That makes total sense actually and basically mirrors my own profession. The reason I made doubly sure to put emphasis on being an outsider looking in, one always misses the finer points without first-hand knowledge.
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Jason Schreier: Video Game Delays Cause More Crunch
- Thread starter Atheerios
- Start date
That makes total sense actually and basically mirrors my own profession. The reason I made doubly sure to put emphasis on being an outsider looking in, one always misses the finer points without first-hand knowledge.
Ughhhhhhhhhhhh.....
Fuck this fucking industry and fuck it for ruining my dreams so much
Software development doesn't work that way. Additional manpower is only helpful up to a certain point after which it's detrimental.
Keep in mind that these people are all working on one product. Imagine you have a shift of 10 people working on just one system, they finish work and go home. The people from second shift come in and continue work where the first shift left and try to solve some issues. However they solved it in a way the people from first shift do not like or do not understand, or it messes up the plans first shift had in mind. But they wouldn't know about it until they come into work the next day. And if they change things again then the people from second shift will start to have issues....etc etc.
I mean look at the very first post of this topic and the replies that quoted it lol.
The key phrase in my post being "as if" not that they literally say it's a magic bullet.
Because people really think it's that simple. Both of my parents are in Unions, and while they do help, it doesn't fix everything.
lol, I love when studio heads try to call crunch by anything but its name. My favorite is "rallying"--"Hey guys, we need to rally tonight."
This is why I love working in the GaaS/live-ops space. Crunch is rare and deadlines are fluid because you've already got steady income. If your feature slips a date, another feature from a different team takes its place, or the product managers will schedule sales and events to make up for the lost revenue. It's a very healthy work environment.
Calling for Unionizing means calling for better conditions. Magic Bullets don't exist. But clear improvements to current conditions do. Unionizing is one of those improvements. Negotiationg power of devs is incredibly unbalanced low.
Because for years, especially in the United States, the right have managed to demonize and minimize the role of unions in order to better exploit the worker.
It's almost as if people are just now realizing what capitalism is. Delays are still a good thing for the product, but there's no way in hell the higher ups are doing it to give a helping hand to employees. Their doing it because they need the quality there, which means more work.
As I've already said on that other thread:
It doesnt matter how many workers you have, or the time you have to finish the game, because it will never be finish.Not a project as ambitious as this.
Rockstar had 8 years, thousand of workers, and they still crunched.
As games become more and more complex, one does not simply "finish" the development of the game. They'll just just release it, knowing that they will have to continue working on it after launch for months to come, patching bugs and glitches. And even STILL, the game will have bugs, glitches and etc.
They are trying to set a new standart for open world games. Heck, for gaming in general. There is no other way to achieve that if not by blood and tears.
And because of their sacrifices, I have all the respect in the world for them.
It doesnt matter how many workers you have, or the time you have to finish the game, because it will never be finish.Not a project as ambitious as this.
Rockstar had 8 years, thousand of workers, and they still crunched.
As games become more and more complex, one does not simply "finish" the development of the game. They'll just just release it, knowing that they will have to continue working on it after launch for months to come, patching bugs and glitches. And even STILL, the game will have bugs, glitches and etc.
They are trying to set a new standart for open world games. Heck, for gaming in general. There is no other way to achieve that if not by blood and tears.
And because of their sacrifices, I have all the respect in the world for them.
So much of it is management, professionalism, and company culture.
When I was in engineering, all the guys we hired who used to code for gaming companies said those jobs were too.....bro-y? EG I know Riot Games mandates you stop working and play League and they even have someone whose whole job is introducing members of different teams to each other to play LoL.
Whereas in the corporate world of software engineering, we just did a normal amount of code a day, shot the shit when it was break time, got our work done, and went home by 5 every day.
If your company "needs" to crunch, it's because the project was poorly planned from the beginning, or it was properly planned and the plan wasn't followed. There are no third options.
I work in project managing for large-scale construction projects and it's basically a similar idea in some ways. The way I understand what you're saying is that essentially you can't just throw more people at the project because they don't have the accumulated prior knowledge and insight, yeah?
Okay.
I prefer that there is no such "new standard" and that they can live as human beings.
I understand your point of view
I preffer to earn less money and have time with my family than to spend most of my time at work.
But not everyone has our mindset
CDPR and its employees are trying to raise the bar
Pretty much every masterpiece in history is the result of overworking, blood and tears
Yea. Because it's one single product and having many people working on it doesn't necessarily lead to more productivity. It should be the same on any engineering project.
You believe that, I believe that precisely CDPR uses arguments like that to emotionally manipulate its workers and earn money at the expense of the health of its employees.
CD Project aren't based in America though, and even then, I'm not sure that a bunch of very talented people would not do something that would benefit them so much just because of 'the right'.
Jason sure is comfortable being a wet blanket and a gadfly. Not saying it's bad but damn I imagine he gets some nasty messages.
yup
It's not going to magically fix everything, but it is the fucking prerequisite to an acceptable future.
Of course it happens. If you have been told a thousand and several times throughout your life that unions are useless and only bad for the worker, you can't think that they have been lying to you.
He's not wrong. Most producers in my experience will plan overtime into their scheduling, and if the deadline gets extended, all of a sudden extra stuff gets added to your task list. Game devs, once you've cut your teeth on AAA or mobile, make a move to a smaller studio. They are so much better to work for in my experience
Unionizing versus not unionizing is one of those things where I am always in the middle and I change my mind on how I feel about it all the time. It's difficult to say that unionizing is perfect and visa versa.
That's a novel take on the subject of GaaS games, for me at least. Never thought about it from the designers' perspective.
I'm sorry but I'm not convinced. Your suggestion is that these talented developers have been fooled by right-wing propaganda into thinking that unions are bad for the worker, but we armchair analysts on Era are too smart to fall for it and we know better?
I'm just saying - if it really is that simple and would be so effective, it would have been done long ago. These are not new problems after all.
Like I said, I'd love for it to happen. I just see the old guard having too much sway.
At this rate every game I buy will have been made by treating someone like dirt.
GTA is a household name which means it gets more mainstream attention.
GTA is a household name which means it gets more mainstream attention.
Unionization is an option, but more broadly the industry needs to ditch the ridiculous one-two punch of over-hyped and overwrought game announcements and obsessive secrecy. Had CDPR just done a lengthy trailer at E3 instead of the whole Keanu Reeves/ April launch date shenanigans no one would be the wiser about a delay right now. It would still be "when it's done." It might completely eliminate crunch but would hopefully defuse it a bit.
What's the solution? Downgrade the scope of the game and possibly disappoint in reviews? I've heard hiring more staff isn't always the answer. Delaying much longer is probably the answer as long as you control the development creep. But the competition is fierce. Developing a new IP is a make or break situation sometimes for a company. The risk is real. I'd argue if there is decent profit sharing and benefits at a company "crunch" might be something employees Are ok with. Enough incentives and pride in the product they will want to work more.
i tottaly agree.
i don't enjoy my most loved hobby anymore knowing the price people paid to make it.
Sometimes I wonder if all the people yelling for a Union have ever actually been a part of one.
Sure sometimes they make things better but my personal experience is that they usually fuck things up more than they make them better heh.
Sure sometimes they make things better but my personal experience is that they usually fuck things up more than they make them better heh.
At this point, if these people with a specific skill that is not easily replaced don't unionize, I can't help them.
Game devs remind me of pro wrestlers in that they have a dream of working in their chosen industry because they've loved it since childhood, so despite the fact that they've worked long and hard to develop unique skills that are not easily replaceable, they don't unionize because they just feel grateful to be there.
The regular raises that I've gotten that are tied to (the rapidly rising) COLA, my health and dental care, and the rights that I have as a contract worker in my field are all because of my union, so...yeah, I'm rolling with "they basically make things better," again in my experience.
Game devs remind me of pro wrestlers in that they have a dream of working in their chosen industry because they've loved it since childhood, so despite the fact that they've worked long and hard to develop unique skills that are not easily replaceable, they don't unionize because they just feel grateful to be there.
The regular raises that I've gotten that are tied to (the rapidly rising) COLA, my health and dental care, and the rights that I have as a contract worker in my field are all because of my union, so...yeah, I'm rolling with "they basically make things better," again in my experience.
No, it makes sense.
Cyberpunk devs were going to crunch now through April. With the delay, they're crunching now through September. They've added more months of crunch in the devs lives.
Oh my god. Stop being tight asses and do what we do in manufacturing: have multiple shifts and stay open 24/7 if its all that. If the millionaire asshole rockstar dev wants to work 18 hour days, let him. Have three crews on 8 hour shifts and let people have a life outside of work. Something has to give.
This industry seems to exploit passionate, talented people and it is bullshit. I don't know how you people that work in this field put up with that.
This industry seems to exploit passionate, talented people and it is bullshit. I don't know how you people that work in this field put up with that.
From a macro sense, in order to get rid of crunch, a company has to adjust their output expectations and give longer windows without fear of repercussions. As others have mentioned, you can only have so many cooks in the kitchen before you get diminishing returns. The problem is that you have to get shareholders and bosses to go longer without getting a return on their investment.
Ideally your earlier products continue to make money and bring in a steady cash flow that will allow ample time for R&D as you prepare your next product for release. The problem is that it appears in the current AAA environment, the model is unsustainable without heavy crunch at most studios.
Downgrading the scope of your game and expectations is always an option, but that risks upsetting your market who generally want something bigger and better than the last game they played.
Obviously there is always compensation as a way to help make the crunch "worth it", but with labor laws in most of the US, a lot of employees can be locked out of overtime if salaried.
Being the good soldier and coming in for overtime is natural for this industry. For most of them, this is their passion. Not to mention that many of them don't know if they're going to be retained for the next job.
I know of a games developer that does this, and still does crunch. So... nope, still not the solution.
It always blows my mind that the development time of Final Fantasy VII was only around one year. And that was considered a massive game.
Remember when everyone said it'd be better if Pokemon delayed itself so they could have all the Pokémon and also avoid crunching?
Funny about that.
Funny about that.
They do?
Maybe I'm imagining it, but I could swear when article or thread is discussing crunch culture it's about CDPR most of the time while companies like R* or Naughty Dog usually don't get talked about in that context as much.
That said R* got deserved heat for cracking crop hard and driving crunch for RDR2.
Also CDPR leadership deserve heat for not being able to uphold what they talked about crunch last Summer.
I feel like some developers do that already (nonchalantly). Those little message that come with the game saying that "they worked very hard on this game" or that thank you page by Rockstar for the completion of RDR2. Obviously no crunch mention, but I'd like to think that they're way of saying "we almost killed ourselves making this one, thanks for buying it!" without being obvious.