Is it even possible? I find that most people are not serious at all once the intro is over and the real work begins. Everyone seems to have their own agenda. People are hard to contact and maybe answer once or twice a week.

I would say: get to know people first (and know them really well), and team up with them when you know them. It is hard enough to do internet work with people you know, but it is impossible with people you don't know well.

The Prisoner's Dilemma: Online

A good way to handle it, which is some advice I got from another team, is to make as much of the project as possible without art or any of the 'fun' stuff. Handle all this towards the end of the development. You will obviously need some test areas, animations, sound and so on, but there is no reason to do it all before the code is actually finished. ;)

Digit

That's the way we did it with our team as well and at this stage I can say it worked out very well.

Having a stable, extensible foundation is more valuable than every other consideration put together.

However, you must prepare yourself for a long and lonely first few years when people look at your work and quickly dismiss it, not paying a second glance, because they see no eye candy.

Unless of course, you're recruiting an artist and tell them it's their job to make the game look pretty.

True. But even cheap art, for me at least, appears to be very expensive. :(

Digit