That's fine, the separate files are a benefit here. The only annoyance is clogging up the root project folder -- though some people don't seem to care about that. If they got too numerous (the 5 in OP's "more advanced" project would probably not be too numerous), I'd consider putting the scripts in their own folder. I might even call it 'make' just to mess with people. Then my commands are just make/build and make/deploy and so on (.sh unnecessary). But really, in OP's case, I just have no need for some of their simple wrappers. "npm run dev" is two characters longer than "make dev", pointless.

> I’d argue it’s a waste to use separate files here

Fine. Write a `make.sh` that parses the arguments; that would be better.

> How so?

Well, read the comments here. Do you sense that Make is a beloved tool? Most of the complaints are about some details about syntax, and those complaints are completely valid. If you use Make for its intended purpose, then it's still easily well-worth using, despite that. But if you use it as a glorified script, then all you see is the warts, without any upsides. And you then tell all your friends that "Make sux!" Which is a huge shame because Make is awesome.