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GTA 6 Developers Unionize

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Re: GTA 6 Developers Unionize

#381

Post by Nifty3929 »

WarmWash wrote: post #4

Can anyone comment on why "big video game" dev pay has lagged "big tech" pay so badly? Ostensibly they are doing remarkably similar engineering problem solving, so why is there such a disparity?

Basically - building video games is (or seems from the outside) fun and cool, and so there are lots of people who want to do it. In effect, people are willing to be paid in fun, rather than in money. Also, games just generate a lot less revenue overall than boring, run-of-the-mill, dime-a-dozen SaaS apps. By a wide mile. When you look at these SaaS companies they're generating maybe $1M/yr in revenue per employee (not just developer). Some blockbuster games can achieve that, but not many.

So basically, high supply of labor and relatively lower demand for it in games than in boring business/SaaS software.

Re: GTA 6 Developers Unionize

#382

Post by insane_dreamer »

amazingamazing wrote: post #54
HugoTea wrote: post #5

This is great news, unions not only improve working conditions, but also improve the final product by not having underpaid stressed staff with high turn-over. It's a good sign for the future product quality of any company to see workers unionise.

Really? American cars suck compared to japanese and chinese which are not unionized. What’s an example of a unionized vs non unionized group producing the same thing where unionized is better?

> japanese and chinese which are not unionized

might want to check your facts before posting

Re: GTA 6 Developers Unionize

#383

Post by steve_adams_86 »

sonzohan wrote: post #177
WarmWash wrote: post #4

Can anyone comment on why "big video game" dev pay has lagged "big tech" pay so badly? Ostensibly they are doing remarkably similar engineering problem solving, so why is there such a disparity?

Game dev here, have worked on AAA and indie. First off let me get on my high horse and say the engineering in video gaming is generally more complex than the engineering I've done working in big tech. You need a lot more creativity and ingenuity to solve the unusual problems you run into in gaming. From there, as others have said, it's a simple supply and demand issue. Nowadays I am a university professor, nearly eve…

> engineering in video gaming is generally more complex

This tracks with my experience. Games present so many unexpected challenges. Or, known and expected challenges that are challenging nonetheless.

The other place I've had my ass handed to me was in robotics. Translating digital models to the physical space is how physics tells you it's actually in control and your ideas are cute and all, but other things are going to happen instead.

The simulator starts out simple and gradually becomes grotesque as it contacts reality.

Re: GTA 6 Developers Unionize

#384

Post by miiiiiike »

michaelsalim wrote: post #364
miiiiiike wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> engineering in video gaming is generally more complex than the engineering I've done working in big tech. I always roll my eyes when I hear this from game developers. And my eyes hurt from rolling I've heard it so many times. I've done game dev, systems, backend, frontend, all of it. It's all the same. Maybe you developed low complexity "big tech" projects but, c'mon, you're really going to argue that games are cat…

Not a game dev but I used to dabble in it. Quite surprised by this take honestly. Sure, each domain has its own complex things to solve. But on average, I think it's quite safe to say that game development consistently demands more creative solutions to problems compared to many other fields.

All development requires creativity. Different types of creativity for different types of problems.

Creativity isn’t narrowly defined to exclude everything but art, game mechanisms, and narrative.

You think the creation of GMail didn’t take creativity?

I’m suspicious of anyone who tries to lay a special claim to creativity for their class or type of work. Creates a false creative vs cog narrative that always seems to benefit the speaker.

Re: GTA 6 Developers Unionize

#385

Post by deaux »

Nifty3929 wrote: post #381
WarmWash wrote: post #4

Can anyone comment on why "big video game" dev pay has lagged "big tech" pay so badly? Ostensibly they are doing remarkably similar engineering problem solving, so why is there such a disparity?

Basically - building video games is (or seems from the outside) fun and cool, and so there are lots of people who want to do it. In effect, people are willing to be paid in fun, rather than in money. Also, games just generate a lot less revenue overall than boring, run-of-the-mill, dime-a-dozen SaaS apps. By a wide mile. When you look at these SaaS companies they're generating maybe $1M/yr in revenue per employee (no…

99.99% of SaaS could only dream of the revenue of GTA5, and this post is about GTA6. It generates more revenue than famous SaaS unicorns like Notion and Figma.

Re: GTA 6 Developers Unionize

#386

Post by j1elo »

ernesto905 wrote: post #308

> An end to crunch I was unaware of the crunch concept: "In the video game industry, crunch (or crunch culture) is compulsory overtime during the development of a game. Crunch is common in the industry and can lead to work weeks of 65–80 hours for extended periods of time, often uncompensated beyond the normal working hours" -- wikipedia Needless to say this seems extremely predatory.

It's surprising how Wild West it gets out there. In the EU that would strictly fall into unlawful working conditions; I kid you not, in Spain the law doesn't allow to work overtime for more than 80 total hours per year.

Re: GTA 6 Developers Unionize

#387

Post by sgarrity »

lobf wrote: post #330
sgarrity wrote: post #68

One of these days I'm going to see an article here about how the sex worker characters in GTA 6 have unionized.

You really thought you were cooking here, too.

I did! I thought I was funny! We'll, today was my turn to be an idiot on the internet.

Re: GTA 6 Developers Unionize

#388

Post by [deleted] »

saltyoldman wrote: post #317
ernesto905 wrote: post #308

> An end to crunch I was unaware of the crunch concept: "In the video game industry, crunch (or crunch culture) is compulsory overtime during the development of a game. Crunch is common in the industry and can lead to work weeks of 65–80 hours for extended periods of time, often uncompensated beyond the normal working hours" -- wikipedia Needless to say this seems extremely predatory.

who is in hn these days, remember like 10/15 years ago everyone was just willingly working 65+ hours. now it's "extremely predatory".

[deleted]

Re: GTA 6 Developers Unionize

#389

Post by jhatemyjob »

maccard wrote: post #373
bananaboy wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. There is a lot of ignorance in this thread. As if the only two roles are engine programmer and gameplay programmer where gameplay is just scripting. Nope. We have engineering teams dedicated to: UI, physics, rendering, streaming, automation, gameplay (people who write gameplay features that the game designers will access via script), build infra, pipeline (and pipeline is split up into people doing lighting/…

And none of those people are “low skill”.

I never said they are low skill. They just don't have their priorities straight.

Those QA teams, automation people, production, level designers, vfx artists, tech artists, character artists, 2d artists, prop artists, gameplay scripters, etc are doing all that work just to put some pretty pixels on a 14 year old's screen. There's very little value there.

Re: GTA 6 Developers Unionize

#390

Post by wahnfrieden »

ZenoArrow wrote: post #321
ernesto905 wrote: post #308

> An end to crunch I was unaware of the crunch concept: "In the video game industry, crunch (or crunch culture) is compulsory overtime during the development of a game. Crunch is common in the industry and can lead to work weeks of 65–80 hours for extended periods of time, often uncompensated beyond the normal working hours" -- wikipedia Needless to say this seems extremely predatory.

It's been an issue in the game industry for decades, and yes, crunch is predatory. It's exploiting the passion people have for making games to make them commit to burnout-inducing working conditions. Some game companies have taken steps to improve their working culture, but based on what I've read I get the impression it's still a big problem.

Crunch is good for maximizing shareholder value though. Which is the job of the developers. If they don’t like it they can simply not accept the contract and perish.
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