Video games are now in their prime. Due to recent events, people have begun to spend much more time at home, and games have become one of their main entertainment. Usually, a game is developed from a year to several years, but many developers believe that several years is a sentence. Technology continues to evolve rapidly, and too long development time can lead to the fact that at the time of release, the game will already be outdated in terms of graphics and engine.
Almost everyone knows about art outsourcing now. This is almost the only method to significantly speed up the creation of a game and reduce a large number of operating costs. It has both supporters and opponents. However, it should be noted that even certain risks and possible problems are not able to outweigh its benefits. Let’s look at them again in more detail so that you can be sure that you cannot find the best option for fast and high-quality game creation.
Higher Working Speed
One of the main game art outsourcing advantages, which is always mentioned first, is a significant acceleration of all processes for creating an entertainment product. This is due to the fact that the external team has already been formed and can start any task immediately. You don’t need to post jobs, conduct interviews, and spend time training.
You just have to define the task that you want to entrust the outsourcing company and explain what results you want to see. Everything else is the task of your partner, who is obliged to provide the completed work within the agreed time for a verdict. You can transfer several tasks at once to an external studio, or even select several such studios.
Access to Modern Technologies
Working in the game art and development field requires a huge amount of advanced tools. Without them, it is impossible to create characters, environments, animations and other important aspects of the game. Modern software requires powerful hardware. All of these are large costs that can be easily avoided by seeking help from an external team.
The professionals you hire already have access to their programs in which they work best. There is a lot of such software and each has its own advantages. In your case, your main advantage is that you do not need to purchase additional equipment and licenses. You are only actually purchasing the services of the people who work with it.
Lower Costs
Echoing the previous two points, this one is one of the favorites of developers who advocate video game art outsourcing benefits. Taking into account the above, we can see a decrease in costs in the following areas:
- Training. The time that you spent on training and which was a lost profit now goes directly to completing tasks.
- Purchase of equipment. An external team has its software, which it pays for independently. You only pay for expert services.
- Providing a workplace. The more in-house workers, the more premises and workplaces you need. With an external team, you don’t have to think about the office or preparing the workplace.
Influence Expansion
Few people talk about this, but in addition to the standard benefits of game art outsourcing, there are also more specific ones. For example, working with a foreign game art company, you get not only qualified experts, but also access to new ways of international promotion.
An external team from another country can tell you about the specifics of creating and distributing games in their region, suggest interesting and non-standard ways of solving specific issues and problems, and give an impetus for a larger-scale expansion of your project. Their approach to work will give you a fresh perspective on how to complete tasks, which will positively impact your overall creative environment.
High Flexibility
When assembling an in-house team, you always clearly think over which positions are most important to you at this stage. However, it happens that there is a need for a narrow-profile expert for one project, after which this person is no longer needed. A constant cycle of hiring and firing is not the best option, and neither is working with freelancers. Therefore, here too, an outsourcing studio will come to your aid.
With it, you can easily fill gaps for any project and not worry about what to do with people after its completion. External teams perfectly adapt to specific tasks and select the composition depending on the work to be done. They easily add and remove people when needed. Usually, they have expertise in a huge number of areas: animation, 2D game art, 3D modeling, development on different engines, quality assurance, marketing, etc. You just choose what you need.
Bottom Line
Game art outsourcing advantages are too big to try to ignore. By working with external teams, you get more free time to focus on more important issues within your company and avoid the professional burnout of employees who are forced to work with the same type of tasks.
Outsourcing gives you a competitive edge: you get more time and resources to think through and present fresh, original ideas. At the same time, bringing your product to market becomes much faster and more timely, taking into account the latest technological advances
