Hi all,
I had been working on a game by myself over the last few months and decided things may go a bit faster, and I could incorporate more fresh/refined ideas into the game, if I brought a few others on board that I knew from work.
Currently, I don't have any type of funding for the project (aside from maybe buying a couple licenses here or there), and have been focusing most on some of the work that can be done without a big investment - mostly story content, or doing some audio/graphics production pieces on the side.
To facilitate the story development, and keep things organized, I created a wiki where anyone I give access can add ideas and modify articles (such as locations, NPC's, etc)
I have been trying to meet every couple of weeks with everyone over Discord (we had agreed Wednesday night would work for us all) and initially got a lot of energy and productive discussion from the first meeting, but afterwards I haven't been able to get anyone together for a second meet. I understand that they are not obligated to meet every couple of weeks or even contribute, especially as I am not paying an hourly rate/salary at this point (we all agreed we would wait to talk about that until the project was more developed and we received funding), but I want to try to re-capture some of that energy and get people involved again. Myself, I contribute at least one or two articles to the wiki every week.
I had also been trying to keep things semi-formal in meetings (I take notes and facilitate casually), but had received some feedback from one of my team members that this all 'seemed too much like a job', which I interpreted as I am asking for too much from them or being too formal (as if it was a job)
I want to keep some form of organization for consistency's sake (such as a semi-regular discussion) so everyone is on the same page, and is aware of the way the story is evolving (I have provided a framework people are comfortable with, and am very open to new ideas - being very transparent and forward about this).
Does anyone have ideas on how to keep people engaged and interested in the project, enough so to meet virtually every 2-3 weeks, with limited resources?
Here are some things I have been trying so far, with little success:
Adding content regularly, providing updates on our facebook/discord channels monthly (mixed results, fairly low view count)
Following up with a group chat every 2 weeks to make sure everyone is still available for that day (mixed results, some members do not respond/open the chat)
Continuing to add content on the wiki regularly (nobody logs in to see the new content)
Physically meeting whenever possible (hard to get more than 1 person together, they usually only want to hang out - don't want to talk about new ideas)
Pruned members who had no contributions and have not even been in contact for over a month
Refrain from calling the meetings meetings (I prefer 'calibrations', as I am mostly talking about new/updated content and talking about it with people)
I believe I do not have an issue with general interest in the project - some of the members had a lot to contribute and seemed legitimately interested in the first meeting - and everyone has expressed they are interested in contributing to the story
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