There was this question about learning Blender. The point that came up in some of the comments was is this on topic? I mean, modelling tools in general are a fundamental tool in making important assets for a game, but would something like 'How can I learn Maya/Flash?' be on topic for here?
And expanding on that, would 'How can I make my model look more realistic' also be on topic?
Like I've said before, it isn't as much about topic as the audience. We want questions that are interesting to game developers of different kinds.
If a tool or technique is relatively common in the production of game assets, then I vote that they're on topic.
That being said,
How can I learn Maya/Flash?
Personally I don't like "how can I learn X" where X is anything since it's not the kind of long tail question that attracts experts to the site. Good questions are specific.
But this:
How can I make my model look more realistic
Is a great question, assuming there's an actual image or specific case the user wants us to look at and provide feedback on. If it didn't come with an image, it wouldn't be a good question.
I think this is a good question that needs clarification. I'd vote for off-topic because:
There are a lot of fundamental tools to create game-assets. Eg. Photoshop/GIMP or Illustrator/Inkscape for textures or 2D game-assets. Audio- and video-editing software for soundtrack/effects and cut-scenes.
Most if not all of these tools have something in common: You don't use them exclusively for game production. So a question about learning the basics of such a program is definitely off-topic. If the question was specifically targeted at game-development, that would be something else.
Just because a program is being used in the game production pipeline doesn't mean we should answer questions about that here. If some people choose MS Word to write their design documents, we wouldn't want questions along the lines of: "How do I create a heading in Word"
I'd consider something along the lines of "How do I learn Photoshop/Maya/3D Studio Max/Lightwave" as off-topic whereas something like "Best Maya setup for low-poly modelling" or "How to bake normal-maps in blender" as on-topic (although one could argue about that too).
I wish I could just say, "refer them to the 3D Graphics Techniques site" - but it's stuck in eternal proposal phase :(
If the site existed, I'd say these questions are all off-topic, and people should be referred to the 3D site. So this could be a temporary problem - I like to think one day the site will exist :)
And of course, it's only 3D - doesn't help on questions about 2D or music-tools...
This has come up again, with a very specific question about modelling in Maya, with a picture.
I would rather not see these questions here. But I would also rather not see half0 the programming questions we have here either, because I think SO can do them better. And there's no SO equivalent for modelling yet. So if we're going to have a double-standard, let's at least do it in the direction that provides a resource not otherwise available.
0 That's half after you filter out the quarter of the site that's "getting started" crap, which doesn't belong anywhere on SE.
