Jason Schreier: As Naughty Dog Crunches On The Last Of Us II, Developers Wonder How Much Longer This Approach Can Last

liquidmetal14 · Mar 13, 2020

I had a situation at work just today where I offered to stay two hours but they wouldn't let me.

Like I said before, this is a more granular issue that is just a matter of hard-working people sometimes being forced to or pressure too or just driven to make the best product possible.

The thing that really needs to change the messaging and honestly the best managers are always the best communicators. That doesn't mean you don't need to be swift sometimes but you can be constructively critical while not sounding like a complete prick

this is the approach of the company that I work for that I want to change but I'm only one person and I realized that if you come to 100 developers maybe only three or four of them might have people that truly get it.

effin · Mar 13, 2020

Speaking as a game artist it's really easy to see how this stuff happens. I've crunched before in the past for an entire year cycle and it was absolutely awful, I cannot imagine mentally going through that again, and I honestly don't think I could.

Yet there's also the ambitious side of me that sees a studio like Naughty Dog and can't help but desperately want to work there and put up with the crunch just so I can get experience from other really talented artists, some of which are the best of the best. In my head I kind of justify it with a "hey, you can put up with a few years of crunch to be able to work in a studio like that and improve drastically".

Its a ridiculous mindset to have, especially knowing that going through crunch that bad again would absolutely destroy me. The sad part is I know many many artists who have a far greater level of ambition than I do and will put up with almost anything to see their ambitions realised (I can't speak to other professions mind you)

it's one of the reasons stuff like this is so hard to stamp out. Often if you're the type of artist who makes it to a studio like Naughty Dog, you have to be someone extremely ambitious and hard working in the first place. Meaning that as mentioned, you need both upper and middle management to ensure this kind of crunch doesn't happen. Crunch will almost always occur in creative endeavours, but it should be the exception and not the rule.

Polyh3dron · Mar 13, 2020

nDesh said:
Man, what being an exclusive means to this forum. The reactions in this thread are super tame compared to the RDR2 and CDP related threads.

keep up the good fight!

Nanashrew · Mar 13, 2020

nib95 said:
How so? I see more defending of Rockstars practices in the first few pages of said thread than in here.

Kotaku's Jason Schreier: Inside Rockstar Games' Culture Of Crunch

https://kotaku.com/inside-rockstar-games-culture-of-crunch-1829936466 Here's the story Jason has been working on the last weeks. Here's a sample: Adding more links to new articles, thanks hydrophilic attack Eurogamer...

www.resetera.com

I remember that thread. A lot of posts pissed me off and I made some pretty aggressive posts in there regarding how people were acting and their mentality regarding "passion".

texhnolyze · Mar 13, 2020

Arion said:

This needs to be bumped on every page.

Frost1800 · Mar 13, 2020

Well, when the reputation is too bad, and it becomes unsustainable. Maybe SIE can close the studio, and open a new Naughty Cat studio with key members from the old studio.

shimon · Mar 14, 2020

Grue · Mar 14, 2020

Arion said:

I feel like this got a little lost among the general discourse.

Sunshine is the best disinfectant. Personally I'm not expecting an industry-changing event any time soon; but we should support open journalism like this, highlight it when someone provides an expose, and remember change doesn't happen overnight -

- But won't happen at all if no-one is doing this work, or reading it.

Grue · Mar 14, 2020

shimon said:

Well there it is.

I refer to my previous post.

Iwao · Mar 14, 2020

People are going to continue to support games that are made under crunch conditions because articles like this promote discussion around how awful crunch is, only for a certain amount of time, and then it's not discussed anymore in any big way until the next article is written. So what happens is people actually don't care enough and will just want to play the games that have so much hard work and sacrifices put into making them. I suppose unionization will help stop this so that is the first step. The problem is that the developers are the ones choosing to work these hours because of the culture. These studios need to stop being so proud and not have practices that promote working under such conditions.

Thera · Mar 14, 2020

afternoon delight said:
No.

Cactuar said:
No. No it's not.

Yes it is, pure and simple. Only people who agree with capitalism doesn't see it (or wants too).
It is forced labour. That's modern slavery in a developped country.

Juan29.Zapata · Mar 14, 2020

Arion said:

Jason is one hell of a guy. Complete admiration. This reminds me I need to get on with reading his book.

Deleted member 37917 · Mar 14, 2020

Is it a problem more specific to Americanan development studios (even though I'm sure it can exist in other places)?

In my field (hard science), American academic laboratories are well known to have some crazy working schedules, lab meeting on Sunday morning and so on. As a postdoc, I even declined an offer to work with a star of my field and went to freaking Japan instead (which is telling...).
A friend of mine at Stanford was even put in a weird situation where he was supposed to "compete" against another postdoc from the same lab.

I'm sure that an industry where lots of money is involved such as videogames will often lead to companies having that sort of crunch culture, but I often get the impression that the American working culture as a whole is statistically more toxic than the European or even the Asian one, to compare with what I've experienced.

Naga · Mar 14, 2020

zakatana said:
Is it a problem more specific to Americanan development studios (even though I'm sure it can exist in other places)?

In my field (hard science), American academic laboratories are well known to have some crazy working schedules, lab meeting on Sunday morning and so on. As a postdoc, I even declined an offer to work with a star of my field and went to freaking Japan instead (which is telling...).
A friend of mine at Stanford was even put in a weird situation where he was supposed to "compete" against another postdoc from the same lab.

I'm sure that an industry where lots of money is involved such as videogames will often lead to companies having that sort of crunch culture, but I often get the impression that the American working culture as a whole is statistically more toxic than the European or even the Asian one, to compare with what I've experienced.

Yes, it happens more in american studios, partly due to lack of good labour laws, partly due to competition culture.
This was a big part of Japanese culture before, but they've improved a lot over the past gen or so.

Cactuar · Mar 14, 2020

Thera said:
Yes it is, pure and simple. Only people who agree with capitalism doesn't see it (or wants too).
It is forced labour. That's modern slavery in a developped country.

No. No it is not.

It is not slavery. It is not forced labor.

According to the ILO's Forced Labor Convention, forced or compulsory labor is all work or service which is exacted from any person under the threat of a penalty and for which the person has not offered himself or herself voluntarily. Forced labor can include forced sexual services.

How about you post some pictures of people working at Naughty Dog, and I post some pictures of slavery. We'll see if it's the same thing.

The Wraith · Mar 14, 2020

Schreier doing gods work. Without a doubt the best games journalist out there. Keep it up Jason.

ArkhamFantasy · Mar 14, 2020

zakatana said:
Is it a problem more specific to Americanan development studios (even though I'm sure it can exist in other places)?

In my field (hard science), American academic laboratories are well known to have some crazy working schedules, lab meeting on Sunday morning and so on. As a postdoc, I even declined an offer to work with a star of my field and went to freaking Japan instead (which is telling...).
A friend of mine at Stanford was even put in a weird situation where he was supposed to "compete" against another postdoc from the same lab.

I'm sure that an industry where lots of money is involved such as videogames will often lead to companies having that sort of crunch culture, but I often get the impression that the American working culture as a whole is statistically more toxic than the European or even the Asian one, to compare with what I've experienced.

This is not an american problem. Rockstar and CDPR are 2 of the worst offenders and japanese workers in general are notorious workaholics. Sakurai just hospitalized himself.

It varies by developer, Insomniac and Media Molecule have much healthier work cultures than Naughty Dog despite being less successful and under the same publisher.

Insomniacs management is just incredible.

Lyng · Mar 14, 2020

ArkhamFantasy said:
This is not an american problem. Rockstar and CDPR are 2 of the worst offenders and japanese workers in general are notorious workaholics. Sakurai just hospitalized himself.

It varies by developer, Insomniac and Media Molecule have much healthier work cultures than Naughty Dog despite being less successful and under the same publisher.

Insomniacs management is just incredible.

Yeah. It very much depens on the countries labor laws, and even within the EU they vary a lot.

James Sawyer Ford · Mar 14, 2020

Most industries involve periods of crunch and long hours to get a product released. Don't know why people are shocked when it happens in video games.

Many love their craft and are willing to put in the hours to make a great product. I don't see it as a bad thing.

ThisIsBlitz21 · Mar 14, 2020

zakatana said:
Is it a problem more specific to Americanan development studios (even though I'm sure it can exist in other places)?

Japan is arguably worse with their work culture, but theyre less documented by the western media.

It's a problem that exists everywhere tho.

ArkhamFantasy · Mar 14, 2020

James Sawyer Ford said:
Most industries involve periods of crunch and long hours to get a product released. Don't know why people are shocked when it happens in video games.

Many love their craft and are willing to put in the hours to make a great product. I don't see it as a bad thing.

They lost SEVENTY PERCENT of UC4s designers. What are they going to do when there isnt enough young talent to exploit anymore? Its short term profit at the expensive of long term sustainability.

That obviously doesn't even cover the moral issues with working people 80-120 hours a week for months or years on end, which is obviously not normal.

James Sawyer Ford · Mar 14, 2020

ArkhamFantasy said:
They lost SEVENTY PERCENT of UC4s designers. What are they going to do when there isnt enough young talent to exploit anymore? Its short term profit at the expensive of long term sustainability.

That obviously doesn't even cover the moral issues with working people 80-120 hours a week for months or years on end, which is obviously not normal.

I don't think this necessarily has anything to do with management at ND being concerned with profit.

I think it's a cultural problem and has more to do with building generational defining games that raise the bar.

If the turnover rate is truly that high, it does seem like an issue, but I'm not part of ND's management. Maybe the way ND works is having a team filled with core, strong leads while lower level employees that are fungible to a certain extent.

It may not be efficient, but it's the only way they've found to operate a studio with such high standards, and those that can't keep up eventually burn out and leave

There are a lot of jobs like this where the attrition rate is very high due to the nature of the work. The reality is that most great works simply require complete devotion to the craft.

ArkhamFantasy · Mar 14, 2020

James Sawyer Ford said:
I don't think this necessarily has anything to do with management at ND being concerned with profit.

I think it's a cultural problem and has more to do with building generational defining games that raise the bar.

If the turnover rate is truly that high, it does seem like an issue, but I'm not part of ND's management. Maybe the way ND works is having a team filled with core, strong leads while lower level employees that are fungible to a certain extent.

It may not be efficient, but it's the only way they've found to operate a studio with such high standards, and those that can't keep up eventually burn out and leave

There are a lot of jobs like this where the attrition rate is very high due to the nature of the work. The reality is that most great works simply require complete devotion to the craft.

They literally lost their game director, what are they going to do if they lose neil too?

Do you think those 2 can be replaced by 20 year olds? Id highly doubt it.

James Sawyer Ford · Mar 14, 2020

ArkhamFantasy said:
They literally lost their game director, what are they going to do if they lose neil too?

Do you think those 2 can be replaced by 20 year olds? Id highly doubt it.

Bruce was gone for a while

If 30% of the studio is still there, then one of them will step up or they can hire an external candidate

Like I said, I'm not necessarily agreeing with their management approach, but it's probably a result of their pedigree. If they don't have projects run like this then the quality suffers and in the meantime they haven't found a better way to deal with the situation while retaining their high standards

Deleted member 37917 · Mar 14, 2020

ThisIsBlitz21 said:
Japan is arguably worse with their work culture, but theyre less documented by the western media.

It's a problem that exists everywhere tho.

I cannot talk about sectors which I do not know, but when it comes to my field (I've lived 8 years in Japan and worked in 3 different universities/research centers), the Japanese researchers have a much better work-life balance than their American counterparts. It may be different in the private sector, but from what I've seen, things are changing fast.

Deleted member 57361 · Mar 14, 2020

ArkhamFantasy said:
They literally lost their game director, what are they going to do if they lose neil too?

Do you think those 2 can be replaced by 20 year olds? Id highly doubt it.

What they always did. Replace him. You can already see that TLoU 2 has two co-directors. ND works in a way that makes people grow and gain experience. Neil, for example, started there as a gameplay programmer before direct a game.

Deleted member 12833 · Mar 14, 2020

James Sawyer Ford said:
Most industries involve periods of crunch and long hours to get a product released. Don't know why people are shocked when it happens in video games.

Many love their craft and are willing to put in the hours to make a great product. I don't see it as a bad thing.

Yea, it always surprising when I see such a fuss made here. I've never worked at a place where there wasn't some type of crunch.

ArkhamFantasy · Mar 14, 2020

Tofer said:
Yea, it always surprising when I see such a fuss made here. I've never worked at a place where there wasn't some type of crunch.

Show me what data you're looking at that shows 80-120 hour workweeks for months on end as "normal".

Because the 40 hour work week is pretty widely recognized in America, and its usually better in other countries, or at least have much better PTO.

James Sawyer Ford · Mar 14, 2020

ArkhamFantasy said:
Show me what data you're looking at that shows 80-120 hour workweeks for months on end as "normal".

Because the 40 hour work week is pretty widely recognized in America, and its usually better in other countries, or at least have much better PTO.

Certain professions require this commitment

- Surgeons
- Investment banking / management consulting
- Lawyers at big firms
- Engineers / Software devs
- Big 4 Accountant

Again, it's even going to vary with one company to another. Don't like being a software dev at Amazon due to the hours and stress? Work somewhere else

Most of these professions simply demand a big commitment, but people can lateral to a different line of work that requires less hours if it's not for them

ND is one of the world's premier studios, it should not be a shock that they have an enormous work ethic to develop ground breaking titles. Can't keep that up? Then move on. It's ND's decision to press their employees this hard, and most gladly do it because they love the work

There are other studios that have a more normal work pace, but they aren't creating ND tier titles

kiaaa · Mar 14, 2020

James Sawyer Ford said:
Certain professions require this commitment

- Surgeons
- Investment banking / management consulting
- Lawyers at big firms
- Engineers / Software devs
- Big 4 Accountant

Again, it's even going to vary with one company to another. Don't like being a software dev at Amazon due to the hours and stress? Work somewhere else

Most of these professions simply demand a big commitment, but people can lateral to a different line of work that requires less hours if it's not for them

ND is one of the world's premier studios, it should not be a shock that they have an enormous work ethic to develop ground breaking titles. Can't keep that up? Then move on. It's ND's decision to press their employees this hard, and most gladly do it because they love the work

There are other studios that have a more normal work pace, but they aren't creating ND tier titles

Those jobs you listed usually compensate employees very well. Game dev does not.

darfox8 · Mar 14, 2020

James Sawyer Ford said:
Certain professions require this commitment

- Surgeons
- Investment banking / management consulting
- Lawyers at big firms
- Engineers / Software devs
- Big 4 Accountant

Again, it's even going to vary with one company to another. Don't like being a software dev at Amazon due to the hours and stress? Work somewhere else

Most of these professions simply demand a big commitment, but people can lateral to a different line of work that requires less hours if it's not for them

ND is one of the world's premier studios, it should not be a shock that they have an enormous work ethic to develop ground breaking titles. Can't keep that up? Then move on. It's ND's decision to press their employees this hard, and most gladly do it because they love the work

There are other studios that have a more normal work pace, but they aren't creating ND tier titles

Personally feel there's a HUGE difference between those jobs you listed and being some contractor working on animation(not to mention the pay which I'm ignorant on but I'd be shocked if they aren't multiple times that of a contractor at ND). Like nearly all those rolls you mentioned are extremely important to the powers that be in those companies. Also those jobs you listed are usually at the height of their career path doing the work they trained and studied to do. The bosses would be screwed if just one of them was angry or disgruntled. With game dev you just replace them with someone younger and less beaten down. It's not a smart way to build an industry.

James Sawyer Ford · Mar 14, 2020

kiaaa said:
Those jobs you listed usually compensate employees very well. Game dev does not.

Game devs at ND are pretty well compensated from what I understand

There are other examples of professions with long hours and lower pay (certain teachers, etc)

James Sawyer Ford · Mar 14, 2020

darfox8 said:
Personally feel there's a HUGE difference between those jobs you listed and being some contractor working on animation(not to mention the pay which I'm ignorant on but I'd be shocked if they aren't multiple times that of a contractor at ND). Like nearly all those rolls you mentioned are extremely important to the powers that be in those companies. Also those jobs you listed are usually at the height of their career path doing the work they trained and studied to do. The bosses would be screwed if just one of them was angry or disgruntled. With game dev you just replace them with someone younger and less beaten down. It's not a smart way to build an industry.

Most of that work you mention is already outsourced to foreign companies

I can assure you that devs at ND are all there for a reason and have great portfolios or credentials

darfox8 · Mar 14, 2020

James Sawyer Ford said:
Most of that work you mention is already outsourced to foreign companies

I can assure you that devs at ND are all there for a reason and have great portfolios or credentials

Most of the work YOU mentioned is outsourced? I don't understand what you are comparing then...

Ayirek · Mar 14, 2020

Tofer said:
Yea, it always surprising when I see such a fuss made here. I've never worked at a place where there wasn't some type of crunch.

Has anyone ever had to go to the hospital from exhaustion at any of these places? Occasional overtime vs months of 12 hour+ days 6 or 7 days a week aren't the same.

Venuslulu · Mar 14, 2020

James Sawyer Ford said:
Most industries involve periods of crunch and long hours to get a product released. Don't know why people are shocked when it happens in video games.

Many love their craft and are willing to put in the hours to make a great product. I don't see it as a bad thing.

Why are we ok with people getting hospitalized due to crunch. Why are other studios making similarly level scaled games and have a structure in place to avoid prolonged crunch with producer roles.

Those other professions have systematic problems on how it's set up to and needs to be changed, and people in those industries know it.

I've worked multiple jobs that required crunch, and the same job at another company on competing product and didn't. I really don't see how "passion" solves everything.

Deleted member 1726 · Mar 14, 2020

Situation sound absolutely horrible, I guess that's the price of this sort of success without further delays. I'd be happy for a delay if it meant less of those work hours and happier mental health of game developers involved with these marquee franchises.

Not specifically crunch time but when I started as a web developer I'd been there two months and my boss said to me "mark (not his real name) has done 14 hours overtime this month, you haven't don't any, really need to start seeing some overtime being put in" I was pretty fucking annoyed because I was getting my work in work hours without the need to stay and i would've purposely been going slow during the day just to put in overtime to "please him" that I was doing OT.

James Sawyer Ford · Mar 14, 2020

raitosaito said:
Why are we ok with people getting hospitalized due to crunch. Why are other studios making similarly level scaled games and have a structure in place to avoid prolonged crunch with producer roles.

Those other professions have systematic problems on how it's set up to and needs to be changed, and people in those industries know it.

I've worked multiple jobs that required crunch, and the same job at another company on competing product and didn't. I really don't see how "passion" solves everything.

How is what ND does not a systematic issue?

There's no bounds to how good a Videogame can be.

If a studio wants to be a top tier studio it's not the same as making equivalent products at two different companies. There isn't a competing product to "we bout to redefine AAA"

Tora · Mar 14, 2020

Daffy Duck said:
Situation sound absolutely horrible, I guess that's the price of this sort of success without further delays. I'd be happy for a delay if it meant less of those work hours and happier mental health of game developers involved with these marquee franchises.

Not specifically crunch time but when I started as a web developer I'd been there two months and my boss said to me "mark (not his real name) has done 14 hours overtime this month, you haven't don't any, really need to start seeing some overtime being put in" I was pretty fucking annoyed because I was getting my work in work hours without the need to stay and i would've purposely been going slow during the day just to put in overtime to "please him" that I was doing OT.

Shit boss, sorry to hear man.

The difference a manager makes to the enjoyment of your job is insane lol

Deleted member 1726 · Mar 14, 2020

Tora said:
Shit boss, sorry to hear man.

The difference a manager makes to the enjoyment of your job is insane lol

he was certainly an odd one, he never saw the value people did unless there was x amount of hours OT clocked per month on their timesheet. You could've done the best website ever, but he wouldn't be bothered. He was also the owner of said company.

if it was my company I would be asking why people need to do so much overtime every month to get work done and what could be done to combat it. it wasn't like we were a horrendously busy studio.

Neo Ankh · Mar 14, 2020

Until workers unite and leverage their bargaining power this will continue. Conditions like this point to a giant failure in leadership. "Well it's always been like this..." is a pathetic excuse brought about by incompetence.

Garrett 2U · Mar 14, 2020

James Sawyer Ford said:
Most industries involve periods of crunch and long hours to get a product released. Don't know why people are shocked when it happens in video games.

Many love their craft and are willing to put in the hours to make a great product. I don't see it as a bad thing.

You should read the thread.
This isn't about some people volunteering to put in a couple extra hours to make a great product.

Superking · Mar 14, 2020

But with 70% of the designers who worked on Uncharted 4 now gone

SEVENTY PERCENT?

TLOU2 might has well be a completely different game :O

James Sawyer Ford · Mar 14, 2020

Garrett 2U said:
You should read the thread.
This isn't about some people volunteering to put in a couple extra hours to make a great product.

It isn't? Nobody is being forced to work at naughty dog

Arthands · Mar 14, 2020

Oblivion said:
SEVENTY PERCENT?

TLOU2 might has well be a completely different game :O

Safe to say most people who worked on the previous game has left

James Sawyer Ford said:
It isn't? Nobody is being forced to work at naughty dog

ND is having both issues. Crunch AND people quitting.

ToddBonzalez · Mar 14, 2020

Oblivion said:
SEVENTY PERCENT?

TLOU2 might has well be a completely different game :O

Designers, not employees. Design ie one department among several. We don't know what to the overall turnover rate was.

WordsintheWater · Mar 14, 2020

Arion said:

This is good to see.

Era of not Yakuza · Mar 14, 2020

dtraposo said:
This is just...so transparently petty

Imitation Of Life · Mar 14, 2020

The era of Luigi said:

He defending the staff Cooper threw under the bus. Which he has since apologized about albeit halfheartedly.

Arthands · Mar 14, 2020

James Sawyer Ford said:
Certain professions require this commitment

- Surgeons
- Investment banking / management consulting
- Lawyers at big firms
- Engineers / Software devs
- Big 4 Accountant

Again, it's even going to vary with one company to another. Don't like being a software dev at Amazon due to the hours and stress? Work somewhere else

Most of these professions simply demand a big commitment, but people can lateral to a different line of work that requires less hours if it's not for them

ND is one of the world's premier studios, it should not be a shock that they have an enormous work ethic to develop ground breaking titles. Can't keep that up? Then move on. It's ND's decision to press their employees this hard, and most gladly do it because they love the work

There are other studios that have a more normal work pace, but they aren't creating ND tier titles

An enormous work ethic wouldn't make decision and then not informing the relevant employees. That's work sabotage to manipulate people into crunch culture.

Worst of all for some of Naughty Dog's developers were the times when a high-level decision might lead to their work being scrapped without them even knowing it. An artist might be working on a building in The Last of Us II's post-disaster version of America without realizing that their scene was cut or overhauled. They might not find out for days or even weeks, leading to hours and hours of wasted work—a demoralizing feeling compounded by the other stresses of production.

Jason Schreier: As Naughty Dog Crunches On The Last Of Us II, Developers Wonder How Much Longer This Approach Can Last

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The Pyramids? That's nothing compared to RDR2