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Recommended Team Sizes (Alpha 10)

By Kuggar

The game tells you what the recommended designers, programmers and artists are needed for projects in the design document.

This guide is meant to just inform you on recommended sizes for each type of software.

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Created by

Kuggar
Offline

Category: Gameplay Basics, Walkthroughs

Languages: English

Posted

Updated

11 Mar, 2018 @ 9:19am

3 Jun, 2024 @ 7:36am

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429	Current Favorites

Guide Index

Overview

2024 Update (Beta version)

Welcome message!

Recommended Team Sizes

Hints and Tips

Comments

2024 Update (Beta version)

Greetings fellow developers,

The game has become a lot more complex over the years since I wrote this guide. This is a great thing, of course, but it's made this guide even less useful.

You can no longer simply check out the table below and prepare your office block for the future. The offices you create must be easily adaptable to expansion. I.e. In 1980, you may still only need what's in the table below, however, now when you get later in the game, team sizes can become astronomical if you want them to be. For example, in 2010, selecting all features on an OS now means you need upwards of 15 designers, 25 programmers, 5 artists and 25 years to develop.

It all comes down to the expected interest. Selecting all of the above will put expected interest at 100% and wasted interest at 450%. Ultimately, you will not select every feature, but only those that can make your numbers to 100% with very little wasted.

In conclusion, you can still use the table below as a very rough guide, but keep in mind you will need to leave room for expansion.

Welcome message!

Welcome to this guide!

For a while now I've struggled with planning team sizes for the future and I wanted to make an excel spreadsheet with all of this information on just for myself... then I thought, why not share with the community?!

All recommended team sizes are based on a 'Select All' in the features section.

Recommended Team Sizes

1st number is Designers
2nd number is Programmers
3rd number is Artists

The leader of a team is not included and is needed in addition to the numbers below

Note: It looks like all recommended numbers (not including games) max out in the year 2000

Type

1980

1990

2000

2010

Operating System [Computer]

4 - 8 - 1

7 - 14 - 1

8 - 16 - 1

Operating System [Console]

3 - 6 - 1

6 - 11 - 1

7 - 13 - 1

Operating System [Phone]

N/A

6 - 11 - 1

2D Editor

2 - 3 - 1

3 - 5 - 2

4 - 6 - 2

3D Editor

N/A

2 - 4 - 0

5 - 9 - 0

Audio Tool

2 - 3 - 0

2 - 4 - 2

3 - 5 - 3

Game Engine

2 - 3 - 1

3 - 5 - 2

4 - 7 - 2

Game [All but sports]

2 - 3 - 2

2 - 4 - 2

4 - 8 - 7

5 - 8 - 7

Game [Sports]

2 - 2 - 1

2 - 3 - 2

4 - 6 - 5

4 - 7 - 5

Office Software

4 - 6 - 1

4 - 7 - 2

4 - 8 - 2

CMS [Web]

N/A

2 - 4 - 2

CMS [Financial]

2 - 3 - 1

3 - 5 - 2

CMS [Workflow]

2 - 4 - 1

3 - 6 - 1

Anti-virus

N/A

2 - 3 - 1

3 - 5 - 1

Hints and Tips

This section will be for when I discover or find hints and tips relating to team sizes

Most software does not require a lot of artists. It is recommended that you put your artists in your programmers team and set their role accordingly. There's no point in making a 'team' of 1 or 2 artists as you'll need another room plus a leader. HR can handle this in A10
Always send your staff for training. If a program requires System and Network programming, always train your team in these skills as it will directly affect your product score when you outsource reviews in Alpha.
Your support team will depend on how many active users you have using your products and how many bugs you fixed during Beta. Always try and accomodate for ongoing growth. Try and keep your support teams under 30.
Marketing teams are similar to support teams, you must always account for growth, but note that with marketing, there will be a golden number depending on how much you spend on marketing for a product.
At the beginning either split your initial marketing (and support) teams in to two of each, or increase the vacation range so fewer people are away at once.

12 Comments

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freelancer909 31 Mar, 2021 @ 11:38am

Just a note I use programers in support with one star each service marketing. They are hard to find level 2. I agree with the team sizes but I only use at the most 6 in a team. Also I develope two of each catagory so I release a game or product every 2 years with 4 years to develope and always do research. Usally play on impossible and win no problem by 2015. Easy fun game.

Coda 14 Aug, 2020 @ 1:48pm

Thank you so much! I just bought this game a few days ago, so this really helps! Gave you an award, because you deserve it <3

LatN's Strategy 14 Jul, 2020 @ 8:01am

This will help with my building plans for the moved location to settle in. Thank You!

LatN's Strategy 14 Jul, 2020 @ 7:57am

Support team size; for am, pm teams should the size reach 15 in each to stay with the 30 team minimum or 30 each? I have reached as much as twenty each team.

Purifier 10 Apr, 2020 @ 4:14pm

thank you for this guide Kugger. What i want to know still is what effect (positive or negative) is there if you have more of each. My core team is of size 11 (including leader) but since i had every member help with every part (Design, art and programming) from pretty much the start, most of them are now multitalented. I started with Pharma software (i use mods) so now, 10 years later all 11 members of that team have the system, 2d and medicine skills of design, programming and art.

Kat-Chan 16 Feb, 2020 @ 5:15pm

this rly helps thanks

LordDecapo 18 Jan, 2019 @ 6:04am

thank you good sir!

Papa 12 Dec, 2018 @ 12:38am

:/ Daisy chain them using the wire mode (I) and chain the servers that way.

tbm1986 27 Oct, 2018 @ 11:31am

For every support office, I have three separate shifts using the same space and equipment. I have an art office/team and they do contracts when not working on in-house assisnments or in training in order to keep my reputation high.

I haven't tried having leads, HR and project managers. I'm wondering how they work.

Can servers be daisy-chained more than two at a time in the 80s somehow? It's my major bottleneck.

LatN's Strategy 24 Oct, 2018 @ 6:30am

Nice work; thanks for the tips!

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