Agile Game Development with Scrum (Addison-Wesley Signature Series (Cohn)) [Paperback]

Clinton Keith (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0321618521 | ISBN-13: 978-0321618528 | Publication Date: June 2, 2010 | Edition: 1

Deliver Better Games Faster, On Budget—And Make Game Development Fun Again!

 

Game development is in crisis—facing bloated budgets, impossible schedules, unmanageable complexity, and death march overtime. It’s no wonder so many development studios are struggling to survive. Fortunately, there is a solution. Scrum and Agile methods are already revolutionizing development outside the game industry. Now, long-time game developer Clinton Keith shows exactly how to successfully apply these methods to the unique challenges of game development. 

Keith has spent more than fifteen years developing games, seven of them with Scrum and agile methods. Drawing on this unparalleled expertise, he shows how teams can use Scrum to deliver games more efficiently, rapidly, and cost-effectively; craft games that offer more entertainment value; and make life more fulfilling for development teams at the same time.

You’ll learn to form successful agile teams that incorporate programmers, producers, artists, testers, and designers—and promote effective collaboration within and beyond those teams, throughout the entire process. From long-range planning to progress tracking and continuous integration, Keith offers dozens of tips, tricks, and solutions—all based firmly in reality and hard-won experience.

Coverage includes

• Understanding Scrum’s goals, roles, and practices in the context of game development
• Communicating and planning your game’s vision, features, and progress
• Using iterative techniques to put your game into a playable state every two to four weeks— even daily
• Helping all team participants succeed in their roles
• Restoring stability and predictability to the development process
• Managing ambiguous requirements in a fluid marketplace
• Scaling Scrum to large, geographically distributed development teams
• Getting started: overcoming inertia and integrating Scrum into your studio’s current processes

Increasingly, game developers and managers are recognizing that things can’t go on the way they have in the past. Game development organizations need a far better way to work. Agile Game Development with Scrum gives them that—and brings the profitability, creativity, and fun back to game development.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“ If you’ve ever felt that gaps exist between ‘traditional’ software development using Scrum and video game development using Scrum, this book is for you. Clinton effectively bridges those gaps by covering the adjustments necessary for disciplines, individual roles, and processes and project phases unique to game development, thoroughly supporting it with explicit examples and practical advice. Simply put, a must-read for game developers that are currently using or plan to implement Scrum or other agile processes within their company.”

—Jeff Lindsey, Producer, Longtail Studios

 

“ I wish Clinton Keith could go back and write this book 15 years ago—it would have helped me see things a lot differently. Agile Game Development with SCRUM is a one stop shop for game teams interested in using scrum techniques.”

—CJ Connoy, Game Producer, Treyarch

 

“ By the time you wake up and realize that you really need this book, your project will probably be too far gone. Dive into agile before it’s too late and let Clinton be your guide. Tested under the fires of true game production, everyone involved in game development will gain from reading Clinton’s wisdom.”

—Jason Della Rocca, Founder, Perimeter Partners, and former Executive Director of the International Game Developers Association

 

“ Clinton Keith has written an excellent book for both practitioners and students. He combines an in-depth analysis of the challenges of large scale game development with hands-on advice on the use of Scrum. His often funny anecdotes illustrate that this guy has really experienced the heat of large computer games projects.”

—Bendik Bygstad, Professor of Information Systems, The Norwegian School of IT

 

“ Clinton Keith combines his experience as both video game developer and agile practitioner to apply Scrum philosophy to the unique challenges of video game development. Clint clearly explains the philosophy behind Scrum, going beyond theory and sharing his experiences and stories about its successful application at living, breathing development studios.”

—Erik Theisz, Senior Producer, 38 Studios

 

“ Clinton has combined his extensive game and software development experiences with agile methodologies. The result is a thoughtful, clear, and, most importantly, realistic application of agile to game development.”

—Senta Jakobsen, Senior Development Director, DICE

About the Author

Clinton Keith is an independent agile coach and Certified Scrum Trainer who helps game developers and nongame developers alike adopt Scrum, Extreme Programming, kanban, and other agile practices to greatly improve their productivity, workplace, and product quality.

Over the course of 25 years, Clint has gone from programming avionics for advanced fighter jets and underwater robots to overseeing programming for
hit video games such as Midtown Madness and Midnight Club. Clint has been a programmer, project director, CTO, and director of product development at
several studios. Through a series of presentations and his popular blog, Clint introduced the video game industry to Scrum in 2005. As CTO, Clint helped High Moon Studios achieve a place on IT Week Magazine’s Top 50 Technology Innovators list in 2005 and 2006 and win several of San Diego Society for HR Management’s Workplace Excellence Awards in 2005, 2006, and 2007.

For more information, visit www.ClintonKeith.com.

Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional; 1 edition (June 2, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0321618521
• ISBN-13: 978-0321618528
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 7.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #368,672 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Clinton Keith is an independent agile coach and Certified Scrum Trainer who helps game developers and non-game developers alike to adopt Scrum, XP, Kanban, and other agile practices to greatly improve their productivity, workplace, and product quality.

Over the course of 25 years, Clint has gone from programming avionics for advanced fighter jets and underwater robots to overseeing programming for hit video game titles such as Midtown Madness and Midnight Club. Clint has been a programmer, project director, CTO, and director of product development at several studios. Through a series of presentations and his popular blog, Clint introduced the video game industry to Scrum in 2005. As CTO, Clint helped High Moon Studios win IT Week Magazine's "Top 50 Technology Innovators" in 2005 and 2006, and San Diego Society for HR Management Workplace Excellence Awards in 2005, 2006, and 2007.

For more information, visit www.ClintonKeith.com.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent book describing the perfect pairing of game development with Scrum, June 4, 2010

By 

Michael Cohn "agile developer" (Lafayette, CO USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Agile Game Development with Scrum (Addison-Wesley Signature Series (Cohn)) (Paperback)

Scrum and game development go together as well as chocolate and peanut butter. In this book, Clinton Keith does a perfect job of showing how to put them together.

The book is split into five parts. The first part describes the crisis facing game development because of the explosion in complexity and game size. Not wanting to end on a down note, Part 1 also describes how agile/Scrum address these problems. Part 2 is probably the best overall introduction to Scrum anywhere. I now even recommend this Part (100 pages) to my non-game development clients. Part 3 goes deeper into many of the specific challenges facing game projects--planning, creating cross-functional teams from such a variety of disciplines, and reducing the overhead of iterating. Part 4 dives deeper into the specific disciplines and offers great advice in the areas of art, audio, design, qa, and production. The concluding part contains 3 chapters describing some of the challenges you'll face, how to work with a publisher, and how to start.

This is a great book that is chock-full of stories from author Clinton Keith's fifteen years in the game industry. The writing is crisp and conversational with topics covered in just the right amount of detail. The hand-drawn look of the illustrations match the book perfectly.

Agile Game Development with Scrum should be required reading for anyone on a game project. And it offers a great deal to anyone starting out with Scrum.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Advice From a Seasoned Veteran!, June 7, 2010

By 

Luke Hohmann (Sunnyvale, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Agile Game Development with Scrum (Addison-Wesley Signature Series (Cohn)) (Paperback)

Thank you, Clinton, for making the time to write this truly wonderful contribution to the Scrum/Lean/Agile Community of Practice.

What makes this book stand out among the many dozens of Scrum/Lean/Agile community of practice is that Clinton writes from genuine experience. He doesn't sugar coat his mistakes. He doesn't belabor his considerable skills. He simply outlines what he has learned about making really great games. Through Scrum, Lean, and Agile.

What I appreciate this book is the detailed advice that is exclusively devoted to the field that Clinton knows so well. Instead of creating a "one size fits all books", Clinton concentrates his writing to creating games. As the Founder of a serious games company, I know that Clinton's advice is spot on.

If you're in the game industry, and you want to learn how to create better games, get this book.

Luke Hohmann
CEO, The Innovation Games® Company
[...]: The seriously fun way to do serious work -- seriously.
Follow me on twitter at lukehohmann

4.0 out of 5 stars Useful to a Larger Audience than Game Developers, August 5, 2011

By 

Methods & Tools Editor "www.methodsandtools.com" (Vevey Switzerland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Agile Game Development with Scrum (Addison-Wesley Signature Series (Cohn)) (Paperback)

Drawing from his own experience as developer and CTO in the game development industry, Keith Clinton has written a book that provides both an overall vision of the Agile and Scrum approaches combined with a detailed practice of these principles in the specific context of game software development. It gives therefore also a good introduction to the software practices of the gaming industry. I noticed for instance that the customer - outsourcer relationships are not very different from the relationships between game production companies and external developers.

The book is well written and easy to read, with a lot of practical experience that Clinton Keith retrieved from his own professional career and contributions from other people involved in agile adoption for game development, especially in the "Myths and Challenges of Scrum" chapter.

Although it might naturally have a stronger appeal to game software developers and project managers, this book provides a lot of practical consideration that will be useful to a larger audience interested in transitioning to Agile.