Hello

Is it possible to develop a 3D "point and click adventure game" (think of Life is Strange, Syberia (the last two ones who are in 3D), Detroit Become human (with way less of production value of course), the newer Sherlock Holmes games... Etc. I think you get the picture.

Game Characteristics:

- 3D "point and click adventure"(like Life is Strange, Syberia, Detroit Become Human,  Sherlock Holmes games...) etc.

- Unreal Engine

- "Deduction mechanism" (like in all new "detective" adventure games (agatha christie poirot games, Sherlock Holmes etc.), otherwise pretty much standard adventure games mechanisms, nothing special, no "extra hard to develop" game mechanisms planned...

- PC platform (steam)

- 8 hours of gameplay (approximately)

- Really no real "story or choice" branching at all (NO "Detroit become human", NO "Dark pictures Anthalogy"), rather a linear experience.

- Heavy useage of various bought "pre-made" assets (3D, "code" etc.) to speed up and "cheapen" development

- Fully english voice acted (of course)

6 people payed full time (experienced people (at least one title shipped)) + externists (sound, music, voice acting, translation etc.) , 12 months of development

- One programmer (not just blueprints) experienced in Unreal Engine

- One Level Designer in Unreal engine.  -  Im not sure about this, but he might partially be also doing "3D Generalists stuff" because im not sure he needs 12 months for the work, i think he should be able to finish all the "maps" (locations) sooner than 12 months... But im not sure about this point...(any map makers out there...?)

- One 3D Animator ( we will use Mocap and probably Facial capture as well, so he will have way less work because of this) i assume that he should finish the work in half the time (6 months instead of 12, so the remaining 6 months im planning to use him as a 3D generalist (or hire dedicated 3D generalist instead of him for the remaining 2nd 6 months of development).

- 1st 3D Graphic Designer - Character Artist specialization - We will use "easier" solutions for characters -Metahuman, Character Creator etc. Im not planning to sculpt a lot of characters from "nothing"/beggining. The same goes for clothing. We will try to use "easier" "pre-made" solutions, but some brand new work in Marvelous Designer will be probably still needed. Still again, im somewhat "confident" he can finish all the characters because of this sooner than in 12 months, so in the "free time", im planning to use him also as a "3D generalist"...

- 2nd 3D Graphic Designer - "Generalist" (Props, Enviroments etc.)

- 3rd 3D Graphic Designer - "Generalist" - myself. Although because i will be doing all the other stuff around the project , im planning I might be able to allocate only like 50% of my time (at most, probably even less) to 3D graphics itself...

So 6 "experienced" (at least one title shipped i would like from them to have) people, full time, 12 months...

Its HARD to predict of course but according to me, it COULD and SHOULD be possible/doable to make this game...?

2 things im a bit worried:

1st) Is only one programmer sufficient...? But again, we are talking about basically a "point and click adventure" (in 3D) ... I just cannot see why one (experienced) programmer that can buy/use all the "code" from unreal engine marketplace he wants, should have a problem with that... Im not building the next AI (ChatGPT), im building a "frickin" "point and click adventure" game (basically) in 3D...

2nd) Im not sure if I have enough of 3D graphic designers... I have one dedicated Generalist, then me (0,5x time generalist), thats "1 and a half" (1,5) 3D generalist... Than i have a dedicated 3D character artists... I really assume that he should be able to finish with all the character stuff way sooner than in 12 months and thus should help with 3D generalist stuff. The same goes for the 3D animator... Im not sure about the Unreal Engine Level/map editor guy though... He might need all those 12 months...?

So... whats your experience, tips, predictions, oppinions... Do you think its a reasonable number of people (6 full time guys) and development time (12 months) for such game...?

(Also if anybody has any links, articles etc. about how much time each game genre takes to develop, or simply some writtings/info in this direction i would be glad to read it, i wasnt able to find much (nothing really) in this specific issue of gamedev)...?

Thanks

It's definitely possible, the problem I see is not the timing, nor the materiality of the project, but the choice of engine.

Unreal for a point and click game seems too overkill. I myself would not download gigabytes of data for a point and click game, I'd definitely give it a try in my browser though, or in mobile.

I'd use a simpler, more user friendly engine (for other non-programmers in your team to be able help you as well) that supports web applications, because Unreal dropped its support. I'd go with Game maker instead, or Unity if you don't want to pre-bake your scenes.

Sounds feasible, especially if your 6  employees are paid. 

If the codebase for your project is very simple, then yes, one programmer should be enough. But keep in mind that the programmer is the one that glues everything together. You could have the best Graphics designers in the world working on your game, but if something happens to your programmer then your game development will probably  come to a halt. It will be imperative that your one programmer codes in such a way that others can make sense of it in a worst-case scenario. 

I also feel like Unreal is a bit overkill for a point-and-click adventure -- lots of visual-novel/point-and-click games use Ren'Py or modified RPG Maker MV.

But on the other hand, using Unreal might be a very good choice to make your game stick out from the crowd. 

Of course it is possible. But will the game be any good or playable. Or will peolpe be willing to pay for it.   The company behind the newer Sherlock games has 80+    employess and pumps out about 1 game a year. And this is  with    expericence...

The hardest part for such a game is writing. I am told some authors even get away with only writing the story and selling it printed on paper, no engine whatsoever    :-b

I am missing the position of writer in your list above. And for your deduction stuff you need not only game mechanic, but elevate the story to a playable experience.   Otherwise you need a lot of bells and whistles to sell a walking simulator. Also you have no quality assurance /game testing planned.

But from a pure mechanical viewpoint, sure, clobber a prototype  with bland  assets and maps  in  a ready to go engine and make it pretty afterwards. Assuming you do have a story. That should give you quite an insight how  much work there might be involved. The first few puzzles should do .

For your guesswork, you can do what i did. Just look at released games and their companies. How much people work there, how many gams do they realease. Or look at kickstarter projects . How much took successful games to fund their game. You can calculate back, how many dev hours you could pay with that.