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[Marty Chinn]

I think we need to stop looking at the game development industry as a specific sector and compare it directly to other software development, and in that case, the market has generally solved this. There are more companies now paying rewarding salaries with good benefits that do not expect that kind of working environment, and they produce higher quality software with fewer bugs and it sells better.

The problem with comparing it to other software development is in other software development there are clear cut design and implementation that is done which is by far easier to predict and in turn also result in fewer bugs. The software design and interaction is nowhere even close to being as complex as a game.

The game development sector of software development has a culture problem. It's insular in hiring; largely hiring people who are passionate about games, and the culture of crunch gets instilled in developers. Most of the managers in game development come out of those development environments, and they double-down on the concept of crunch.

No argument here.

This is one reason why I'm usually happy to see non-gaming companies invest in the gaming sector, because it's going to be one of the only opportunities to break the crunch culture. When Amazon, Facebook, and other tech companies that have a work life balance start producing games, and when they produce high quality games that sell well, it'll be a shakeup to the traditional, siloed game development culture.

I don't think you realize they don't have the work life balance you think they do, on top of that some companies you think would bring their culture only buy out companies who have a pre-existing culture so it doesn't change and on top of that, their work productivity flow is different so it clashes which causes more problems. I've seen a few cases where a large company like you mention has done this. Them stepping in doesn't pan out the way you think it should.

 

[hoyalawya]

I respect the game devs' passions and sacrifices. This is one of main reasons I never buy or sell used games.

 

[cartographer]

So what is it about AAA game development that turns project managers into idiots? If your people have to work 80+ hour weeks indefinitely to finish a project on time your project plan is shit.

See, I don't think it has anything to do with AAA game development, or poor project management. I think it has everything to do with working people like slaves simply because you can and they will.

I'm guessing many don't have significant project management training or experience outside the game industry. If all they know is project management within the industry, then it's very likely they just view overworking as a norm and not a problem.

 

[brau]

I respect the game devs' passions and sacrifices. This is one of main reasons I never buy or sell used games.

Right.

Another reason why i'm always surprised at people calling devs "lazy".

 

[zoukka]

This happens a lot in software development when releasing nears closing depending on project management.

10 years, 7 days a week

 

[charlequin]

Go on...

Professional athletes are engaged in a fundamentally competitive, zero-sum field: they succeed not just by being able to perform their sport, but being able to perform it as well as possible, either competing directly with others or with their own historical performance. As such, they have to maintain as high a level of performance as is possible, and complete the training regimen necessary to do so because physical performance can only be maintained through the direct application of training time. At the same time, every athlete carefully manages their actual performance schedule to avoid overtaxing themselves since that can result in injury, which is obviously extremely undesirable.

People at a game company fit much more in the mode of any other white-collar job. There's a limit to how much practice outside your job will actually help you stay sharp at your skills as a programmer or artist, and it's specifically beneficial for it to be something outside your job as your improvement will come from stretching yourself in new directions, not rote repetition. Your goal isn't to deliver the very best imaginable example of whatever you do, it's to do as well as you can within the time and budget scope you're working within, in pursuit of the overall goal of shipping a good product within a reasonable schedule. Working yourself to the bone is objectively, unambiguously a detriment to that goal, which is why the optimal situation is people who work extremely hard and efficiently during their work hours and keep their skills up outside of work, but also keep a schedule that avoids burnout.

Treyarch and Epic were infamous for it, I'll admit that may have change in recent years. A lot has. I mean, Riot has gone from one extreme to the other, and I suspect is actually dragging other LA studios into better practices.

Yeah, I didn't think to account for change over time in some of my comments earlier. Like, I forgot that Riot used to be much much worse than they are now. Or EA is a great example as well: they went from the poster-child for excessive crunch thanks to EA_Spouse to generally far more reasonable schedules across the board. Much like Naughty Dog kind of makes games in a style that was most popular in like 2008, they also seem to have held on to attitudes about crunch that were more widespread in 2008 than they are today.

That seems like a reasonable argument, but if it is correct, then why do you think the problem hasn't been solved through the market?

Historically stuff like work culture is heavily driven by middle management and middle management are the part of any big company that are the most resistant to direct market pressure. Especially when problems in that area have their negative consequences over a long-term, they tend to just keep going due to inertia.

I will note that in part this problem has improved lately, and it's primarily driven by executive level intervention -- specifically, companies noting that it's bad press to do endless death marches and it doesn't actually make them more money, and thus overriding the decisions of the people who try to get "free" labor by overworking people.

 

[Kysen]

Crazy how hard Sony had this studio working when the guys up at Polyphony seem to be chilling with endless delays.

 

[inpHilltr8r]

I'm assuming they mean Sony Santa Monica, who is also ridiculously notorious for deathmarching.

Interesting, but nope. Certainly not in the same league. There was this one month before Ascension went gold though.

Crazy how hard Sony had this studio working when the guys up at Polyphony seem to be chilling with endless delays.

Studios have a great deal of independence in these matters. Also note that ND were bought, and had a well established culture before they were Sony.

 

[The Dutch Slayer]

My main question is then why go do it again at EA?
Its not like that is different there right?

 

[slosherbomb]

I couldn't imagine having to work that long every week. It's not healthy.

 

[eggandI]

That's partly a result of people wanting bigger and better graphics. I've always thought Nintendo's approach was the most sensible but people seem to lose their minds any time some rumor about the NX not being very powerful pops up, so obviously lots of people disagree.

A crazy amount of studios have closed up in the last 10 years and the decrease in new IPs this generation alone is staggering. 10 years from now there are going to be a handful of non-indie games left lol

 

[Cindi Mayweather]

"Poor devs..."

Give me a fucking break. There's no need to feel sorry for these people. It was their own choice to work at AAA developer that is being whipped by a greedy publisher.

Want to avoid crunch? Make your own indie game. Problem solved.

Wasn't Jonathon Blow peeing inside bottles before Witness came out during crunch?

 

[mishakoz]

My main question is then why go do it again at EA?
Its not like that is different there right?

It sounds like it is. Studios vary in culture and habits. It easy when you've "had a policy" of asking 80 hour weeks from the get go or for years. However, if that isnt how its traditionally done, employees would revolt.

Its a tricky situation but its sounds like Naughty Dog were viewed as the "big leagues" where working those hours was just expected, like it or not, and the prestige of working at ND was enough to keep employees from complaining.

Also, just want to say a purely anecdotal story. I worked across the street from ND for awhile and ate at the same place they would go to, got to chatting a lot with a bunch of them daily. everyone I met seemed pretty chill and happy, This was around TLOU, not sure when, but they would say that they were working long hours but not in a complainy kind of way. (again, purely anecdotal and not everyone goes on lunch and complains)

 

[meerak]

It's hard for people who don't make software to understand crunch culture, but it's not all that dissimilar from what you see in athletics, for example.

There is a real buy in these places that "working hard" can only be measured by your time in office / at the gym / on the field, whatever pains it may cause your body / mind / family. And nothing, NOTHING, matters more than working hard.

Crunch culture is just another extension of buying in to the idea of "being a man" and "getting the job done". "If you can't work as hard as me, I'm better than you." This idea is different cross-culturally, as in, whether it is tied to Manliness or Honour or Respect or Boss Belief, but all those are just shades of the same colour.

Crunch culture is specific to software, but its analogs exists everywhere, in most all major industries.

Work/Life balance is a relatively new concept, and will continue to take hold as time passes, but it's not going to flip overnight.

I'm in the process of taking the leadership role in a family business, a software developer, and while we took serious time to try to kill crunch culture years ago, it still exists today; and it's not so easy to understand or root out. One of the odd things you don't expect is how some people WANT to crunch. Either through guilt, fear of work quality, fear of deadlines, fear of job safety. Of course these are results of other problems and cultural qualities, but that is another story.

I also don't want to sidestep the fact that sometimes crunch is simply needed, sadly. When the economic downturn swallowed up all our clients it became impossible to charge the same for our dev sprints, and imperative that we output MORE work, at BETTER quality, than we had done before, within the same billing period. This obviously means longer hours. Thankfully, it was a short period. But this was solved by luck - a golden goose project - and we could still be there now.

Keep in mind though we are 25 years old as a company current size is only 6 peeps, so our crunch issues will be very different than bigger companies.

Long post! Sorry. Good luck devs!

 

[FelixFFM]

^this is very true.

 

[dracula_x]

Crazy how hard Sony had this studio working when the guys up at Polyphony seem to be chilling with endless delays.

Not sure if serious.

1. GTS was delayed only once so far, Unchated 4 was delayed several times.
2. Working conditions in Japan usually much worse than in the US. For example,
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/working-towards-death-in-japan-140758364.html

“We don't have a 5 o’clock-and-get-out kind of culture,” she says with a shrug. While her schedule depends on the specific project, Fujita, in her late twenties, says her typical workday currently lasts about 15 hours or more. “I don’t really have a choice,” she says.

^ that's IBM btw, not just a random company

 

[TurboLibre]

That's crazy. I always knew writing in the games industry was different from the Hollywood structure, but can't imagine how it leads to hours like that.

 

[charlequin]

This is one reason why I'm usually happy to see non-gaming companies invest in the gaming sector, because it's going to be one of the only opportunities to break the crunch culture.

Hell, for all the shade NeoGAF can throw about mobile gaming, because those companies tend to have more influence from the general-software side they also have tended to have better work balance than old-school gaming companies.

So what is it about AAA game development that turns project managers into idiots?

To some degree it's a self-reinforcing spiral because paying less means getting much shittier project managers and other facilitative staff, and because crunch makes everyone so tired and burned-out that they make stupider decisions.

The problem with comparing it to other software development is in other software development there are clear cut design and implementation that is done which is by far easier to predict and in turn also result in fewer bugs.

lol no

A ton of what goes into game development is predictable and clear-cut these days. Many parts of AAA development are operating in areas that are well-understood. Conversely, a ton of general software development is oriented around tackling problems that are relatively unique or unusual. These days AAA game development relies heavily on standardized graphics APIs, extensive middleware systems with well-honed pipelines, asset creation using industry-standard techniques -- the same kind of process improvements other software companies have been leveraging, really. There isn't a qualitative difference here that makes comparisons across the fence useless.

I would certainly agree that game companies as a whole see more work thrown out and more buggy work accepted because of shifting requirements or unpredicted challenges, but that's more a result of games running five years behind general software in project-management systems than anything else, really.

Its not like that is different there right?

EA has actually improved dramatically on this topic since they first got really seriously publicly shamed.

 

[The Dutch Slayer]

It sounds like it is. Studios vary in culture and habits. It easy when you've "had a policy" of asking 80 hour weeks from the get go or for years. However, if that isnt how its traditionally done, employees would revolt.

Its a tricky situation but its sounds like Naughty Dog were viewed as the "big leagues" where working those hours was just expected, like it or not, and the prestige of working at ND was enough to keep employees from complaining.

Could be but I see heading up an EA studio for a major AAA game on a licence ip is not like "taking it easy".
I would be very surprised if all of a sudden now she can go home at 17:00 and not take most weekend off "like a normal person".
I simply don't see the project for it and don't see the company for it.

 

[charlequin]

Could be but I see heading up an EA studio for a major AAA game on a licence ip is not like "taking it easy".

I mean, this stuff is also relative. 60 hours spent mostly M-F is a big step down from 80 hours across all seven days even if it's still an intense workload compared to default.

 

[fabricated backlash]

Kind of explains why many AAA games feel so devoid of joy.
Also knowing that people suffered like that for a game actually diminishes my enjoyment.

 

[Liquid-San]

Doesn't a writer at a AAA studio earn at least 100K?

Don't get where this question stems from. If you're working 80 hour weeks, you're basically being paid 50k for a normal work year of 40 hour weeks. Just twice.

 

[SprachBrooks]

Meh, developers need to unionise otherwise this will never be resolved.

 

[Shengar]

She's right about it being an arms race with no real winner, and she's right to point out that AAA games made within the last generation aren't sustainable any more. It's a shame.

The arms race is a very apt term to describe the condition of this industry. People wants more, better graphic, better gameplay, better everything but doesn't want to pay more or wait longer for it. This is really shitty, and I guess it have to do with how the gaming industry closely related to tech industry.

That's even worse! Funneling the entire industry into 2 or 3 giant entities that control the whole market places a lot of control into the hands of a few. The opposite is what has been logically happening in response to the walled nature of AAA development - the rise of Indie studios is because gate keeping the industry wasn't healthy.

Never says yes to industry conglomeration.
The last thing you want to have in this industry is oligopoly market where only handful of very strong companies controls the flow of money.

You're silly.

The conditions are bullshit. I didn't say they weren't. They are. Publishers and even development houses exploit their workers. Yet, those people continue to do it. So, unless you're running yourself ragged for a pay check, you have to love some part of it somewhere. Personal Development and Personal Growth in your chosen profession have to be the driving force to put up with the bullshit. If not, then you can leave and pick a more healthy job to pay the bills. Assuming you aren't spending above your means and living an unsustainable lifestyle anyway.

I don't have to care about the "sacrifice" though. That's a highly personal thing. No one gives a shit about my sacrifice every day and I simply run a retail store. No one cares about my working 80 hours a week either for way less pay than a game developer. I sell the shit you make and have for over a decade. People like me make sure these products are presented in the best light possible so people will buy them. I sell the shitty season passes too. I put up with the bullshit. I get death threats too. To my face just because a copy of a game didn't work. I have wept because I thought serving my customers was noble, even after coming back from a liver transplant. No one cares. My "sacrifice" was a choice. I didn't have to do it. Neither do you. I especially don't have to care when a person pushes off their sacrifice on others. Because I used to do it. "For the fans" is exactly that.

Luckily, the US government finally stood up for us and I no longer have to do that. I hope someone stands up for developers in the future as well. Or stand up for yourselves.

Consumers are fucked up too. We spend too much. We spend what we don't have. We demand more and don't play it. We don't finish the games we buy but go out and buy games the next day because more more more more more. We're quick to bitch. Quick to threaten. Quick Quick Quick. More More More. Consumers can be fucking disgusting. Why would you work so hard for those people? Think about that before it comes out of your mouth.

You're talking to a person who admires the hard work that goes into the process of entertainment. Who admires the people who do it for the right reasons. Who wants to add value to a person's life. To add joy. Guess what? In our current society, that's hard fucking work. You're talking to a person who will actually write an email to thank a developer for their hard work on a title I enjoyed.

I used to be that asshole. I'm trying very hard to learn and not to be that guy anymore. Trying very hard to appreciate these things we have taken for granted. So give it to them. I try to give what support I can. I don't want you to work "for me" though.

Shout out to this honest post. It really shitty that our current culture is pretty centered around consumerism mindset, which of course is at odds with any creative workfield. People should try to have it slow, and think how certain product or perhaps, craftwork could come into their hand.

 

[Sid]

They can make a 10 hour SP only game in these times and it'll probably sell well if it's good and gets good enough marketing.

 

[supernormal]

This is basically the case for all things that ever amount to anything substantial. In any field the people who stand out are basically the ones who sacrifice the most for their work, and for them it's worth it at least while they do it, maybe not so much in retrospect.

The thing for videogames though is that the challenge is so massive that these sacrifices are made even for things that don't end up succeeding. The standards are so high, based on the competition and also the demand from the consumers, that it feels like there really is no place for you as a developer if you're not willing to work like this.

Being a creator in entertainment myself it should feel like I can sometimes relate, but honestly I can't. The hurdles games have to go through to just exist in the most crude version are astronomical compared to other mediums. I have the utmost respect for creators in this field.

I am an advocate of games costing more, and I do give more support via collectors, or even buying multiple copies for games I love. I've argued before that in order for games to keep evolving and keep things sustainable we would have to move into shorter, episodic content in order to off-set the massive risk.

 

[Benjamin1981]

She complains about the high work load on AAA titles but joins EA to work on Star Wars. Doesn't get anymore AAA than that. Don't feel sorry for her one bit.

 

[Shengar]

She complains about the high work load on AAA titles but joins EA to work on Star Wars. Doesn't get anymore AAA than that. Don't feel sorry for her one bit.

Have follow the discussion in this thread nor the article? EA have improving their working condition which is why like she said that the Star Wars game wouldn't even come out until 2018.

Geez, if you're not reading the article at least follow the discussion here.

 

[joms5]

That's quite sad that working in AAA has led to such negative outcomes for some.

80 hours a week?! As a writer? Any other writers in here? How is that possible?

 

[Interficium]

Naughty Dog is notorious for their crunches in the industry and has been for years, from the very start of the Uncharted series. The term "death march" among devs referring to crunch actually originates from their studio, from the Uncharted 2 days.

Although their rep is sterling from a technical art perspective (although you get a lot of comments from people like "Well, if we had the ICE team right next door we could do that shit too"), you ask your average AAA dev with 5+ years experience if they'd be interested in jumping ship there and you'll usually get a resounding hell no. Contrast this with your average NeoGaf poster in the bi-annual "which dev would you like to work at?" poll thread where Naughty Dog places at the top or near the top of the list every without fail.

Somebody said in here "wow, their project management must suck!" got a chuckle from me, because ND doesn't really HAVE project management; they've prided themselves for years and years on not having producers at all.

Someone brought up Riot, but they're not like Naughty Dog at all, at least since the Tencent purchase in 2011. Plenty of other problems like the bro-culture hivemind they've installed but you rarely if ever hear about 80 hour weeks.

The gaffers handwaving a lot of this stuff by pointing to ancient shit like EA Spouse from 2004 (when the EA of today actually has a pretty good rep in the industry fro work-life balance, a large part of it from the heat they took in 2004) and saying "WELL THAT'S JUST HOW IT IS EVERYWHERE STOP WHINING" is pretty fucking funny to me. Just like Naughty Dog, they can't remove their mentality from the early aughts.

"Poor devs..."

Give me a fucking break. There's no need to feel sorry for these people. It was their own choice to work at AAA developer that is being whipped by a greedy publisher.

Want to avoid crunch? Make your own indie game. Problem solved.

Finally, a proud hero steps forward with an answer to the question of "What's the worst post on NeoGaf ever made." God bless you, you complete and utter sociopath.

 

[Comfort Jones]

In reality, even at 60 hours a week, employee productivity dips sharply. After a couple months of continuous 60 hour weeks, each employee is actually producing less total per week than they would have had they stayed at 40, in addition to their life basically being miserable. All the stuff about how this is the only way to produce great games or whatever is complete bullshit; better balanced workweeks to begin with would pay off much better over a whole multi-year dev cycle.

This really needs to be reposted every time one of these threads pop up. People defending this shit or acting like it's just some harsh reality to live with hurt my brain.

 

[Clint Beastwood]

She complains about the high work load on AAA titles but joins EA to work on Star Wars. Doesn't get anymore AAA than that. Don't feel sorry for her one bit.

She joined EA years ago and the game is still nowhere in sight, because you know, there's probably better working conditions that don't require 80 hour weeks.

 

[sphinx]

"I mean, Uncharted 1; a ten-hour game, no other modes... you can't make a game like that any more."

yes you can, in fact I beg of you to go back and do these games.

PLEASE stop the bloat madness, every fucking game I play these days overstays its welcome.

please more games like Resident Evil REmake and less "300 hours to complete 100% with a guide, 600 hours without it" open world games.

 

[Bronetta]

This really needs to be reposted every time one of these threads pop up. People defending this shit or acting like it's just some harsh reality to live with hurt my brain.

It also needs to be sent to every damn studio in existence.

How did things get so out of control? Is this the American dream?

 

[Shengar]

That's quite sad that working in AAA has led to such negative outcomes for some.

80 hours a week?! As a writer? Any other writers in here? How is that possible?

She's a creative director as well. I don't think there's a pure writer in the video game industry. Even if someone hire as one, that writer writer probably have to do some directing as well considering what's in the writers mind rarely translates well into other people.

 

[JetSetRadio]

I hope she got the moneys doing that because that's just silly.

 

[Marty Chinn]

lol no

A ton of what goes into game development is predictable and clear-cut these days. Many parts of AAA development are operating in areas that are well-understood. Conversely, a ton of general software development is oriented around tackling problems that are relatively unique or unusual. These days AAA game development relies heavily on standardized graphics APIs, extensive middleware systems with well-honed pipelines, asset creation using industry-standard techniques -- the same kind of process improvements other software companies have been leveraging, really. There isn't a qualitative difference here that makes comparisons across the fence useless.

I would certainly agree that game companies as a whole see more work thrown out and more buggy work accepted because of shifting requirements or unpredicted challenges, but that's more a result of games running five years behind general software in project-management systems than anything else, really.

lol yes.

Most software in other industries have clear definitions on what needs to be done and there's a much clearer path on how to implement it compared to game development. It's not about the APIs or all that jazz, but how you design something, how it works, and how you sometimes need to throw it out or change it because of it not working. There's a lot more nuance that goes into game development than traditional software development. It's that nuance that is the biggest difference which makes it harder to plan around. Certainly you add buffer to the schedule to account for that, but it's still unpredictable and harder to plan relative to other software development.

 

[Zeenbor]

I've worked for all kinds of studios: budget games, AAA, indie.

AAA can be great, especially with all the resources available to make your vision come to life. Unfortunately, working 80+ hours for someone else wears thin after a couple of years, especially as you get older.

That being said, I work 80+ hours now, but it's for my own company and the future of my employees. I'm lucky that I don't have kids (yet); those that do have very difficult choices of fulfilling expectations at work and at home. At my company, we try to have the absolute least amount of crunch as possible.

If I was AAA right now with a spouse and kids, I'd probably be looking to get out of the industry, just to gain some stability and diversify my skill set. Game development, in general, is very volatile and you could be let go at any time due to unforeseen circumstances.

 

[lemon__fresh]

lol yes.

Most software in other industries have clear definitions on what needs to be done and there's a much clearer path on how to implement it compared to game development. It's not about the APIs or all that jazz, but how you design something, how it works, and how you sometimes need to throw it out or change it because of it not working. There's a lot more nuance that goes into game development than traditional software development. It's that nuance that is the biggest difference which makes it harder to plan around. Certainly you add buffer to the schedule to account for that, but it's still unpredictable and harder to plan relative to other software development.

This, in my experience (7 years of software development in multiple industries) is just not true... MAYBE if you are a junior developer just working on defects...

 

[Clear]

I would certainly agree that game companies as a whole see more work thrown out and more buggy work accepted because of shifting requirements or unpredicted challenges, but that's more a result of games running five years behind general software in project-management systems than anything else, really.

That's just not true. General software is mainly about function, games are about entertainment and artistry. They are works of commercial art created in a medium that due to its highly synergistic nature is not that amenable to sudden shifts and changes in creative direction.

Unlike a movie, you can't employ late-in-the-day quick fix strategies like reshoots, because everything is interconnected and needs to interoperate dynamically with user interaction.

Its an extremely complex and challenging form to work in, increasingly so on the largest scale products. Nobody gets into making AAA games and goes; "Gee, this is easier than I thought it would be !"

 

[RoadHazard]

Yeah, working at a place like ND sounds amazing when you just think of the cool stuff they produce, but then you learn what working there actually means. No thanks. I'm also in software (not games), and have pretty steady 40-hour weeks. If we risk missing a deadline on a project, we're gonna miss it rather than working 80 hours a week. This is in Sweden though, we don't have that insane work culture overall. I'm not sure how things are at, say, Dice, but I doubt it's as bad as what she's describing.

 

[GabeTheGrouch76]

"Poor devs..."

Give me a fucking break. There's no need to feel sorry for these people. It was their own choice to work at AAA developer that is being whipped by a greedy publisher.

Want to avoid crunch? Make your own indie game. Problem solved.

Mogwai
Expert in Videogame Development
(Today, 03:47 PM)

 

[Marty Chinn]

This, in my experience (7 years of software development in multiple industries) is just not true... MAYBE if you are a junior developer just working on defects...

This has been my observation in my experience with 12 years of software development with a significant amount of that time in game dev.

 

[Furio53]

I've been a part of AAA, done the indie thing, seen pretty much the whole spectrum.

For ND, it works for them because they put out a successful game(s). Personally, I've been doing this long enough now and crunched enough to know that it's something I try to emphasize at wherever I'm working. Work/life balance that is. Personally, I would never work at ND or places that celebrate crunch. It's disgusting to me. I understand things might go wrong and there are deadlines where a short crunch is necessary due to unforeseen circumstances.

One of the issues for me is all the people who crunch hard on these death marches, then the game isn't successful and you get laid off. Why the hell did I just work for 6+ months of 6-7 days a week 12+ hours and my reward was what... getting laid off? fuck that noise.

My last job search I made it a point to ask about crunch policy and work/life balance during interviews. It's a touchy subject, and most people were taken off guard that I would ask and be concerned about crunch. I ended up at a place that really tries to work with everyone to avoid crunch and it's fantastic.

It's a discussion that needs to continue, but most people are too scared to stand up for themselves and say hey, I do NOT want to crunch, I want a life and that's important to me.

IMO the long term crunches are disgusting and detrimental to team moral, the project itself and each individuals health. It's not worth it. Maybe the games I make won't be Uncharted and celebrated on a global scale, but I'll be happier because I won't be a miserable person.

 

[brandonh83]

That's partly a result of people wanting bigger and better graphics. I've always thought Nintendo's approach was the most sensible but people seem to lose their minds any time some rumor about the NX not being very powerful pops up, so obviously lots of people disagree.

Games with best textures = best games, duh.

 

[lemon__fresh]

This has been my observation in my experience with 12 years of software development with a significant amount of that time in game dev.

Your assumption that game development is more difficult than all other software applications just seems uninformed/biased. Maybe you were previously working for companies that weren't solving difficult problems.

 

[Vegetable Lasagna]

Videogames aren't worth it period. The industry takes advantage of people who want to live out their dream career in the hobby they love. Even if you are making great money in this industry the time investment isn't worth it. Go work in anything but games.

I wised up and have since been working in mobile, web and medical software. Rarely work overtime and the money is way better. I also actually enjoy playing games again in my free time.

 

[Lightning_Roller]

Man, I have a buddy of mine going into game development and taking classes for it. I honestly wish him the best of luck with it because the AAA industry sounds crazy. Hopefully he goes indie or something to start.

 

[Marty Chinn]

Your assumption that game development is more difficult than all other software applications just seems uninformed/biased. Maybe you were previously working for companies that weren't solving difficult problems.

More difficult than all other software development? Of course not. More difficult than average or even most, sure. The key difference I'm trying to highlight is in just about all other software development, the goal is clearly defined. How you achieve that goal may be complicated and challenging, but the goal is clearly defined and when you get it to work it's clear and not subjective. Game development is highly subjective in defining what the goal is so reaching that goal isn't as clear about when you're there. Hell, I've written whole systems that worked perfectly as planned and to spec, but was thrown out in the end because it didn't work as a whole in the end and directions were changed. I'm not saying nothing ever gets thrown out in other software development either, but the point I'm getting at is the goals tend to be a lot more rigid and concrete in other software development.

 

[Clear]

Your assumption that game development is more difficult than all other software applications just seems uninformed/biased. Maybe you were previously working for companies that weren't solving difficult problems.

Again, games aren't just about function, they are art. Commercial art admittedly, but the point is that what constitutes greatness in a game or a movie is an intangible quality, its not a problem to be solved per se.