The Four Phases of Video Game Development

1. “Our game will do everything and sell ten millions units” design phase 
2. The disposable-code greenlight phase
3. Bug introduction architectural phase 
4. Creating content "because the schedule says" phase 
5. Fixing content created too early phase
6. Fixing code that should have been thrown out after greenlight phase phase
7. The marketing reset phase
8. Death march to gold master phase

(inspired by @imccowatt)