71–80 of 505 posts
https://kotaku.com/how-biowares-anthem-went-wrong-1833731964
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Having worked in the industry they believe it's necessary. I got yoked into a mandated long weekend and was laughed out of the room when I demanded a retrospective. Long hours is a failure, we should know what failed so it doesn't happen again. Their response? That's just the way it is in games. Absolutely zero desire or acknowledgement that it should be different.
It’s toxic culture at the leadership level. When my employer asks for some outrageous development on a compressed time schedule I speak my mind. Maybe that’s why most AAA games suck these days.
Now they certainly do have unique pathologies related to their "cheap" talent pool churn - the lack of experienced people leads to some shockingly bad mistakes reoccurring, and lack of attention to detail from passion often shows.
Later Civilizations (V and later) for instance often came out with some shoddy AI doing things like pathing algorithms clearly designed before they added the one military unitn one civilian unit per hex limit, spamming absurdly bad trade deals, or deciding the proper thing to do against a technologically advanced power who thanks to game mechanics gives research points for every technology they lack is embargo them over conquest of one militant city-state, making it even harder to catch up.
> For many kids who grew up with controllers in their hands, being a game developer is a dream job, so when it comes to talent, supply is higher than demand. That's the crux of this entire article in one sentence. This might be an upopular opinion here, but right now the supply of developers overall [across all industries] is much lower than demand. No one is forcing a developer to work for a game studio. It might be…
Making games might be your dream job, just make sure you are fully aware of the realities of your dream job and decide if you are willing to accept that reality day in and day out.
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>They should grow a spine and say no to ridiculous work conditions. YES! You're absolutely right! > They don’t need to unionize. Err... Why on earth not? That would literally be the definition of growing a spine and saying no to ridiculous work conditions but also having it be effective.
I probably jumped the gun on the unionization part. I don’t know a lot about it but my impression of unions is not so bright. Maybe my ignorance is showing with that regard
Not to say that the mods don't work hard at this as well nor that there aren't others who contribute positively here. This is just such a perfect example that I'd like to draw attention to it.
Game developers let themselves be exploited with low pay and unpaid overtime. They should grow a spine and say no to ridiculous work conditions. I am tired of hearing about it. They don’t need to unionize, they need to realize that they have a unique and valuable skill set. If we are talking specifically about programmers, we have the fortunate leverage to tell our employers to go piss up a rope with the weekly job o…
They have a valuable skill set, but making big games takes large groups of testers, tool programmers, texture artists, etc. Who are talented but not unique.
Like movie productions, games depend on a lot of skilled labor. And like movie productions, they tend not to be steady employers. So like film production in the US, it makes a lot of sense to have guilds or unions to protect work situations. Maybe also to create a framework for long term benefits, though I guess that is more debatable.
Game developers let themselves be exploited with low pay and unpaid overtime. They should grow a spine and say no to ridiculous work conditions. I am tired of hearing about it. They don’t need to unionize, they need to realize that they have a unique and valuable skill set. If we are talking specifically about programmers, we have the fortunate leverage to tell our employers to go piss up a rope with the weekly job o…
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Unions is a solution we got kinda nailed long time ago.
I’m not knowledgeable enough of unions to take an informed position on their merits. My impression was that unions are often an image of protection and nothing more. I could be wrong about that though.
That said my views on unions have become less negative: as someone pointed out - at least around here the construction companies with highest percentage of unionized workers are generally the most profitable ones year after year.
Why? I can only guess but I guess people work better when they know they are safe and also get a fair pay based on their work.
Game developers let themselves be exploited with low pay and unpaid overtime. They should grow a spine and say no to ridiculous work conditions. I am tired of hearing about it. They don’t need to unionize, they need to realize that they have a unique and valuable skill set. If we are talking specifically about programmers, we have the fortunate leverage to tell our employers to go piss up a rope with the weekly job o…
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In my experience it was the ic level. Leadership would say, what's a reasonable timeline for feature x. The engineers would spend two hours arguing that estimates are bullshit, then give a trivially small (and obviously wrong) estimate. Leadership would say, are you sure? Engineers would basically flip them the bird and say yes. Then inevitably be late. I get it, estimating is inexact. But there's a clear difference…
A good project manager will wrestle a more realistic estimate from their developers before forwarding it to leadership.