560 –> 01:09:44.040
Shlomo Sher: yeah right.
611
01:09:44.100 –> 01:09:44.580
A Ashcraft: They are.
612
01:09:45.030 –> 01:09:48.270
Shlomo Sher: And the second one working for the for the publisher.
613
01:09:48.780 –> 01:10:00.450
Shlomo Sher: And right seems like you’re not really part of the team you’re just doing the job that you’re contracted to and can be exploited yeah it’s an interesting I like I like the team concept here.
614
01:10:00.480 –> 01:10:03.750
Casey O’Donnell: So it’s a microcosm of I think a lot of those broader issues.
615
01:10:04.200 –> 01:10:06.990
Shlomo Sher: um alright so Casey now let’s go back.
616
01:10:08.040 –> 01:10:14.430
Shlomo Sher: Right to this idea about being honest with the students about the realities of game development and misconceptions of the work, etc.
617
01:10:14.910 –> 01:10:35.670
Casey O’Donnell: Sure yeah so I mean some of it is you know just being honest when you know some studio shutters and lays off, you know 400 people i’ll talk about it in class when you know, a new sexual harassment case comes about at a big game studio i’ll talk about it.
618
01:10:37.020 –> 01:10:40.050
Casey O’Donnell: Rather than pretending like it doesn’t exist or it doesn’t happen.
619
01:10:40.830 –> 01:10:41.490
A Ashcraft: right but.
620
01:10:41.730 –> 01:10:45.390
Casey O’Donnell: yeah but it’s also about talking to them about.
621
01:10:46.800 –> 01:10:50.190
Casey O’Donnell: How they relate to game development.
622
01:10:51.390 –> 01:10:51.810
Casey O’Donnell: I mean.
623
01:10:53.340 –> 01:10:53.940
Casey O’Donnell: You know.
624
01:10:56.340 –> 01:11:13.740
Casey O’Donnell: it’s it’s hard, because not everybody who comes through a program a game design and development program is going to get a job, making games and to tell them, you know I tell I tell my students like if if all you do is your homework.
625
01:11:14.940 –> 01:11:27.420
Casey O’Donnell: you’re you’re not going to get a job in games, you can probably go get a job somewhere else and find something related right you’ll be able to take your skills and you’ll be able to do something, but it’s not going to be in games likely.
626
01:11:28.770 –> 01:11:32.730
Casey O’Donnell: Because you can’t just do the bare minimum.
627
01:11:34.020 –> 01:11:34.650
Casey O’Donnell: and
628
01:11:36.690 –> 01:11:37.080
Casey O’Donnell: But.
629
01:11:37.590 –> 01:11:38.280
Casey O’Donnell: It also doesn’t.
630
01:11:38.700 –> 01:11:40.530
A Ashcraft: Go ahead yeah is that is that.
631
01:11:40.770 –> 01:11:46.650
A Ashcraft: Is that because they should be expecting crunch, they should be expecting these problems that you sort of described as a beginning.
632
01:11:46.650 –> 01:11:47.130
Casey O’Donnell: So i’m.
633
01:11:47.640 –> 01:11:48.930
A Ashcraft: late stage capitalism.
634
01:11:49.050 –> 01:11:51.720
Shlomo Sher: Or is it because of the competition involved here.
635
01:11:51.780 –> 01:11:53.340
Casey O’Donnell: I think I think it’s also that.
636
01:11:54.810 –> 01:12:05.880
Casey O’Donnell: You know, as faculty as teachers like we’re asking people to kind of do exercises that ideally get them interested in.
637
01:12:06.570 –> 01:12:15.210
Casey O’Donnell: Doing More above and beyond right like I wouldn’t expect my students, you know, so I teach our our kind of first formal.
638
01:12:16.200 –> 01:12:22.470
Casey O’Donnell: game design class and I asked them to make three print and play non digital games right now.
639
01:12:23.040 –> 01:12:33.450
Casey O’Donnell: In the course of a Semester, which means they’re basically doing three game game jams, but i’m like look, you can pace yourself, this could be normal like i’m big i’m anti crunch, I don’t believe in it.
640
01:12:34.410 –> 01:12:44.790
Casey O’Donnell: But you know but that’s also why you know, so I don’t expect from my students to make three super polished things like i’m expecting something mediocre like.
641
01:12:45.210 –> 01:12:56.490
Casey O’Donnell: That and that’s and that’s even a good bar like hey you did a really good job you know it still needs work like there’s more to be done, but ideally that if they then took.
642
01:12:57.480 –> 01:13:03.990
Casey O’Donnell: That good idea and i’m like hey This is great, you should actually do something with this and i’ll i’ll tell my sense of like this is really cool.
643
01:13:04.560 –> 01:13:10.770
Casey O’Donnell: For your sake, I hope you continue to do something with this get it up on itch you know do a.
644
01:13:11.310 –> 01:13:21.540
Casey O’Donnell: print on demand version of your game for the game crafter like whatever right that that becomes part of your portfolio, but it’s honestly going to be like two months to six months.
645
01:13:21.900 –> 01:13:34.560
Casey O’Donnell: Of more work for you to get there to where it’s really done and, but I do encourage my say like if if you know if you make time for this and it’s important to you, you can get there.
646
01:13:35.580 –> 01:13:38.220
Casey O’Donnell: And then it’s going to do more for you.
647
01:13:39.810 –> 01:13:54.300
Casey O’Donnell: But I can’t expect that, as a teacher, because I think that would be unreasonable i’d be asking them to crunch and instead it’s like you know I want to make sure you’re far enough along that you can finish this journey without me if you want to.
648
01:13:56.400 –> 01:13:59.580
Casey O’Donnell: But that, unfortunately, like.
649
01:14:00.600 –> 01:14:05.880
Casey O’Donnell: it’s not that because, ideally, you know, a full time student that’s that’s their full time job.
650
01:14:06.330 –> 01:14:17.310
Casey O’Donnell: And that’s also why a lot of folks when they finish a game game design and development program it might take them a year to go get that first job and oftentimes it’s taking.
651
01:14:18.240 –> 01:14:34.200
Casey O’Donnell: Work that they’ve done or continuing development on a project, so it really is portfolio worthy because school is full time, and so they don’t have the time to do that and at Michigan State University, a lot of our students have jobs to pay rent and stuff like that and.
652
01:14:35.250 –> 01:14:40.830
Casey O’Donnell: You know, some schools their students don’t have that same problem but ours ours do.
653
01:14:42.780 –> 01:14:47.370
Casey O’Donnell: But I think that also there’s something of value in the fact that.
654
01:14:48.540 –> 01:14:49.470
Casey O’Donnell: They still want to do it.
655
01:14:51.090 –> 01:14:59.340
Casey O’Donnell: And kind of work towards it, but it isn’t you know you tick the boxes and you finish your degree and you’re going to get the job.
656
01:15:00.780 –> 01:15:05.010
Casey O’Donnell: Like there’s just also not enough positions like that.
657
01:15:07.530 –> 01:15:21.990
Casey O’Donnell: So I talked to him about that, but but to your point I also I also tell them like it doesn’t have to be your job right, like you, can you can do you know you can have a passion like maybe it’s good for your passion to not be your job.
658
01:15:23.220 –> 01:15:29.280
Casey O’Donnell: Because, then it lets you maintain that relationship with it, and so you know hey you came through and you got your.
659
01:15:30.600 –> 01:15:37.620
Casey O’Donnell: This but you know, and you really are good at modeling and so you know you get a job doing 3D modeling we’ve had students that go to work for.
660
01:15:40.110 –> 01:15:49.860
Casey O’Donnell: places like hey we’re furniture manufacturers are mainly do 3D modeling for furniture manufacturers and they’re like hey it pays the rent and then I get to make games and i’m not miserable like.
661
01:15:50.400 –> 01:16:01.080
A Ashcraft: So right and it’s true the most people most people, especially bachelor’s degrees students, most people don’t get jobs in their industry, whatever, whatever their they get their bachelor’s degree in.
662
01:16:01.410 –> 01:16:08.160
A Ashcraft: it’s it’s not it’s very uncommon for people to actually like like I got this bachelor’s degree, and then I went into a career and I had.
663
01:16:08.640 –> 01:16:09.420
Shlomo Sher: Except for.
664
01:16:10.440 –> 01:16:12.840
Shlomo Sher: You know, business and chemistry.
665
01:16:13.170 –> 01:16:13.980
Shlomo Sher: I think you know I mean there’s.
666
01:16:14.880 –> 01:16:18.060
A Ashcraft: Like you know my my roommate in college was a chemistry.
667
01:16:18.780 –> 01:16:37.050
A Ashcraft: Major and he and he went on to get an MBA and work as a as a as a as a web developer, and now he’s now he’s going back to school to get to do business stuff becomes see he’s he’s got an opportunity to be like the the CFO of a of a of a of a school district right.
668
01:16:37.170 –> 01:16:38.610
Shlomo Sher: School what are they different.
669
01:16:39.180 –> 01:16:43.380
Casey O’Donnell: One of the early lead game designer so vicarious his degree was in.
670
01:16:44.880 –> 01:16:46.020
Casey O’Donnell: molecular biology.
671
01:16:46.260 –> 01:16:47.490
Casey O’Donnell: And, but it was like.
672
01:16:47.580 –> 01:16:58.860
Casey O’Donnell: He was interested in systems and so right so oftentimes like that’s the other funny thing right it’s like you know we we offer game design and development degrees, but like i’m also like you know.
673
01:17:00.090 –> 01:17:02.970
A Ashcraft: learning how to learn and how to recognize systems.
674
01:17:03.360 –> 01:17:09.600
Casey O’Donnell: And, like all of these skills that are important for for game makers doesn’t have to come from here can come from lots of places.
675
01:17:10.110 –> 01:17:16.050
A Ashcraft: And the things that you’re intrinsically motivated to do can get degraded by extrinsic motivations like money.
676
01:17:17.250 –> 01:17:25.140
Shlomo Sher: Right right all right Casey last question, or you know the last question is kind of like the.
677
01:17:26.220 –> 01:17:34.590
Shlomo Sher: The question that takes us out with right it’s a it’s a you know we’ve been talking about the challenge of creative collaboration and game development right so.
678
01:17:35.670 –> 01:17:45.000
Shlomo Sher: What do you want to leave people with right what, what do you want people to kind of remember that and let’s and let’s keep it to you know under two minutes.
679
01:17:45.450 –> 01:17:45.840
sure.
680
01:17:46.950 –> 01:17:52.680
Casey O’Donnell: um I mean I, for me, I think the most important aspect of.
681
01:17:54.360 –> 01:17:56.880
Casey O’Donnell: Creative collaborative work really.
682
01:17:56.910 –> 01:18:00.510
Shlomo Sher: Is hey sorry Casey i’m gonna i’m gonna start that again.
683
01:18:00.810 –> 01:18:01.620
Shlomo Sher: yeah because.
684
01:18:03.000 –> 01:18:06.480
Shlomo Sher: This part this part i’m going to use for promotion.
685
01:18:06.960 –> 01:18:13.410
Shlomo Sher: Sure, so I so you were looking down thinking, and you know we’re doing this as video to.
686
01:18:13.830 –> 01:18:14.250
Casey O’Donnell: that’s fine.
687
01:18:14.700 –> 01:18:17.400
Shlomo Sher: Alright, so, so I want to be able to kind of get you.
688
01:18:17.490 –> 01:18:19.830
Casey O’Donnell: That i’m glad I do what I always do it just talk.
689
01:18:19.830 –> 01:18:20.610
Casey O’Donnell: With my hands.
690
01:18:21.000 –> 01:18:21.540
Shlomo Sher: yeah.
691
01:18:21.570 –> 01:18:25.380
A Ashcraft: Go for it so yeah so let’s try to what, what do you want to leave us with.
692
01:18:27.720 –> 01:18:35.070
Casey O’Donnell: So I mean, I think, for me, the big part of creative collaborative development, I think one of the biggest pieces is.
693
01:18:36.600 –> 01:18:54.030
Casey O’Donnell: Really valuing the other people that you are working with on your team, and that it is about I know I talked a bit about being a whole person, but that by embracing the fact that we are working together on something that, ideally, we want to work together on.
694
01:18:55.230 –> 01:19:00.660
Casey O’Donnell: You know, but even if even if we’re sort of being forced to work together, but if we can at least come together.
695
01:19:01.290 –> 01:19:22.620
Casey O’Donnell: Recognizing each other as whole people that have important things to offer an important perspectives that really embracing that and and not just giving it lip service and recognizing that conflict is going to be a part of that, and so, how do we productively work through conflict so.
696
01:19:23.670 –> 01:19:28.260
Casey O’Donnell: That that we can kind of continue forward is a really important piece of this and.
697
01:19:29.400 –> 01:19:34.410
Casey O’Donnell: You know into back to that accepting that somebody is a whole person, that also means that people are going to Fuck up.
698
01:19:35.130 –> 01:19:51.150
Casey O’Donnell: And it means that we have to be able to figure out how to work through that and we’re going to have different values and perspectives and that’s a good thing, because, because it means it’s actually less likely we’re going to have some.
699
01:19:52.410 –> 01:20:02.400
Casey O’Donnell: thing that we’re not paying attention to right having those those different perspectives is a really important and valuable thing and so really embracing one another.
700
01:20:02.970 –> 01:20:16.650
Casey O’Donnell: And the diversity of thought on the diversity of perspectives that people bring to those teams, I think it’s one of just the most important things that we can do to come together and work well together.
701
01:20:17.490 –> 01:20:30.960
Shlomo Sher: All right, nicely said all right, a case to Donald a Casey where can people find you, you know your website for your games and anything else that you want to tell people about where where they can contact you.
702
01:20:31.230 –> 01:20:41.160
Casey O’Donnell: Sure, so the easiest way is I mean honestly if you Google Casey o’donnell i’m the person that comes up and if you add Casey o’donnell Ms you.
703
01:20:41.670 –> 01:21:01.230
Casey O’Donnell: That comes that will get you there but, honestly just CA se y O D O n E ll at.org is my website, and you can find me, you know it’s my email is the same thing at gmail COM my Twitter handle is the same thing so.
704
01:21:01.470 –> 01:21:08.700
Casey O’Donnell: i’m i’m super easy to find and I can also if folks want to find out more.
705
01:21:09.930 –> 01:21:26.580
Casey O’Donnell: about some of the games that i’ve been working on more recently it’s affinity dash games.com and so affinity games is the name of the collective that us some folks and I are part of and so that’s affinity dash games COM.
706
01:21:27.270 –> 01:21:30.990
Shlomo Sher: All right, all right guys good podcast GP.
707
01:21:31.410 –> 01:21:32.610
Casey O’Donnell: Thank you, thank you.
708
01:21:34.380 –> 01:21:34.890
Shlomo Sher: Play Nice, Everybody.
