Been doing a course on becoming a games designer however I've become a little stuck on one part of my latest project and uncertain where to find the resources I need in order to finish it off. I've been asked to put together a pitch type document however I've become rather stuck on how to come up with a basic budget and time scale. The course material states that usually in bigger companies this information is usually provided by a projects manager or equivilent however for the purpose of the course I need to come up with that information myself. Unfortunately I've not got the first clue on how to go about this. On the design side of work I'm pretty excellent as I'm more of an artist/writer but I've had no real experiance in this kind of area. Could anyone please point me in the right direction for resources on this?

The truth is, nobody expects you to come up with precise budget and scale when you are on course. The idea is that you put together a list of activities required to reach the goal of the project and give these time estimates.

The time estimates should be as precise as possible, but in reality they are only precise if the person/people have already previously done the same thing. Therefore as this is your first time doing it, they will be quite off. Later you have the time estimates and by comparing these to the actual time that was spent on activities you can give a better estimate for how long these activities take the next time you are doing something similar. This is the goal of the course as I see it. I could be wrong though.

By the way, even in a company the project manager is likely to ask you for your own time estimates for given job anyway. The latter being especially true if you are a freelancer.

364 days in the year, minus how many weekends, holidays, possibly sick days a person will take a year gives you the number of days worked by an individual in a year

divide their wage by this value, gives you how much they cost a day

then for each task multiply the number of days by how much the individual completing that task costs per day should give you a fairly accurate estimate (obviously not factoring in other runing costs of the business)

Quote: Original post by Stowelly
364 days in the year, minus how many weekends, holidays, possibly sick days a person will take a year gives you the number of days worked by an individual in a year

divide their wage by this value, gives you how much they cost a day

This number is 260 for the UK.

You will also need to factor in a contingency (10% is a good number to use).

You can create a spreadsheet that has the resources along the top, and the various tasks on the left. Then put the number of hours required by that resource for that job in the required cells. This will help you work out the total project time and the cost assocated with that resource.

You also need to take into account that some tasks can't be started until previous tasks are completed.

Quote: Original post by AndyEsser

Quote: Original post by Stowelly
364 days in the year, minus how many weekends, holidays, possibly sick days a person will take a year gives you the number of days worked by an individual in a year

divide their wage by this value, gives you how much they cost a day

This number is 260 for the UK.

just including weekends, but also bank holidays, and allocated annual holidays and sick days will make this more of a variable (saying that im pretty sure my schedules have never taken holidays into account :( )

Quote: Original post by Stowelly

Quote: Original post by AndyEsser

Quote: Original post by Stowelly
364 days in the year, minus how many weekends, holidays, possibly sick days a person will take a year gives you the number of days worked by an individual in a year

divide their wage by this value, gives you how much they cost a day

This number is 260 for the UK.

just including weekends, but also bank holidays, and allocated annual holidays and sick days will make this more of a variable (saying that im pretty sure my schedules have never taken holidays into account :( )

260 takes into account the days people can work during the year (ie, 52 weeks/year, 5 days/week).

As sick days (generally) and holidays are paid, you still have to take them into account when budgeting, but in terms of timelining that is something you need to know up front.

Quote: Original post by sadrlegends
I've become rather stuck on how to come up with a basic budget and time scale.

Could anyone please point me in the right direction for resources on this?

1. The Business forum.
2. My FAQ 62 - http://www.sloperama.com/advice/finances.htm
3. I have powerpoint presentations on estimating (believe.ppt and seriousdev.ppt), and a budget template, at http://www.sloperama.com/downlode/

The industry yard stick is around US$10K per man-month, and I'd say tilting towards the US$12K nowadays for AAA work. That's what a good contract developer would charge you. I've seen submissions go as low as US$6K and as high as US$15K in the past two years. It depends on a mix of developer's location, toolchain fit with your game genre, and said developer's eagerness to get some cash inflow.

Hope this helps.

-cb