Release Notes - Strange4/RenaEngine GitHub Wiki

Iteration 1

Overall summary

In Iteration 1, the team established project requirements, organized the wiki, and laid out foundational architectural documentation and repository structures. We divided into three specialized sub-teams, focusing on the Game Server, Game Viewer, and Interaction Website, alongside a dedicated game design team for test games to the project. Each sub-team successfully defined its user stories for the upcoming release and implemented baseline boilerplate setups for their respective components. This iteration successfully laid the groundwork for all teams to hit the ground running for full feature implementation in Iteration 2.

Velocity and Contractor Estimate

Overall, we accomplished what we set out to achieve for this iteration: defining core system architecture, establishing team roles and workflows, and setting up working boilerplate code across all project components. Because architectural planning and stakeholder approvals required significant upfront effort, task breakdown and team assignments happened later than expected. However, all core objectives were met by the end of the sprint. Nothing was formally slipped to future iterations, though implementation momentum will scale up significantly in Iteration 2. Since issues and tasks were assigned this iteration, there is no associated velocity, as there were no story points from which to calculate the sprint's velocity.

Contractor Estimate:

  • Total Team Effort: ~144 hours (12 team members × ~12 hours average covering setup, requirements, architecture, and design planning)
  • Standard Canadian Startup Agency Rate: $70 CAD / hour (blended agency rate for Canadian tech startups, discounted to provide competitive edge)
  • Total Estimated Charge: $10,080 CAD

Retrospective

What went well?

Communication inside teams was strong. Most people said this. Team members were responsive, especially when @-mentioned. People were keen to help each other. The sub-team structure was a great idea, and seems to be working great, from the start. Splitting into 3 sub-teams of 4 let us work in parallel, and the teams organized themselves and worked independently. PRs and reviews went smoothly. Reviews were quick and gave useful comments, and commits and PRs moved without much friction. The repo, the boilerplate (website, game server, container) and the issues were all set up nicely, such that it's easier to build upon them in the next iteration.

What went wrong?

Though communication inside teams was strong, communication between sub-teams was weak. Teams didn't always know what the others were doing, which makes it hard to plan the parts that depend on each other. This was addressed verbally and will be addressed moving forward. Tasks were split and assigned later than desired. Wiki tasks were included in this. The meeting to split teams and plan next steps was delayed, partly because the stakeholders and the professor had to approve the project first, so the end of the iteration was rushed. Architecture and docs were a bottleneck; proper planning is crucial, but led to delays before teams could hit the ground running. Everything had to be defined before work could start. Moreover, some details still need to be made routine for the team: the issue workflow and the commit rules still need to be followed consistently.

What improvements did/will you make?

To ensure a smoother execution in Iteration 2, the team will establish clear task ownership during initial sprint planning, assigning every task a designated owner from day one. Weekly sub-team meetings will be implemented to ensure team members are all up to date of their members' progress and delays, and immediate sync calls will be had whenever blockers arise. Beyond that, detailed system design diagrams, API contracts, and data formats will be finalized early in the cycle to ensure clear design, while larger ideation and documentation tasks will be broken down for bigger collaboration efforts. Finally, team members will maintain steady momentum by immediately flagging delays within their sub-teams and strictly adhering to established issue workflows and commit guidelines throughout the iteration.

Breakdown by individual

@Strange4

  • Created and designed software architecture
  • Researched libraries, frameworks and infrastructure requirements
  • Created initial design for game design idea for release 2 game
  • Started work on SDK Generation
  • Made short prototype demo of a subpar MVP for researching technologies

@kcrri

  • Scaffolded website with Next.js, TypeScript and React as a backend-for-frontend, per the wiki
  • Implemented preliminary interaction website authentication logic: format validation, role detection, session cookies (user tokens)
  • Implemented placeholder routes and basic pages for the interaction website, for quicker building in the next iteration

@JenLys

  • Served as the main contact with the stakeholder (CGD)
  • Ensured that all legal documents were completed
  • Organized and attended meetings with CGD (stakeholder approval meeting), and took meeting notes
  • Wrote documentation for the collaborator user manual
  • Co-authored the Live Viewer setup
  • Helped in overall repo wiki organization: added the "Diversity statement" and ensured the wiki contains all required pages & sections.
  • Researched the tech stack that team-viewer will be using for the Game Viewer (i.e. PixiJS)

@DallaliRim

  • Outlined & set team-viewer's user stories for the Game Viewer Epic [#6]
  • Wrote documentation & added findings for the collaborator user manual
  • Co-authored the Live Viewer setup
  • Researched the tech stack that team-viewer will be using for the Game Viewer (i.e. PixiJS)

@YehJordan

  • Wrote documentation & aided in proper wiki setup for Game Viewer related pages
  • Co-authored the Live Viewer setup
  • Researched the tech stack that team-viewer will be using for the Game Viewer (i.e. PixiJS)

@Dopyo

  • Helped brainstorm game ideas to test the project
  • Wrote meeting notes
  • Outlined & set user stories for project wiki & documentation (Epic 5 & related user stories)
  • Outlined & wrote 3 user personas
  • Helped organize wiki & update README.md
  • Provided quick & detailed PR reviews & comments
  • Co-authored the Game Server setup

@Marian-Hristov

  • Outlined, designed and wrote documentation for the Game Server
  • Co-authored the Game Server setup
  • Wrote & set Game Server related User stories (3.1, 3.2, 3.3)

@benjaminsunliu

  • Planned the tentative backlog of the Game Viewer for this release
  • Outlined & created issues & tasks for the first epic of the Game Viewer
  • Added baseline setup page for the Live Viewer & added PixiJs setup
  • Outlined & wrote documentation for the Game viewer & Pixijs
  • Researched the tech stack that team-viewer will be using for the Game Viewer (i.e. PixiJS)
  • Peer-reviewed project documentation & wiki pages

@CanadianMaple-Syrup

  • Co-authored the Game Server setup
  • Outlined & setup reusable issue templates
  • Outlined & setup project board workflows
  • Outlined & set several epics & user stories (setup & sub-parts)

@lucaieraci

  • Designed & co-authored the interaction website setup (basic placeholder routes, auth and logic)
  • Discussed & co-authored interaction website testing (Jest) setup
  • Fixed folder structure on existing website setup code to meet cross-teams demands between website & game-viewer teams.

@nicolas-zampieri

  • Designed & co-authored the interaction website setup (basic placeholder routes, auth and logic)
  • Discussed & co-authored interaction website testing (Jest) setup

@SacciadisG

  • Designed & co-authored the interaction website setup (basic placeholder routes, auth and logic)
  • Discussed & co-authored interaction website testing (Jest) setup
  • Outlined & set user stories for interaction website (Epic 1, US 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, 1.5) and associated tasks
  • Took meeting notes for team-wide group meeting (and meeting minutes)
  • Wrote iteration 1 notes

Generated Release Notes

## What's Changed
* Update README.md by @JenLys in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/1
* Update issue templates by @CanadianMaple-Syrup in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/2
* Added link to project board and wiki TOC by @Dopyo in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/33
* 31 011   setup boilerplate game server code by @CanadianMaple-Syrup in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/35
* 32 012   setup container for game server by @CanadianMaple-Syrup in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/39
* 19 0.2 initialize website with Next.js and TypeScript by @kcrri in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/42
* Setup Game Viewer Page by @benjaminsunliu in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/65

## New Contributors
* @JenLys made their first contribution in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/1
* @CanadianMaple-Syrup made their first contribution in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/2
* @Dopyo made their first contribution in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/33
* @kcrri made their first contribution in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/42
* @benjaminsunliu made their first contribution in https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/pull/65

**Full Changelog**: https://github.com/Strange4/RenaEngine/commits/Iteration1