People can be monumental jerks, alas.
(And I think mildly blunt is fine, I think. But it's always best to assume that people have good intentions, at least at first. Doubly so when all you can do is remove them from the project.)
That doesn't seem too crazy. Although it still might be worth looking back through interactions and seeing whether there might be creative differences that are slowing one aspect or another of the work.XBDC36 wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 1:20 pm
Well if you want to get really technical, I'm working with 6 people (not including myself). 2 writers, 3 artists (though they each have separate jobs like two have split the work of the sprites for example so one is working on sketches and outlining and the second is working on coloring and the third is working on backgrounds/concept art), and 1 composer. One of the artists and one of the writers are also going to do programming and GUI as well.
I don't think that combining ideas is a *bad* idea, per se. But at best, it slows things down (while utilizing the best ideas and creating a better overall project). At the worst, it makes it almost impossible for work to get done and can lead to an incohesive mess.XBDC36 wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 1:20 pm
What do you mean with the last part? All of us who are working on the story (that being the two writers and me suggesting ideas/reading/editing/etc.) collectively agree if an idea might work before we start writing it, so I've never really felt like it's my story as it is our story. Since this is based on a game that already exists, I depend on them (probably more than I should honestly) because I suck at characterization and many times when I've suggested an idea for a scene what I get most of the time is "nice idea, but the reaction of this character would be this instead of that". Originally, I was supposed to be the second writer, but because of how often this happened, I guess I got nervous and took on another writer instead and demoted myself to editor (which is something I feel a lot more comfortable doing. I get to read the story that we've all built together from our combined ideas and fix any errors that the writers might have missed or make dialogue a bit more realistic. Do you mean to say that having us all combine ideas like that is a bad idea?
Ideally the way a joint writing project should work is something like this:
Person A: "Here are some great ideas!"
Person B: "Here are some other great ideas!"
Both people: "Let's pick the best and form a cool, cohesive story from both. A will work on POV X and Y while B will work on POV Z!"
Both people: "*high five*"
** Two months later
Person A: "I have a great script!"
Person B: "So do I!"
Person A: "I like your script, but would suggest these minor changes."
Person B: "Yours is also great, and here are some minor changes I'd suggest."
** Two months later
Both: "We're done! **high five**"
#####
But what I've found in experience is that it often works more like this...
Person A: "I have this great idea!"
Person B: "I have some other great ideas!"
Both: "Let's figure out which ideas are the best!"
**Two months later**
Person A: "Now that we've figured out which are best, let's put together an outline!"
Person B: "Hmmm...I'm not sure that your outline makes sense. It's kind of a mess when we put all our thoughts together. We should cut idea X, Y and Z."
Person A: "But those were my favorite ideas."
Person B: "..."
Person A: "I'll put together a different outline and you'll see how awesome it is!"
Person B: **thumbs up**
**Two months later
Person A: "I have cleverly put together an outline that's super cool and incorporates all the best ideas!"
Person B: "Now it no longer has *my* favorite ideas."
Person A: "....Fine. Then you put together the outline."
Person B: "Sure."
**Two months later
Person B: "Let me present you with my glorious and masterful outline!"
Person A: "This outline lacks all the ideas that I joined this project to write about. I hate it."
Person B: "...fine."
And on and on and on...
(I'll also throw in that, at least for me, it's often hard to know if an outline will even make perfect sense until I start writing it. Maybe we thought Alice was the better love interest, but it turns out that the scenes with Betty sparkle with chemistry. Or perhaps Cathy was supposed to be the villain, but suddenly Dorothy's motivation for killing a bus load of children suddenly makes more sense. In an individual project, I'd just go with that instinct. In a group one, every one of those changes needs to run by everyone else. And while I wait for them to respond, that's both time that passes and momentum that fades. And, half the time, I go in the direction we agreed on, which leads to a not as great outcome.
I can't say which scenario yours is. But if you're seeing elements of any of the above "bad" behaviors, it might be worth seeing what you can do to reign them in. (Which might mean saying, "Okay, this is the outline and we're running with it.")