5 Ways to Dominate Recruitment!

Posted by requiem2d

January 7, 2008

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Do you have a great idea but no team? Do you envision this great idea yet fail to find the manpower to translate into a game? When starting out a Mod, it is often very difficult to get a production team together for every process involved, especially if you’re planning anything remotely close to a total conversion. Project Reality started in 2004 and quickly grew in numbers, one factor which was key in its early development stages was recruitment, because without a team you’re nothing. At the beginning, you’ll find modelers & you’ll find level designers relatively easily, however once you start hitting texture artists as well as animators, you do not want to get stuck. Such artists are fewer in numbers and are usually picked up by well established teams. They are especially vital to first person shooters (FPS) and other styles that try to immerse your gaming experience through a high level of graphical detail & a feel of realism no matter the setting. So the question becomes, how do we as a mod recruit if we’re so young as a team?

1) Appearance. First and foremost, the most important is how other people see you. Imagine you sent a prospective artist a private message over a forum with a link to your website. They’ll open their PM, click on the link and within a split second they will make a decision: Close the Browsing Window *or* Continue to Surf. No matter how great of an idea to you have or how sure you are that your mod will one day be the best for a specific game, your site will need to able to sell your project.

2) Make them Imagine! Do you already have something that this prospective artist can work on? Well then show it to them in your pitch. Obviously you’ve picked them out because you feel they’re up for the job, but in what capacity did you envision them? Did you see their work and instantly think “Wow, he’d be a great asset in developing our characters!”. Well then you need to translate those thoughts into your message so that they can share your ideas & vision. Make them imagine what their work on the team will be like and you may be instantly surprised with a positive response.

3) Where to Recruit? Recruiting will cost you a lot of time if taken seriously. You want to maximize the results from your time spent so you’ll have to estimate how many responses you’d get if you posted on a certain site. To help visualize, imagine you posted a thread on a forum and after a day it has a 100 views, how many people do you think would reply and are they the kind of people you are looking for? Although a fan site for Battlefield 3 is very relevant to the actual engine you’ll be modding, you’ll probably not find too many artists because most gamers are just that, gamers. You’ll need to hit up video game artist communities, 3D communities & general modding communities.

4) A Killer Sales Pitch! Because you’re contacting so many different prospects you really only have one shot, as such you need to sell your mod in a couple short paragraphs, post the link to your complete website and hope you’ll get an answer! If you were an animator and received 10 messages every week from mod recruiters who are trying to get you onboard, you’d want to join the one with the most lucrative traits:

Professionalism – There’s nothing like working for a mod that looks and feels like they have their shit together, make sure you do exactly that before wasting your time recruiting. Keep an updated website, spell check your messages and remember you want something from them, not the other way around.

Flexibility – Remember this is volunteer work, no one buys this royalties stuff and you certainly shouldn’t mention it (unless you have the cash in hand). If you want a mod to be exactly according to your design plan, pay people. If you don’t have money, let them voice their opinion and contribute to the overall progress of the mod.

5) Mod Funerals! Let’s face it, 90% of mods fail. Half of them never really got off the ground to start off with, but the other half managed to get a few people together, including skills you’re looking for. If a mod announces that it is closing doors, it’s fair game to shoot some of the ex-modders an e-mail or PM describing your mod. There’s a fairly good conversion on contacting such people as they’re already interested in modding and have started to learn the game-variant of their particular skill (i.e. Low-Poly Modeling is specific to games, not the 3D/CGI market as a whole).

Even with all these tips in hand you might get 5 new team members for every 100 messages you send out, this is the reality of it. Nothing will come free, but persistence will pay off. Set yourself a quota of people you want to contact each week and stick to it. Good luck modders!

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