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What I think you are doing wrong is not composing teams for what are they actually doing. Updates will for Tech levels will usually update highest * feature, so selective initially hiring can pay out on the long run. Here's some explanation:
All of the products, with exception of 3D tool, are based on System + 2D features. Even Audio tool can be done with only these features, it will not fill 100% of Market need, but will sell good, nevertheless. So update/dev teams should always have Employees that have 3* in System as base, and the rest should be created by the type of what products are you producing. Usually it is best to have at least 2 devs with 3* in System + 2D, because that's usually 80% of the development, and 3* give 15% speed bonus.
If you are creating games, there is no need for Audio, 3D, and Network, features you can create System+2D, with Audio no fet, and all games will sell great. For Antivirus, you will need Network only after OS-es with Network starts rolling out, but that's after 1995-early 2000 (phones).
Office same as Antivirus, tools need 2D, or Audio, or 3D, so having two more System+Audio or System+Network 3* devs is enough. Console and Phone need Hardware, so there is no need for this skill unless you are doing these products, so hiring Employees without Hardware for all the rest is smart strategy. PC OS is the only product that requires all tech (except 3D, since there are no features), and can mainly be done with System+2D+Network.
As for bugs, there are several factors that impact them:
1. How much of Iterations was done during Design, where 3.5 is the optimal spot, since it will create minimal bugs for Alpha stage, and bring score to 9/10
2. The more employees are working during Alpha stage, the more bugs will be created. Even more, if they are lower level (God forbid 1*). So having fewer 3* Devs is far better, because, less people less bugs, and they get 15% speed bonus and more bonus for bonding, since it's a smaller team
3. Total amount of bugs is set when going to Beta phase, and around 70% of that total can be done during Beta (I've tested this several times, even Beta testing for full year, had 300+ bugs after release)
4. More Features, more bugs, so high Wasted interest will mean more features are used then needed, indirectly increasing bug count
5. Using Frameworks, and Reviews during Alpha stage can reduce highly the final bug count, because Reviews give around 1.5% reduction on completion, and Frameworks speeds up development time, lessening the frame for bug creation.
So when you start but fixing, it starts fast, because bugs for base Tech, and low Features are done first. After the it goes to Features 2*, which are slower to fix, and require Skill of 2*, so a lot of Employees with 1* in that skill will not be able to contribute.
To reiterate, you should know at the beginning of the game which products are you going to create that run, hire 3* devs with System + Techs that you are going to use in those products, and let them handle updates, after the release. Your problems should be solved :)
So, instead of having update teams stuck on some feature lacking 2/3* employee, it is far better separate Design teams from Dev ones, and while Design is doing a new product, Dev teams can do porting and updates, and you are sure that they have enough skill, since they were ones that did Alpha/Beta stage.
But unfortunately it misses my point, a bit. All things you have said make sense to me and most of the things I understand pretty well and implement it more or less already.
But my question was, if there is any way to see once I started an update, which workers I need. Do I need a programmer, do I need an artist, do I need specific stars levels in specific specialities? Maybe you already told me, but then I did not understand.
My question is specifically towards the update process. Not the design or developement process.
The same for the bugs:
I dont really care, that there are a lot of bugs or no. I will fix them. But I noticed, that if there are like 300 bugs reported, that the first 290 bugs are very quickly fixed but the last 5 take a long time. Of course, obviously there is missing s skilled programmer to fix those last 5 bugs, but WHERE can I see the requierments for bug fixing, Where can I see, what star levels at which specialications my team need to fix those bugs.
My workaround is okay for me - just assing my high skilled teams for a couple of hours to fix those last bugs - but I want to know if there is a more elegant way.
And just to be clear: I am NOT talking about bugfixing BEFORE release, I am talking about bug fixing at the end of an UPDATE process.
So you did Sport game, with 2x2* Feature and 2x1* feature, when a new Tech level for System arrives, you will need 2* System developers to update it. However it is more visible if you had and Audio Feature 2*, because I also sometimes get stuck at this, because I hired only 1 Employee with 2 or 3* in Audio and he is sick/on leave, or just do other stuff.
Next example, you implemented Grapchichs Feature from 2D Tech, which required both developer and an artist. So when the Tech level up for 2D, an update will contain both 1* in Art and Code, so it would be finished.
As for bugs after Release, I think the same way, because new bugs later will spawn after upgrading Tech levels or Ports, which means it will require Code 2* to fix them.
Note: Art is used only for development, and not for bugs, so artist are not fixing bugs (im 99.99% sure)
Thank you. And sorry that I did not understand it on the first glance.
I was suspecting that I can get an idea of the requirements this way (your suggested way) but I was hoping for an more obvious and or easier solution. Like and button to press on which opens an info dialog containing those requirements)
As for the big fixing during updates: I don't really know tbh. Sometimes it get stuck, I assign my central art team (which contain only artists, no secondary role for coding) and it shows progress again. But I can be wrong since the memory is a bit blurred. Could also be the last part of the actual update.
When you are doing Contracts that require only Art, or game Expansions with only Art features (usually 3D games), after Alpha stage, there are no bugs to be fixed, which means that Art do not produce bugs.
I noticed that aswell, and this is kind of an "exploit" sometimes. But I was not able to build the bridge from fact A to B. Thank you!