Hi guys! I have a question, is there any place where i could find out what the average team size was for games like Morrowind, Diablo 2, etc. I am trying to find details on how many positions they employed and what-not... Or if there is anyone who could explain to me what an average team for an RPG of this size would contain, i would really appreciate it if they could enlighten me! Thanks in advance! -SilverKnight

There is no such thing as an average game. Team size depends on four things

1. How big the design is.
2. How much cash you have.
3. How many good staff you can get.
4. How long you have to make the game.

If the design requires 100 people then that is how big the team is, unless that is you can't afford 100. In which case the team will be smaller and the design will be changed.

Team sizes for triple A projects these days are anything from 30-150 people.

Can't be bothered to log in.

Take a look at the Postmortems in Game Developer Magazine or online on Gamasutra at: http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/article_display.php?category=5

(You'll need to be registered at gamasutra.com to access the articles in the above link - registration is free).


As well as giving you an insight into development practices that do and don't work, most postmortems also include data on the size of the team, the time the project took and software used.


You should bear in mind that the size of the team is often linked to how long the game was in development and even company culture - a team of 10 could develop a AAA game if they were given a 5 year development cycle, a team of 50 could do the same in two years. NB: team size and time usually isn't always so clear cut though - doubling the team size doesn't halve the development time ("the mythical man month")

RPGs don't necessarily need larger teams, but they do tend to need longer development times when compared to more "linear" games.

Quote: Original post by RajaSK
Hi guys!

I have a question, is there any place where i could find out what the average team size was for games like Morrowind, Diablo 2, etc. I am trying to find details on how many positions they employed and what-not... Or if there is anyone who could explain to me what an average team for an RPG of this size would contain, i would really appreciate it if they could enlighten me!

Thanks in advance!

-SilverKnight

A crude rule of thumb is 10 people per year per million dollars spent. So, a 10 million dollar title (fairly typical these days) would be something like 50-person team 2 years.

However, people don't add linearly for productiviy, so the more people you have, the less efficent each one is.