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Gotdatmoney

Member
Oct 28, 2017
14,575
I feel bad for the guy because he had his anxiety spike seeing all those articles and whether he would become a liability because of the 'bad press' and such. All over a translated sentence.

People here have a tendency to not watch full videos before commenting. The dude is very articulate in his points. His stuff should not have been taken out of context because he was clear about what he was talking out. Games press being shit for clicks is the usual.
 
OP
OP
rrc1594

rrc1594

Member
Oct 25, 2017
9,852
I don't work in software or anything but I get the need to get your work done. I'm only able to work 3Hrs of OT a day and 10Hrs max in a week. There have been times when I wanted to go beyond 3hrs just because I wanted to get my cases done.
 

Raysoul

Fat4All Ruined My Rug
Member
Oct 26, 2017
3,030
There's no such thing as a work with zero crunch, not just on game development, but in almost all sectors. I hate it but sometimes it is inevitable. There are deadlines, unexpected work, officemates getting sick, unforseen events, and other things that would have people crunch.

However, it is up to the company or the management on how they can reduce or mitigate it, like providing excellent pay, benefits, day offs, not forcing the crunch, asking people to take breaks, providing realistic deadlines, communicating with the lower management, etc.
 
Oct 25, 2017
16,738
So if Jason's report comes out and says there was indeed crunch what then?

I feel like there is two sides in this thread. Those trying to downplay the idea of crunch and those trying to use this example as crunch. All of us have little information.

I will say. I do appreciate him being candid, but he opened up this pandoras box by being so open.
 
Jul 10, 2018
583
Reading all the posts here pretty much proves the Developers point. You can tell people did not bother to give this mans video their time.

He mentions multiple times the intention of the video and tries to genuinely clarify and shed light on his experience with 343. And all people want to do is tell him that he's wrong and crunch is bad.

People don't care what this man has to say, they just want to be outraged. He even basically calls out games journalism for being unprofessional and lazy. Watch the video people.
 

Griffith

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
5,585
I didn't know resetera had so many people who know 343 Industries better than someone who worked there for eight years /s
 

astro

Member
Oct 25, 2017
57,210
Can we stop talking about "Era" like this place is only one type of opinion? There are plenty of us ITT with opposing beliefs, as is true for every single thread where this point is made... it doesn't really help anything at all.
 

Splader

Member
Feb 12, 2018
5,064
Lol this forum. Dude specifically asks people not to take is single lines or quotes as gospel, uploads a video in English this time to prevent any miscommunication, and the first page is still filled with people who are going off of the title alone.

Never change era, never change.
 

Pollux

Banned
Oct 26, 2017
940
There is absolutely a conversation to have about how deadlines can help breed crunch. I don't consider having to crunch for a deadline to be my choice... that is not something I ever really enjoy.

In development sometimes an issue arises and a deadline is not moveable, this is true in many other fields of work too. It is somethign many people will have to have to figure out at some point. That is not an excuse for all the times this happens because of poor management, and it is never an excuse to force your employees to stay on be that via direct orders or the culture of necessity you have cultivated.

There is a very big difference between actively choosing to crunch because you are in the flow with a problem/solution, and being forced to by a deadline/problem arising. Part of a good management team, though, is how THEY problem solve THESE situations by mitigating harm to employees.

These things are a massive balancing act, but too often the weight falls too heavily on the people at the bottom. We have far too many examples of this to hand wave the situation away.

We also need to be constantly mindful that not ALL examples of crunch are this, and to not dictate to those of us who need to work this way sometimes in a condescending and controlling way.
Very well said. My perspective is skewed to an extant because my deadlines are court imposed (lawyer).
 

astro

Member
Oct 25, 2017
57,210
Lol this forum. Dude specifically asks people not to take is single lines or quotes as gospel, uploads a video in English this time to prevent any miscommunication, and the first page is still filled with people who are going off of the title alone.

Never change era, never change.
I didn't expect the very next post after mine to do this... oh well, lol.
 

Dekuman

Member
Oct 27, 2017
19,032
I know how management works. While there are shitty management practices that is essentially forcing staff to do OT and work weekends, a lot of times management will 'suggest' employees do things like overtime to get a project done and employees will do it to keep their jobs, for the extra pay, or because they feel obligation to see something through.
 

Navidson REC

Member
Oct 31, 2017
3,439
working into the morning hours is a sign of a bad culture at a workplace, whether its forced or not. i'm saying this as someone who pulled some all-nighters myself when working on my phd and yes i'm well aware that 343 is far from the only crunching developer in the business
I'm also currently working on a PhD and also doing pretty much the same. One reason is definitely the general workload (especially relative to the pay, and these are for sure bigger/systemic issue that need to be addressed) but I'm also REALLY passionate about my field, and that's definitely a contributing factor.

Crunch sucks. Work/life balance is extremely important. But I still think this should be discussed with more nuance. There's a huge difference between people working late hours on something they care about (and being allowed to take the next day off) and people being forced to toil away for weeks and months.
 

slothrop

â–˛ Legend â–˛
Member
Aug 28, 2019
3,924
USA
🤷‍♂️ I definitely work late sometimes. Definitely nobody forces me, or really even knows. I just feel like working on something because I'm in the zone. The idea it's some cultural failure completely regardless of whatever management is putting out is, I think, quite a bit misconceived and unwilling to deal with context.
 

CobaltBlu

Member
Nov 29, 2017
818
People should really watch the video to understand what he has to say. I feel sorry for this guy, he is having such a hard time having his voice heard accurately.
 

JINX

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,481
Here is a more accurate summary (but people should watch the video instead):

He hasn't been able to sleep or eat because of the stress of news sites and channels miss-attributing quotes and publishing partial/misleading forum quotes to him. He's worried that people at 343 are going to think he's smearing them because of this misreporting, while also being worried about what his future employers might think about it.

Direct video quotes:
"All because people took a few sentences out of the contexts of a 15mins long video, wrote about an article about it for clicks."

Clarifying the video :
"So I wanted to make this video, to clarify some of the things in other video I shared. To bring some actual context to the things people partially translated and quoted on. So the very first things I need to say and I said it in my last video, is that I do not represent 343. Everything is my own opinion, I shared my own experience working at 343 and it was overall a very happy experience. I am not and shouldn't be a Halo news source , I repeat I am not and should not be a Halo news source. I am one employee in this big development team, my experience does not represent everyones experience there. I live in Washington state, I love it here. But my experience with Washington state is not going to be the same as my experience next door. The same thing applies here, some people might have better experience than I do and some people might have it worse I don't know. I can't speak for everyone at 343, secondly my knowledge of the project is limited. Even though I work on this game, I don't know everything about it. I can share with you my overall experience, but that is not going to be the full story. I don't even know everyone in the studio, either way no one should take a single experience from a single former employee to judge the whole studio and their game. That's not fair and genuine, I was genuinely happy when I was at 343. If it was that bad I wouldn't stay for 8 years, where there rough days? sure most job have rough days. I stated in the video, that I was very grateful to do what I do. People I know work very hard for the game because we care, I left 343 because it was time for me to move on. The 343 "baggage" I was talking about, is the fact that I will not be able to work on any other IP as long as I'm at 343. I want to try new things, and with 343 I can't and thats fair because Halo is the only IP they're working on. I left 343 in a good term, there was no bad blood. I mentioned in the video that I all most cried on my last walk in the studio because I'm really... really going to miss the place and the people there."

On project ambition/content cutting :
"The articles also mentions that I said the game is overly ambitious and stuff, do I think the game was overly ambitious? yes. But that is my opinion, was I sad that some of the work I did got cut? sure, but that happens to almost every form of entertainment, movies, tv shows, events and video games you name it. We watch the deleted scene from good movies all the time, this shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. While I didn't make any of the decisions, we can all agree that is better to have a good solid game without fillers. I remember watching a deleted scene from Revenge of the Sith, that scene is about Yoda arriving at Dagoba. In the DVD the person who work on the shot felt really sad that this shot got cut from the final movie, he said he actually begged George Lucas to put that in the movie but it got cut. It's the same thing here, the contents being cut in the game. This does not mean they do it on purpose to upset the artist, this happens all the time in video games and movies and television shows and so on. "

On the "masterpiece" comment :
"The forum and the press mentioned don't expect it to be a masterpiece and the reason I say that is because we are in the age of games that can get hyped up so much and fans starting to have unrealistic expectation about it. It does not mean it's not going to be a good game,
I said it in the video I still look froward to play it and I will always support game because I know how hard people worked on it. We got good writers working on it, the story is going to be great. Semi- open world is going to be fun, in my video I just suggest that the audience should have an open mind going into this video game after all it is the very first time Halo in a semi-open world form. it might not check all the checkboxes that you have for the game, but it can still be a good game."

On the engine (SlipSpace) comments :
"And about the engine, some article says I said the engine is defective. This is a misleading way to saying this, what I said is that engine still needs updates. There are still improvements to be made and again that happens to every game engine. Unreal 4 still have updates and patches despite them already announcing unreal 5 already and that is an engine thats been here for decades. I stated in the video that the Halo engine is getting better every day, everybody is working really hard on it. It can achieve amazing graphical result, everyone is working hard to implement new features in it. Performance is getting better, I'm certain it will improve even more after I left. "

On the crunch comments :
"And finally the crunch, this is what upset me the most. It is one sentence in a 15 mins long video, which wasn't even a point of the video and that got brought out to be the headline of these articles. I really need to clarify that I never said that there was a constant crunch, nor did I say I was forced to crunch in the video.
Everyone crunch for a different reason, some could be the deadline sure. But many of us just want to go the extra mile to do the best we can, sometime an artist like me got into a zone and they just want to continue. I some time got really into what I was working on and I forgot to eat and I was eager to finish while I had the momentum going. I didn't want to stop creative juices from flowing, when ever that happens an artist could easily loose their sense of time and keep in mind we have been working from home for over a year now. Lots of time I wasn't able to focus on work during the day fully because kids are running around, I have to do tech support because they're doing remote learning. Sometime I need to go help out in the kitchen because dinning out wasn't really safe. So often I start to focus on after the kids are asleep, which is around 9pm so I work through midnight very easily. Either way I really need to clarify that I wasn't forced to crunch and It's definitely not a constant thing. But the press make it look like 343 has a crunch culture and that really made me mad because everyone have different experience. some people do crunch a little bit more than the other, but that is not across the studio and that is not happen constantly. People who work in 343 including myself are allowed to take a personal day off to decompress and spend time with family. Think about it if I really crunch for a project every single day how in the world do I have time to keep this Youtube channel running and another channel on BilliBilli? The purpose I said my colleague and I had experienced working over midnight is because I want to show people that we care about this project, we are passionate about it. Maybe sometime we do need to hit the deadline, but that is a very rare thing for me for the past eight years I was there. once again I can only speaK for my self, I don't speak for other employee or their schedule. So don't just take what I said in my personal experience and apply it to the whole studio. It doesn't work like that. "

Press/channel coverage of the partially translated and misleading forum post/translation :
"So, I understand that big game websites and channels need content to run, you want to get more clicks. I understand as I am running a youtube channel myself, but to take a partially translated forum post and run a full article on it is not responsible and honestly is pretty lazy because things I shared in that video nobody, no press, no creator reached out to me personally to get more context. I actually sent email message to some of the websites and the youtube creators wanting to offer more context for what I said and neither of them got back to me. Why is that? it really made me upset
that my video which was intended for positivity and encouragement, somehow turned into this. If you're working with the press or running a game news channel please be responsible with your source. And if you're a halo fan take my word with a pinch of salt because as I can not talk for everyone in a huge project in a studio like this."
 

Splader

Member
Feb 12, 2018
5,064
Finally finished the video, and man his English is really friggen good.

The video is really well made, it's not that long, and goes through the whole thing. I encourage everyone to please watch the video before commenting on this topic.
 

astro

Member
Oct 25, 2017
57,210
Finally finished the video, and man his English is really friggen good.

The video is really well made, it's not that long, and goes through the whole thing. I encourage everyone to please watch the video before commenting on this topic.
Too many people don't even read the OT, getting them to read an article or watch a video before jumping in is not something you'll ever convince some of them to do.
 

Navidson REC

Member
Oct 31, 2017
3,439
I sometimes really wonder if the people railing against the kind of crunch described here have either never worked towards a deadline or if they realize that this issue goes way beyond the videogame industry. I feel it's much more an inherent problem of capitalist systems rather than a problem of a specific workplace or industry. It sucks, there needs to be more regulation, absolutely. But I'm just not sure whether putting all the blame on studios is enough when the problem is much more systemic (and maybe even human?) in nature.

Like, when there's no deadline pressure I of course procrastinate more. When there's a deadline looming I kick into high efficiency mode, but that's not always enough and thus may lead to late nights.

At any rate, this is an important discussion but I'm not sure if the answers are as easy as some make them out to be.
 

Splader

Member
Feb 12, 2018
5,064
Here is a more accurate summary (but people should watch the video instead):

He hasn't been able to sleep or eat because of the stress of news sites and channels miss-attributing quotes and publishing partial/misleading forum quotes to him. He's worried that people at 343 are going to think he's smearing them because of this misreporting, while also being worried about what his future employers might think about it.

Direct video quotes:
"All because people took a few sentences out of the contexts of a 15mins long video, wrote about an article about it for clicks."

Clarifying the video :
"So I wanted to make this video, to clarify some of the things in other video I shared. To bring some actual context to the things people partially translated and quoted on. So the very first things I need to say and I said it in my last video, is that I do not represent 343. Everything is my own opinion, I shared my own experience working at 343 and it was overall a very happy experience. I am not and shouldn't be a Halo news source , I repeat I am not and should not be a Halo news source. I am one employee in this big development team, my experience does not represent everyones experience there. I live in Washington state, I love it here. But my experience with Washington state is not going to be the same as my experience next door. The same thing applies here, some people might have better experience than I do and some people might have it worse I don't know. I can't speak for everyone at 343, secondly my knowledge of the project is limited. Even though I work on this game, I don't know everything about it. I can share with you my overall experience, but that is not going to be the full story. I don't even know everyone in the studio, either way no one should take a single experience from a single former employee to judge the whole studio and their game. That's not fair and genuine, I was genuinely happy when I was at 343. If it was that bad I wouldn't stay for 8 years, where there rough days? sure most job have rough days. I stated in the video, that I was very grateful to do what I do. People I know work very hard for the game because we care, I left 343 because it was time for me to move on. The 343 "baggage" I was talking about, is the fact that I will not be able to work on any other IP as long as I'm at 343. I want to try new things, and with 343 I can't and thats fair because Halo is the only IP they're working on. I left 343 in a good term, there was no bad blood. I mentioned in the video that I all most cried on my last walk in the studio because I'm really... really going to miss the place and the people there."

On project ambition/content cutting :
"The articles also mentions that I said the game is overly ambitious and stuff, do I think the game was overly ambitious? yes. But that is my opinion, was I sad that some of the work I did got cut? sure, but that happens to almost every form of entertainment, movies, tv shows, events and video games you name it. We watch the deleted scene from good movies all the time, this shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. While I didn't make any of the decisions, we can all agree that is better to have a good solid game without fillers. I remember watching a deleted scene from Revenge of the Sith, that scene is about Yoda arriving at Dagoba. In the DVD the person who work on the shot felt really sad that this shot got cut from the final movie, he said he actually begged George Lucas to put that in the movie but it got cut. It's the same thing here, the contents being cut in the game. This does not mean they do it on purpose to upset the artist, this happens all the time in video games and movies and television shows and so on. "

On the "masterpiece" comment :
"The forum and the press mentioned don't expect it to be a masterpiece and the reason I say that is because we are in the age of games that can get hyped up so much and fans starting to have unrealistic expectation about it. It does not mean it's not going to be a good game,
I said it in the video I still look froward to play it and I will always support game because I know how hard people worked on it. We got good writers working on it, the story is going to be great. Semi- open world is going to be fun, in my video I just suggest that the audience should have an open mind going into this video game after all it is the very first time Halo in a semi-open world form. it might not check all the checkboxes that you have for the game, but it can still be a good game."

On the engine (SlipSpace) comments :
"And about the engine, some article says I said the engine is defective. This is a misleading way to saying this, what I said is that engine still needs updates. There are still improvements to be made and again that happens to every game engine. Unreal 4 still have updates and patches despite them already announcing unreal 5 already and that is an engine thats been here for decades. I stated in the video that the Halo engine is getting better every day, everybody is working really hard on it. It can achieve amazing graphical result, everyone is working hard to implement new features in it. Performance is getting better, I'm certain it will improve even more after I left. "

On the crunch comments :
"And finally the crunch, this is what upset me the most. It is one sentence in a 15 mins long video, which wasn't even a point of the video and that got brought out to be the headline of these articles. I really need to clarify that I never said that there was a constant crunch, nor did I say I was forced to crunch in the video.
Everyone crunch for a different reason, some could be the deadline sure. But many of us just want to go the extra mile to do the best we can, sometime an artist like me got into a zone and they just want to continue. I some time got really into what I was working on and I forgot to eat and I was eager to finish while I had the momentum going. I didn't want to stop creative juices from flowing, when ever that happens an artist could easily loose their sense of time and keep in mind we have been working from home for over a year now. Lots of time I wasn't able to focus on work during the day fully because kids are running around, I have to do tech support because they're doing remote learning. Sometime I need to go help out in the kitchen because dinning out wasn't really safe. So often I start to focus on after the kids are asleep, which is around 9pm so I work through midnight very easily. Either way I really need to clarify that I wasn't forced to crunch and It's definitely not a constant thing. But the press make it look like 343 has a crunch culture and that really made me mad because everyone have different experience. some people do crunch a little bit more than the other, but that is not across the studio and that is not happen constantly. People who work in 343 including myself are allowed to take a personal day off to decompress and spend time with family. Think about it if I really crunch for a project every single day how in the world do I have time to keep this Youtube channel running and another channel on BilliBilli? The purpose I said my colleague and I had experienced working over midnight is because I want to show people that we care about this project, we are passionate about it. Maybe sometime we do need to hit the deadline, but that is a very rare thing for me for the past eight years I was there. once again I can only speaK for my self, I don't speak for other employee or their schedule. So don't just take what I said in my personal experience and apply it to the whole studio. It doesn't work like that. "

Press/channel coverage of the partially translated and misleading forum post/translation :
"So, I understand that big game websites and channels need content to run, you want to get more clicks. I understand as I am running a youtube channel myself, but to take a partially translated forum post and run a full article on it is not responsible and honestly is pretty lazy because things I shared in that video nobody, no press, no creator reached out to me personally to get more context. I actually sent email message to some of the websites and the youtube creators wanting to offer more context for what I said and neither of them got back to me. Why is that? it really made me upset
that my video which was intended for positivity and encouragement, somehow turned into this. If you're working with the press or running a game news channel please be responsible with your source. And if you're a halo fan take my word with a pinch of salt because as I can not talk for everyone in a huge project in a studio like this."

rrc1594 could you please threadmark this or add it to the OP?
 

Deleted member 15973

User-requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
5,172
It's not forced crunch but usually expected from you. For some reason more hours put in means better than working effectively with less hours. It's an issue in a lot of sectors. My TL use to work 2 hours extra unpaid trying to get approval for overtime but was rejected but still worked an extra 30 minutes. I can't talk about my experience at my job and compare it to game development as my job isn't about making money, I'm just support.
 

christocolus

Member
Oct 27, 2017
14,933
Here is a more accurate summary (but people should watch the video instead):

He hasn't been able to sleep or eat because of the stress of news sites and channels miss-attributing quotes and publishing partial/misleading forum quotes to him. He's worried that people at 343 are going to think he's smearing them because of this misreporting, while also being worried about what his future employers might think about it.

Direct video quotes:
"All because people took a few sentences out of the contexts of a 15mins long video, wrote about an article about it for clicks."

Clarifying the video :
"So I wanted to make this video, to clarify some of the things in other video I shared. To bring some actual context to the things people partially translated and quoted on. So the very first things I need to say and I said it in my last video, is that I do not represent 343. Everything is my own opinion, I shared my own experience working at 343 and it was overall a very happy experience. I am not and shouldn't be a Halo news source , I repeat I am not and should not be a Halo news source. I am one employee in this big development team, my experience does not represent everyones experience there. I live in Washington state, I love it here. But my experience with Washington state is not going to be the same as my experience next door. The same thing applies here, some people might have better experience than I do and some people might have it worse I don't know. I can't speak for everyone at 343, secondly my knowledge of the project is limited. Even though I work on this game, I don't know everything about it. I can share with you my overall experience, but that is not going to be the full story. I don't even know everyone in the studio, either way no one should take a single experience from a single former employee to judge the whole studio and their game. That's not fair and genuine, I was genuinely happy when I was at 343. If it was that bad I wouldn't stay for 8 years, where there rough days? sure most job have rough days. I stated in the video, that I was very grateful to do what I do. People I know work very hard for the game because we care, I left 343 because it was time for me to move on. The 343 "baggage" I was talking about, is the fact that I will not be able to work on any other IP as long as I'm at 343. I want to try new things, and with 343 I can't and thats fair because Halo is the only IP they're working on. I left 343 in a good term, there was no bad blood. I mentioned in the video that I all most cried on my last walk in the studio because I'm really... really going to miss the place and the people there."

On project ambition/content cutting :
"The articles also mentions that I said the game is overly ambitious and stuff, do I think the game was overly ambitious? yes. But that is my opinion, was I sad that some of the work I did got cut? sure, but that happens to almost every form of entertainment, movies, tv shows, events and video games you name it. We watch the deleted scene from good movies all the time, this shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. While I didn't make any of the decisions, we can all agree that is better to have a good solid game without fillers. I remember watching a deleted scene from Revenge of the Sith, that scene is about Yoda arriving at Dagoba. In the DVD the person who work on the shot felt really sad that this shot got cut from the final movie, he said he actually begged George Lucas to put that in the movie but it got cut. It's the same thing here, the contents being cut in the game. This does not mean they do it on purpose to upset the artist, this happens all the time in video games and movies and television shows and so on. "

On the "masterpiece" comment :
"The forum and the press mentioned don't expect it to be a masterpiece and the reason I say that is because we are in the age of games that can get hyped up so much and fans starting to have unrealistic expectation about it. It does not mean it's not going to be a good game,
I said it in the video I still look froward to play it and I will always support game because I know how hard people worked on it. We got good writers working on it, the story is going to be great. Semi- open world is going to be fun, in my video I just suggest that the audience should have an open mind going into this video game after all it is the very first time Halo in a semi-open world form. it might not check all the checkboxes that you have for the game, but it can still be a good game."

On the engine (SlipSpace) comments :
"And about the engine, some article says I said the engine is defective. This is a misleading way to saying this, what I said is that engine still needs updates. There are still improvements to be made and again that happens to every game engine. Unreal 4 still have updates and patches despite them already announcing unreal 5 already and that is an engine thats been here for decades. I stated in the video that the Halo engine is getting better every day, everybody is working really hard on it. It can achieve amazing graphical result, everyone is working hard to implement new features in it. Performance is getting better, I'm certain it will improve even more after I left. "

On the crunch comments :
"And finally the crunch, this is what upset me the most. It is one sentence in a 15 mins long video, which wasn't even a point of the video and that got brought out to be the headline of these articles. I really need to clarify that I never said that there was a constant crunch, nor did I say I was forced to crunch in the video.
Everyone crunch for a different reason, some could be the deadline sure. But many of us just want to go the extra mile to do the best we can, sometime an artist like me got into a zone and they just want to continue. I some time got really into what I was working on and I forgot to eat and I was eager to finish while I had the momentum going. I didn't want to stop creative juices from flowing, when ever that happens an artist could easily loose their sense of time and keep in mind we have been working from home for over a year now. Lots of time I wasn't able to focus on work during the day fully because kids are running around, I have to do tech support because they're doing remote learning. Sometime I need to go help out in the kitchen because dinning out wasn't really safe. So often I start to focus on after the kids are asleep, which is around 9pm so I work through midnight very easily. Either way I really need to clarify that I wasn't forced to crunch and It's definitely not a constant thing. But the press make it look like 343 has a crunch culture and that really made me mad because everyone have different experience. some people do crunch a little bit more than the other, but that is not across the studio and that is not happen constantly. People who work in 343 including myself are allowed to take a personal day off to decompress and spend time with family. Think about it if I really crunch for a project every single day how in the world do I have time to keep this Youtube channel running and another channel on BilliBilli? The purpose I said my colleague and I had experienced working over midnight is because I want to show people that we care about this project, we are passionate about it. Maybe sometime we do need to hit the deadline, but that is a very rare thing for me for the past eight years I was there. once again I can only speaK for my self, I don't speak for other employee or their schedule. So don't just take what I said in my personal experience and apply it to the whole studio. It doesn't work like that. "

Press/channel coverage of the partially translated and misleading forum post/translation :
"So, I understand that big game websites and channels need content to run, you want to get more clicks. I understand as I am running a youtube channel myself, but to take a partially translated forum post and run a full article on it is not responsible and honestly is pretty lazy because things I shared in that video nobody, no press, no creator reached out to me personally to get more context. I actually sent email message to some of the websites and the youtube creators wanting to offer more context for what I said and neither of them got back to me. Why is that? it really made me upset
that my video which was intended for positivity and encouragement, somehow turned into this. If you're working with the press or running a game news channel please be responsible with your source. And if you're a halo fan take my word with a pinch of salt because as I can not talk for everyone in a huge project in a studio like this."
There it is.. thanks for posting JINX
 

Pancracio17

â–˛ Legend â–˛
Avenger
Oct 29, 2017
18,988
I sometimes really wonder if the people railing against the kind of crunch described here have either never worked towards a deadline or if they realize that this issue goes way beyond the videogame industry. I feel it's much more an inherent problem of capitalist systems rather than a problem of a specific workplace or industry. It sucks, there needs to be more regulation, absolutely. But I'm just not sure whether putting all the blame on studios is enough when the problem is much more systemic (and maybe even human?) in nature.

Like, when there's no deadline pressure I of course procrastinate more. When there's a deadline looming I kick into high efficiency mode, but that's not always enough and thus may lead to late nights.

At any rate, this is an important discussion but I'm not sure if the answers are as easy as some make them out to be.
Right. I feel there is little a studio like 343 can do about voluntary crunch like this. Its really him just really grtting into his work, sounds like it at least.
 

Loud Wrong

Member
Feb 24, 2020
14,529
i have no problem with what he's describing. I crunch all the time when I feel like and it doesn't harm my co workers, because I have none. I work for me and sometimes shit needs to get done quickly, and sometimes I'm just really in the mood to keep coding. Sometimes other aspects of my personal life took precedence and I need to make up for lost time.
 

FUNKNOWN iXi

â–˛ Legend â–˛
Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
9,670
User banned (2 weeks): derailing thread with conspiracy theories and platform warring over a series of posts
fuck that. It's just gunna drag people through the mud. I'm not particularly interested, yeah video games are hard to make, yeah it was a monumental struggle, yeah they made stupid decisions along the way, yeah management is unrealistic, blah blah blah. If it bleeds, it leads.
I hear you. I do wonder why Jason Schreier hasn't released that article tho. I hope it's not to just get maximum clicks by releasing it close to Infinite's launch lol.
 

Quellyford

Banned
May 16, 2020
4,072
Wow, there you go. He even said his video was a positive one and there's no crunch that he experienced at 343i...

Also: He says people ran with his story, from legit reporters to crappy clickbait sites, and not ONE person reached out to him for comment??

Kinda makes you wonder. Jason Schreier even retweeted the story and commented saying he's working on something along those lines for a story on Halo development, but it seems confirmed even He did not reach out to this dev for clarification and comments. The developer even says there's no crunch. Kind of concerning, the state of gaming journalism.
 

Bulby

Prophet of Truth
Member
Oct 29, 2017
5,073
Berlin
Really appreciate him addressing this. I wish more devs had the freedom to discuss their experiences, both positive or negative, openly, without fear of reprisal or being labelled a shill.

We need more discussion from everyone involved and less activism journalism.
 

ShapeGSX

Member
Nov 13, 2017
5,254
I swear to god it sounds like some of you people have never worked a job other than retail in your lives and have no actual concept of deadlines. People staying late because they want to meet deadlines is not a problem. CDProject forcing people to stay late IS a problem. There's a difference.

Honestly, that's a grey area, because companies also set unrealistic deadlines and might not have enough staff to meet those deadlines. I don't think a little bit of a stretch to get people to work smarter and plan better is a bad thing. But also having a deadline that is months off from a realistic schedule isn't helpful and can contribute to crunch.
 

nekkid

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
21,823
So if Jason's report comes out and says there was indeed crunch what then?

I feel like there is two sides in this thread. Those trying to downplay the idea of crunch and those trying to use this example as crunch. All of us have little information.

I will say. I do appreciate him being candid, but he opened up this pandoras box by being so open.
No, the two sides in this thread are those listening to what this guy is saying, and those that want there the be issues with crunch at 343.
 

ScatheZombie

Member
Oct 26, 2017
399
I'll just repost my explanation of crunch from last year's thread about crunch.

So, ex-AAA dev here with some feedback for those that actually want to change crunch practices.

1) Almost everyone crunches.

Most studios, especially in AAA, have crunch. In fact, out of the four different publishers I have worked for, every single one expected ALL studios under them to crunch to hit milestones/deadlines. And studios oblige because you don't want to lose incentives, bonuses, funding, or support staff. The list of studios who don't crunch - the list of products that are made 'crunch-free' is going to be unbelievably small if you are looking at AAA products. So if you plan to boycott products that are made in toxic work environments - it's going to be the vast majority of games. That's just how the industry is and boycotting isn't going to solve that.

Oh, and side note: People lie. Or exaggerate. Or downplay. I have had other developers in my own studio during crunch claim to not be crunching because we were only working 60-70 hours a week. Because their last studio worked 80+ during crunch. So this isn't crunch. Because we're in some toxic environment Olympics and shit ain't as bad as the worst experience I've ever had so...

Or, my personal favorite, when "We don't have crunch" actually means "We don't have mandatory crunch". Let me tell you about 'voluntary overtime'. It ain't voluntary. There are always punishments for not 'volunteering' to work extra hours during 'not crunch'. Either you start getting bad performance reviews from your bosses because it 'doesn't seem like you are putting in the extra effort'. Or you get left off emails or meetings out of spite. Or you get reassigned to some other part of the project that is less prestigious or more rudimentary, grunt work. Or you just straight up get demoted or fired. And what quickly happens is that you are bullied into either crunching (but 'not crunching') or pushed out of the company.

There are a lot of developers willing to publicly tow the company line that they 'don't crunch' because it's voluntary. Or their work environment isn't toxic because 'we have great benefits'. I have worked for some exceptionally shitty companies and every single one had developers willing to go in front of the media and proclaim just how awesome the studio and work environment were.
 

Quellyford

Banned
May 16, 2020
4,072
So if Jason's report comes out and says there was indeed crunch what then?

I feel like there is two sides in this thread. Those trying to downplay the idea of crunch and those trying to use this example as crunch. All of us have little information.

I will say. I do appreciate him being candid, but he opened up this pandoras box by being so open.
If Jason says there is crunch while this developer says there isn't, it'll just look like different people have different opinions on the work environment BUT it'll be hard to prove that there is a massive, deeply engrained issue with crunch at 343i when you have a dev putting his name on the line confirming there is no crunch, whereas Jason's article will only have comments one way or the other from anonymous sources, most likely.
 

lupumVigili

Member
Oct 27, 2020
198
We very rarely discuss specific solutions for the non-mandatory crunch.

Great video BTW, nice insights on game development in general.
 

thevid

Puzzle Master
Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,312
Right. I feel there is little a studio like 343 can do about voluntary crunch like this. Its really him just really grtting into his work, sounds like it at least.

Not that it's an issue for 343i, but speaking generally it's still up to studio management to reign things in if things get out of hand. This is what someone from Naughty Dog had to say about crunch over there.

"It's tough," Maximov said. "We definitely have not found the balance you guys [Bungie] have. We're very lucky to have the kind of people who actually have a passion that is so hard to control for us, because we don't have producers, we don't have dedicated management, it's all just an absolute free for all, but that empowers ownership to a level where you can say 'I really care about this thing'. For us that has been the price we have to pay.

"Crunch is never mandated at Naughty Dog," he added, "that's the one thing that will absolutely never happen. No one will ever tell you to stay late. But, people do it, because they absolutely believe they want or need to do this one thing."

For Naughty Dog, one of the issues is that they don't have producers and management to reign things in. That's why I think things get so bad over there even though they don't have "mandatory" crunch. Of course, management and the producers can also be the source of crunch. But it's also their responsibility to mitigate things as much as possible.
 

vixolus

Prophet of Truth
Member
Sep 22, 2020
55,787
Thanks for this. It sounds awful and beyond unsustainable. 60, 70, 80 hours a week?! It's UNFATHOMABLE to me. How do people make it through this?

Again, though, I seriously doubt this is a problem unique to the gaming industry.
It isn't. It's entertainment and law and business all over. My friend worked at a VFX house and made pennies for like 100 hour weeks bc weekends were included.
 

BIG J

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,313
Have people never worked on a deadline or been in the zone? Ya mismanagement happens but not always. A project can be perfectly managed and still have deadline pressures due to unforeseen circumstances.

Quit using Crunch so liberally. Downplayed actual shitty conditions
 

Dyashen

Member
Dec 20, 2017
5,189
Belgium
Already watched the video but man.. Can't think of what he went through and the possible anxiety spike that he has had. Hope he's doing better now. The last bit of the video is... kinda sad?
 

M.Bluth

Member
Oct 25, 2017
4,318
So if Jason's report comes out and says there was indeed crunch what then?

I feel like there is two sides in this thread. Those trying to downplay the idea of crunch and those trying to use this example as crunch. All of us have little information.

I will say. I do appreciate him being candid, but he opened up this pandoras box by being so open.
It does sound like he realized he'd get in trouble for being so open before tbh...
 

headspawn

Member
Oct 27, 2017
14,647
You can bet the people who ran with the story in bad faith yesterday will conveniently ignore the true story today.

It's funny how it turns out 343i doesn't have crunch, when people tried to run with it being really bad for crunch. Hmmm...

The one part of the second video that stuck out is he says that he went out of his way to personally contact some press and youtube content creators who ran the piece to offer up himself to give further context and heard back from NOBODY.
 

Loud Wrong

Member
Feb 24, 2020
14,529
The one part of the second video that stuck out is he says that he went out of his way to personally contact some press and youtube content creators who ran the piece to offer up himself to give further context and heard back from NOBODY.
"Nothing to see here" just doesn't generate the same amount of clicks.