[PCGamer] The pressure to constantly update games is pushing the industry to a breaking point

[dex3108]

In 2004, the partner of an EA employee wrote about the conditions her significant other was working under during a particularly brutal crunch period. He worked 9 am to 10 pm seven days a week, "with the occasional Saturday evening off for good behavior." No overtime pay or other compensation. No deadline for when this would end.

He was not alone, and subsequently others spoke out about similar conditions. There were class-action lawsuits, which EA chose to settle for millions of dollars. In the 15 years since, the conversation about crunch in the games industry has spread beyond whisper networks and isolated exposés, becoming much more common. Developers have been emboldened to speak out about conditions at other employers, from Rockstar to Telltale to NetherRealm. But crunch remains a serious problem.

Recently, another story has become intertwined with crunch: Developers aren't just being worked into the ground to hit a development milestone or a release date, because for many games that's just the starting line. Living games demand a constant stream of content, and only constant work can deliver it.

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https://www.pcgamer.com/amp/the-pre...s-is-pushing-the-industry-to-a-breaking-point


Interesting article by PCGamer and I think that many of us noticed trend long time ago. More and more games are becoming GaaS and neither developers or market can't sustain constant influx of them.

Over the years consumers were slowly trained to stay with the game longer and longer so more money could be earned from same release. And now that is slowly starting to backfire and consumers are now starting to demand more and more content for same release. And answer is pushing developers to do more.

And we don't need to look far to see where all of this is going. It is enough to look at YouTube personalities and Twitch streamers in past 10 years to see how many of them just simply got sick of it and abandoned their work.

 

[ProstatePuncher]

Checking the comments on any single Apex Legends tweet, Youtube upload or otherwise shows ravening hordes of idiots screaming for new content. Its absolutely maddening because they don't get the pipeline behind new content, and how it crushes companies.

Suppose "back in the day", there were so many hobbyist modders making stuff for games like Counter Strike, there was always something new and novel, even if it was entirely untested and shite. I kind of miss those days of UGC.

 

[Dreams-Visions]

Yes, people are insatiable and consumerism is rarely self-checked.

 

[dex3108]

Checking the comments on any single Apex Legends tweet, Youtube upload or otherwise shows ravening hordes of idiots screaming for new content. Its absolutely maddening because they don't get the pipeline behind new content, and how it crushes companies.

Suppose "back in the day", there were so many hobbyist modders making stuff that for games like Counter Strike, there was always something new and novel, even if it was entirely untested and shite. I kind of miss those days of UGC.

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As I said people are being trained to expect constant influx of content. Fortnite is prime example of really aggressive update schedule. And because it is popular people now expect other companies to do the same.

 

[Deleted member 36578]

It's so funny because I'm still kicking it old school. I love buying games, beating the crap out of them, and moving on to the next. I very rarely go back to new content, dlc or expansions with anything. I do not expect devs to keep adding things to the games I buy because I'm the type to purchase multiple games a year. Even the games I play 1000 hours of (monster Hunter, path of Exile) I'm just grinding out the content that's already there not asking for anything new to be added. To each their own. I feel bad for the game devs who feel the need to become a games as service model developer to survive.

I just wanted to add i realize path of Exile is a weird example since the game is straight up games as a service. But I only used it as an example because there's so much damn content already they could've stopped years ago and I'd still be playing. From what I understand however they are one development studio that really figured it out and learned to run things properly using a one game service model for many many years.

 

[norwegiandude86]

They ain't wrong and the games as a service model being embraced by every big developer, is the reason especially after what happened to the epic devs regarding Fornite the worst offender but who knows there may be others as well.

Game devs needs to unionize no human being should be treated the way these devs have been worked to exhaustion that has caused mental health problems and if they take a day off they are replaced.

 

[ArkhamFantasy]

Good thing about GaaS is that it keeps the game in development and delays or lessens layoffs, bad thing is that some studios constantly crunch to keep the game updated as frequently as possible.

Devs kind of lose either way.

 

[Chopchop]

I don't work in the game industry, but I can say that in software, pushing out a release every two weeks or so is a fucking insanely fast release schedule.

Between the planning, development, testing, bug fixing, and so on, you have everyone working their asses off at a grueling pace. The devs and QA people get the worst of it.

Making people do something like that continuously with no end in sight is just plain running your workers to death.

 

[Sky87]

I feel like mod support would help with this. If the community could make maps for Battlefield 5 for example, you'd have more people playing and less complaining about a lack of content i think.

Obviously, this is harder for games like Anthem and Fortnite.

 

[LinkStrikesBack]

As I said people are being trained to expect constant influx of content. Fortnite is prime example of really aggressive update schedule. And because it is popular people now expect other companies to do the same.

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Make no mistake, Fortnite and games like it deliberately want the incredibly aggressive update schedules at the expense of their employees, not to make a better game , but to cut off the business of any company who can't keep their pace. Probably preaching to the choir here though.

 

[True Prophecy]

I like quite a few GAAS titles but I have to admit I was under the naive notion that the developers where not killing themselves to make it work.

I know there are many reasons things have ended up like this and I never thought every game needs to be this model but clearly we as consumers need to consider the humans involved.

I do wonder how much this happens across other mediums but I guess there is nothing quite like games with content demands.

 

[dex3108]

Make no mistake, Fortnite and games like it deliberately want the incredibly aggressive update schedules at the expense of their employees, not to make a better game , but to cut off the business of any company who can't keep their pace. Probably preaching to the choir here though.

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I know the reason. And I was wondering long before Epic crunch story how the hell it is possible for them to release multiple patches sometimes on the same day, let alone weekly updates. Their update schedule is insane.

 

[Asbsand]

If there ever was an incentive to stop selling games as a service and instead as a goods...

 

[lt519]

Make no mistake, Fortnite and games like it deliberately want the incredibly aggressive update schedules at the expense of their employees, not to make a better game , but to cut off the business of any company who can't keep their pace. Probably preaching to the choir here though.

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This is exactly it and why they don't rely on User Generated Content, that is always on a slower schedule.

 

[Lant_War]

Reminds me of when Ubisoft announced they were taking a break in adding content for Siege for 1 season (3 months) to work on the netcode, fix bugs and stuff and the whole community had a meltdown.

 

[PeakPointMatrix]

There needs to be a main development team for the key game, and the GaaS support team for the subsequent content. This system is ridiculous.

 

[PeakPointMatrix]

Reminds me of when Ubisoft announced they were taking a break in adding content for Siege for 1 season (3 months) to work on the netcode, fix bugs and stuff and the whole community had a meltdown.

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Anthem did the same, since those poor devs were probably near-death at that point. Look how people danced on their grave then too.

 

[dex3108]

There needs to be a main development team for the key game, and the GaaS support team for the subsequent content. This system is ridiculous.

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Some companies operate like that. And those are mostly SP games like AC Odyssey. But when your whole game is designed and meant to be updated constantly you can't do that. Those are games like Fortnite, R6 Siege, Dota 2...

 

[lt519]

There needs to be a main development team for the key game, and the GaaS support team for the subsequent content. This system is ridiculous.

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That is how games with expected sequels are structured (Anthem, Division, Destiny) but Fortnite is a different beast. Those other games, while GaaS, are completely different than the live approach of Fortnite. It's almost two separate categories tbh.

 

[HockeyBird]

I know the reason. And I was wondering long before Epic crunch story how the hell it is possible for them to release multiple patches sometimes on the same day, let alone weekly updates. Their update schedule is insane.

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I wouldn't be surprised if Epic short cuts a lot the development process like play testing and bug fixing. Their game doesn't need to be balanced, just have something consistently new. And if there is something that fundamentally hurts the flow of the game, then Epic has conditioned its playerbase to put up with it because they know Epic will upend the meta game within a few weeks at most.

 

[Velocity:Design:Comfort]

There needs to be a main development team for the key game, and the GaaS support team for the subsequent content. This system is ridiculous.

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The fact that people think this is part of the problem. Every game out by major publishers is already structured this way and they are always hiring, but it takes a long time to train and find the right people, and even then, there is less productivity per additional worker quickly.

Hiring more people doesn't mean the earlier employees ever work less. Epic has 1000s of devs but still have brutal schedules.

 

[Imitatio]

Well, I don't see how the industry won't collapse over the next decade at its current pace. Technical expectations will rise again with the new gen, developing will become even more expensive and devs will have to do even more crunch to meet deadlines, support ongoing GAAS, etc.

Overall I feel like the entire industry is really choosing the wrong way for its future, at least in the AAA space.
There's only so much you can accomplish without something changing drastically. And the aspect I see changing quite drastically is the one that involves the people behind the whole dev cycle. What else is supposed to change? Just don't see big publishers slowing down with their aggressive technological and money related push. Bigger, "better", ever more expansive until it all collapses.

 

[KillLaCam]

I feel like the need to constantly update a game wouldnt be an issue if games would stop coming out too early

 

[Komo]

That is how games with expected sequels are structured (Anthem, Division, Destiny) but Fortnite is a different beast. Those other games, while GaaS, are completely different than the live approach of Fortnite. It's almost two separate categories tbh.

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Destiny has their Main Team and the Live Team. Currently the Main team is working on D3, and the Live team is doing all the content currently for destiny 2.

 

[Gobias-Ind]

This really sucks because the consumer base for this industry is an irredeemable horde that deserves to see its favorite hobby go to shit but the workers don't deserve the exploitation.

 

[lt519]

Destiny has their Main Team and the Live Team. Currently the Main team is working on D3, and the Live team is doing all the content currently for destiny 2.

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Yeah, that's what I was saying.

 

[Aeana]

The industry wanted to move to games as a service, so it did, and that's where we are. It's weird to be confused or bewildered. The publishers created this situation. I'd love it if we could go back to single player games that are complete when they're released, but I don't think there's any putting that cat back into the bag now. But blaming the consumers for a situation they were force fed to begin with doesn't make much sense to me.

 

[Sheepinator]

That article title reads like clickbait. The article only mentions one game with a lot of crunch due to fast updates, Fortnite, which is also giving staff the highest compensation in the industry, and another games developer, making Apex, saying they're fine with slower updates. As for streamers leaving, so what, who cares? The top ones are vastly overpaid anyway. Work hard by personal choice for a year or two and they're set for life, and no need for student debt either.

 

[elenarie]

There needs to be a main development team for the key game, and the GaaS support team for the subsequent content. This system is ridiculous.

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What exactly is so ridiculous about that? In a non-service game you do not need people that are good at release coordination or Live Ops. In an ongoing service game, you do. In a non-service game, you need core engine developers. In an ongoing service game, you usually don't. And so on.

 

[norwegiandude86]

The industry wanted to move to games as a service, so it did, and that's where we are. It's weird to be confused or bewildered. The publishers created this situation. I'd love it if we could go back to single player games that are complete when they're released, but I don't think there's any putting that cat back into the bag now. But blaming the consumers for a situation they were force fed to begin with doesn't make much sense to me.

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Well with every single big publishers going all in on GAAS titles we are starting to see the cracks in the model exhaustion by those who work on them and the fact that most people will choose one game to stick with while others fail.

This has happened before after World Of Warcraft everyone and their mother was making an mmo, it required constant updates and a lot of resources many failed while maybe two or three actually had enough of a playerbase to justify the costs of keeping the servers running.

In the end WOW still was the biggest fish in the pond and most of these mmo's went free to play or shut down completely several companies went bankrupt.

GAAS is just the latest trend the AAA publishers are obsessed with

 

[Pearljam and Earl]

"The pressure to deliver on the promise of years' worth of content, before even knowing the sales and retention of any given "game as a service", is leading to an inability to deliver on that promise..."

Who knew?

 

[ClarkusDarkus]

But some games are bare bones at release and maybe some games cut content so they can they add it afterwards.

You only have to look at Destiny 2/Division 2 to see GaaS are hard to sustain.

 

[Sheepinator]

The industry wanted to move to games as a service, so it did, and that's where we are. It's weird to be confused or bewildered. The publishers created this situation. I'd love it if we could go back to single player games that are complete when they're released, but I don't think there's any putting that cat back into the bag now. But blaming the consumers for a situation they were force fed to begin with doesn't make much sense to me.

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Of course gamers are partly responsible. They're the ones who constantly want more and bigger without wanting to pay more for it. Tons of publishers went bankrupt last gen or left or mostly left AAA gaming because of the economics involved and the ones who survived were losing vast amounts of money about a decade ago. That led to MTX which led to GaaS.

 

[norwegiandude86]

What exactly is so ridiculous about that? In a non-service game you do not need people that are good at release coordination or Live Ops. In an ongoing service game, you do. In a non-service game, you need core engine developers. In an ongoing service game, you usually don't. And so on.

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This assumes that every non-service game being developed is done so on a proprietary engine which in most cases they are not.

Not every dev develops their own engine indie devs have done amazing things with Unreal and the Unity engine

 

[Sheepinator]

This assumes that every non-service game being developed is done so on a proprietary engine which in most cases they are not.

Not every dev develops their own engine indie devs have done amazing things with Unreal and the Unity engine

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I think what he means is the live team is probably working with the tools and tech they have, to create additional content, so it's going to be mostly artists and level designers.

 

[BlueManifest]

I wish there would be a breaking point to stop the GaaS, what exactly would cause a breaking point though? Because I don't ever see it breaking

 

[Deleted member 8593]

It's interesting how the invisible hand of capitalism always leads to workers being exploited. Really makes you think.

 

[Tarot Deck]

The industry wanted to move to games as a service, so it did, and that's where we are. It's weird to be confused or bewildered. The publishers created this situation. I'd love it if we could go back to single player games that are complete when they're released, but I don't think there's any putting that cat back into the bag now. But blaming the consumers for a situation they were force fed to begin with doesn't make much sense to me.

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I don't think the publishers are the sole culprit. Those games sell more and generate more revenue than the regular multiplayer game. PUBG and Fortnite were the peak and now we are watching the problems of that way.

What the future holds, I don't know, but it's not the first time we see this kind of crisis.

 

[Roshin]

I feel like mod support would help with this. If the community could make maps for Battlefield 5 for example, you'd have more people playing and less complaining about a lack of content i think.

Obviously, this is harder for games like Anthem and Fortnite.

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But they don't want you to play free content from the community. They want you to buy and keep buying official content.

 

[Gobias-Ind]

If they don't add new skins to Call of Valor: Modern Warfield 12 soon I am literally going to shit

 

[boontobias]

GaaS is bad for customers and creators. Wow thats just crazy

 

[Asuka3+1]

For Reason like this is that I roll eyes when people complain about "predatory/ monitarization tactics" and how those are "anti-consumer". Like, "DO YOU KNOW WHY COMPANIES IN 1st PLACE ARE DOING ALL THAT??"

they are pushing both their staff and the money machine to their limits cause the end user are demanding for more of the product but somehow cry out wolf when they get too know whats need to be done to try to meet those demands.

Is it a problem in the industry? absolutely, is it a problem created solely by evil CEO/ Management sitting in a chair while stroking a cat, hell no

 

[Orochinagis]

Imagine how Fornite team is working on.

Warframe devs were so tired and with big "no sleep" faces when Fortuna were released

 

[dude]

The thing is - Live-ops doesn't have to be constant crunch. GaaS should have been a way to lessen crunch and give devs stability that developing new games doesn't always have. I'm guessing greed and pressure from the gaming community drives employers to push updates as fast as possible.

 

[Chasex]

Solution: Give the community the tools to create the content themselves.

Skyrim, Halo Forge, Source SDK are all good examples of this.

 

[Haubergeon]

It's so funny because I'm still kicking it old school. I love buying games, beating the crap out of them, and moving on to the next. I very rarely go back to new content, dlc or expansions with anything. I do not expect devs to keep adding things to the games I buy because I'm the type to purchase multiple games a year. Even the games I play 1000 hours of (monster Hunter, path of Exile) I'm just grinding out the content that's already there not asking for anything new to be added. To each their own. I feel bad for the game devs who feel the need to become a games as service model developer to survive.

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I have done and will always do this with few exceptions and I feel infinitely happier for it, not to mention it feels like a much more ethical and straightforward way of treating these games - as ethical as any consumption can be. I buy the game when I want to purchase it, I play it based on the content they felt made a complete, purchasable package, complete it and unless it's truly exceptional, I close the book on it and happily move on to something else.

I've truly never understood, in particular, people who hang around games that they actively dislike or are disappointed by, as if they win something by people the people who believed in it first or whatever. Anthem comes to mind - there are plenty of other games like this, if you've ever said "I'm still holding out hope for ___" while still actively playing it against all odds, you're being silly and should go search for something else, because there's almost always something else you could be playing and enjoying.

It really sucks how GaaS absolutely sucks the life out of this industry, but that's capitalism for you. Was going to happen eventually.

 

[Eggiem]

Solution: Give the community the tools to create the content themselves.

Skyrim, Halo Forge, Source SDK are all good examples of this.

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But the money!

 

[Aztechnology]

A super majority of the time nowadays it feels like because games are effectively releasing as early access/foundational titles. That it's absolutely required. If you have a feature complete (within expectation) game at launch. Then there's not an issue. Unless of course you're expecting a long term GAAS title. Then obviously you have to keep updating it... Because that's your damn business model.

It's also ok for people to not play your game every fuggin day. Release an update. Play it for a few weeks, move on. But of course that's not the kind of engagement they want often. They want people like the guys I know who play Destiny and only Destiny endlessly grinding rolls and crap.

 

[ArkhamFantasy]

For Reason like this is that I roll eyes when people complain about "predatory/ monitarization tactics" and how those are "anti-consumer". Like, "DO YOU KNOW WHY COMPANIES IN 1st PLACE ARE DOING ALL THAT??"

they are pushing both their staff and the money machine to their limits cause the end user are demanding for more of the product but somehow cry out wolf when they get too know whats need to be done to try to meet those demands.

Is it a problem in the industry? absolutely, is it a problem created solely by evil CEO/ Management sitting in a chair while stroking a cat, hell no

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Bobby Kotick would be proud of this post.

Consumers have no control over a companies shitty work environment.

 

[Asuka3+1]

Consumers have no control over a companies shitty work environment.

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other than being one of the causes of it, and just complain about it on the internet.