Shit is crazy, a turnover rate like that is just not sustainable. Basic empathy and decency alone should warrant major changes for the good of the employees, but purely from a financial and business viewpoint you're just putting your business in jeopardy.
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Jason Schreier: As Naughty Dog Crunches On The Last Of Us II, Developers Wonder How Much Longer This Approach Can Last
- Thread starter Deleted member 8196
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No I don't but it is obvious that crunch only exists because of bad management.
Because a new employee costs more than a crunched employee. It's fucked up how little they care about their employees well being.
How nice of them encouraging you to take a break while they are pushing you to work 12-14 hour days to be a "team player"
It is absolutely possible to make (even successful!) games without the kind of crunch that companies like Rockstar or ND allegedly put their employees through.
It's not like they are saving lives with this work. It's entertainment, that's it. Stop making your workers lives miserable, ffs.
It was delayed, crunch still happens. This is a pattern that has been shown across multiple titles.
"Voluntarily". Of course they can't force them to work, but the implications are clear that it is required. It requires changes from the top in order to make a culture change like this.
No they don't "just do it anyway" they do it because company culture dictates it even without a specific written or verbal mandate. Union rules would prevent this.
It'll be gone when better labor laws are enacted.
Game developers will have to think twice about crunching if it means having to pay a lot of OT to their workers.
Game developers will have to think twice about crunching if it means having to pay a lot of OT to their workers.
Here's the problem: to the people concerned with money, a delay is really expensive, crunch is far less so. On a AAA game like this, a delay can cost millions in development costs, but those people are working on salary, so 12 hour days just cost the company an extra meal and maybe a few employees they have to replace who leave because of the crunch.
Then you come to the workers themselves, the people actually working those 12 hour shifts. They want to make the best game they can, and know that if they don't put in the time, the game will ship in a worse state, because it has the set milestone schedule. So many of them feel that they need to work the hours, even if it isn't required by management.
Then you come to the workers themselves, the people actually working those 12 hour shifts. They want to make the best game they can, and know that if they don't put in the time, the game will ship in a worse state, because it has the set milestone schedule. So many of them feel that they need to work the hours, even if it isn't required by management.
oh... well what happened to the days of when developers like Blizzard for example would say something to the effect of "it'll be done when it's done" and just leave it open ended? Announce the release date when the game is at a point where it can comfortably release without putting a strain on the dev team. Big budget franchises like The Last of Us and God of War etc sell a gazillion copies. They will make their money in the end..
10 years is really enough for a next gen game with no crunch?
RDR 2 had almost that.
I do hope game development gets a lot better in the next generation, the insane crunch is unsustainable. It'll come to a head at some point and either ND and other developers and publishers get proactive or their games will suffer. Nevermind the very real and human cost.
Sounds pretty similar to what was reported here but I could've sworn Druckmann said that ND wasn't crunching on this game:
cogconnected.com
Is Crunch Mandated at Naughty Dog? The Answer Is a Bit Complicated
According to several people who used to work at Naughty Dog and agreed to speak to COGconnected under the condition of anonymity, the reality of crunch at the studio is somewhat complicated.
cogconnected.com
Wait, people are outraged because of 12 hour days? 12 hour days is not unusual for MANY professional workers out there. That doesn't mean it's good, but some people need some perspective here. When there are deadlines in any industry, there is crunch. 12 hour days is not THAT bad. Or that unusual and definitely not unique to video game developers. It 100% sucks that this is a reality, but it is and people can and do change jobs if this lifestyle isn't for them.
If that were the case, ND wouldn't be crunching like mad right now.
"Yet there are also those developers, some of whom still work at Naughty Dog today, who say that there's a part of them that actually wishes this game would fail. A critical flop might help show Naughty Dog that this isn't the best way to make games, that this level of sacrifice isn't necessary, that maybe the project isn't worth losing all of these people."
Jesus. Hopefully the situation improves.
Jesus. Hopefully the situation improves.
Sure they don't ask you to crunch but when you're the one that doesn't do the time like the rest, who do you think isn't getting picked to work on the next project. People work their asses off to keep their job/promotions but most of the time burn themselves out.
I would hate to work in this field.
I would hate to work in this field.
This gen will have lasted 7 years and Naughty Dog only released two $60 retail games.
Crunch almost seems inevitable for the kind of games ND makes
Yep, its basically burning your future because you want the now. It is not even efficient as prolonged crunch has been systematically shown to be less efficient than normal work. They just take advantage of being the cool profession to burn through people without caring about the long term effects both in the studio culture and in the knowledge know-how.
The entirety of management in big studios needs to be taught proper software management techniques because they fucking dont understand anything about it.
For this to change you have to change the studio culture .
Which is much harder to do than anything else.
Which is much harder to do than anything else.
I see the release as in May, surely a few extra months means they can slow down.
This is what confuses me, they delay the game but still crunch? How much of a delay would this game need to ensure it is up to ND's own standards and that NO crunch is happening? 1 year? 2? Is the industry inherrently flawed with the need for quicker turnarounds than healthy game development time will allow?
Wrong. They already delayed it once and there is still crunch. Delay it again, that means more crunch.
This is true, people really forget what is indirect pressure. This is weird because this is what shape our life, mostly by society.
About union, this is partially true. We have big Union and big worker right in France (saddly, it tends to be weakened by politics), and the last devs who fight for their rights loses their jobs. I think they will go to trial about it but still. And I don't know if their professional reputation were impacted.
70% turnover?! They're lucky they're Naughty Dog and have an unsuspecting stream of devs wanting to work there all the time
This is why Jason confuses people.
kotaku.com
Video Game Delays Cause More Crunch
These days, most video game fans are sympathetic to delays. They recognize that more time makes for better games, and that game development is too complicated for anyone to accurately predict release dates very far in advance. So after a string of high-profile delays this week, including the...
kotaku.com
I'm all for unionizing but this isn't helping when the developers themselves are the ones pushing these long ours.
Not sony or naughty dog are demanding long hours. Even Amy Henning said so and she has no reason to lie for them.
Publishers and Studio Heads would have to send people home after 8 hour days but how is that realistic in any way or form?
Not sony or naughty dog are demanding long hours. Even Amy Henning said so and she has no reason to lie for them.
Publishers and Studio Heads would have to send people home after 8 hour days but how is that realistic in any way or form?
Anything more than a month or so of 12 hour days at the end of a project is inhumane. Worked them for two years and it crushes your soul
Sony literally adjusted down their forecast by hundreds of millions (revenue and operating profit) due in part to TLOU Part II delay to Q1 of the next fiscal year.
If they are crunching problems at Naughty Dog, that's mostly a Naughty Dog problem. Not because Sony was willing to delay the game by 3 months...
