Game development outsourcing is the practice of hiring a third party company to perform the tasks of designing, development, and release of a game. The service may or may not cover concept development depending on the level the client reached with the game. Game development is a continually changing industry. Therefore, experience plays a significant role in the quality of service and delivery. The process of game development outsourcing can be ideal for a single individual or a whole company that seeks to build its game through the services of a third party company. Many outsourcing companies cover both pc and console games.
The entire process of game development, from inception to completion, can last several years. Indie games are smaller projects and therefore take less money and time to complete. Also, much smaller game development outsourcing services can be provided either by a smaller team of developers or individual engineers. Thanks to these indie developers, the independent game industry has increased. Also, this popularity can be traced to such accessible game development software like the Unreal Engine and Unity platform. In addition to these are other online distribution systems like Uplay and Steam.
Generally, mainstream commercial games, be it PC or console, has different stages of development. In the first stage, game development outsourcing begins in pre-production, pitches, prototypes, and game design documentation. The game idea then receives approval before its respective publisher provides the necessary funds before development begins in full-scale — outsourced game development becomes the responsibility of a team of about 20 – 100 game developers. Team members share different responsibilities. Some are testers; others are designers, programmers, and artists. From beginning to finish, the software development process is broken down into smaller tasks and accomplished more efficiently. Which makes game development outsourcing favorable to publishers.