# Some Points

# Treat Everyone Nicely

There are three categories of people here that need to be treated nicely:

# Team Members

Yes, your team members! The fellow people working on the art, the coding, the music, they all look up to you and to each other.

You may skip this part if you're working solo.

# Playerbase

The fans can make or break a game, literally.

# Words Travel Far

Now the reason why you have to remember to treat people nicely is because the better your project's reputation is, the more people will want to play it. Conversely, in-team arguments, bad rep and other undesirable elements can damage a game's public image so badly, the effort put into making it may not be worth the few players left to play it! (I know this sounds very superficial, but it is what it is.)

Remember that humans are social creatures. How you treat others will be known far and wide, be it via Discord or on your Itch page.

# Addressing Burnout

Around the 2-3 month mark, you may have published one chapter or two, making some bugfixes along the way. The errors seem to become kinda repetitive, always some IOError: character.png not found problem or a loop that doesn't work. That's OK, we'll fix it in the next release, you tell yourself. The feedback starts coming in droves: "When's the next update?" or "I think the wolf shouldn't have been so nice to the main character so early in the game, it's too weird" or even "John's chin looks weird! Can you fix that?".

Now in most projects, a short break is not announced, it just takes place by itself without any necessary input. It's more likely to happen right after a build release, as team members might have worked extra hard in the days prior to release and are out of fuel. While this recovery period is essential, it should be planned ahead and not allowed to spiral out of control. As team leader, you can choose to announce to the team that a 5-day break* will be taken, or even say it in the discord server for fans to know. (They'll understand.)

*That said, if team members still have the ball rolling and want to keep working, and you see no signs of fatigue, go right ahead and motivate them to keep working. No need to force a break.