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[Mibu no ookami]

What hasn't really been reported in all of this news about layoffs is that the return of crunch culture is going to return and I doubt when it does it will get anywhere close to the reporting it has recently.

Those who complain about crunch are going to be let go.

These layoffs are honestly just the start of a recalibration of salaries in the industry and a reanalysis of redundant positions. For example, you see a lot of community managers losing their jobs. Companies have to ask whether or not games need community managers and how much that augments game sales. In reality, it's probably a job you could have an intern do.

Games need to come out more polished and less bloated. I don't care about games being 20+ hours. Most of the best games I've ever played are 16 hours or shorter. This is especially true of single player games. These shorter games I've played multiple times over because there is no bloat to them. The most bloated part of Metal Gear Solid was the wolf mission and the key card, both were agonizing back then, but compared to the bloat in games today? I'll take it.

You can beat Super Metroid in 8 hours. Metal Gear Solid in 11.5.

Open world games have been one of the worst advancements in gaming, because not everyone puts the time into building them like Rockstar. Until AI can help fill out these worlds, the industry needs to take a step back from open world.

The original FF7 could be beat in 36 hours, and Square felt the need to extrapolate that in a remake which will cover at least 3 games and probably 120+ hours.

We need to return to tight story telling, tight gameplay mechanics, polished games that are ready for prime time on day 1.

 

[Astray]

I think the main argument in your post is the reduction of scope in both game design and marketing. Both don't really necessitate crunch per se.

Will probably have more thoughts to post on this though.

 

[Mibu no ookami]

I think the main argument in your post is the reduction of scope in both game design and marketing. Both don't really necessitate crunch per se.

Will probably have more thoughts to post on this though.

The industry's answer to avoid crunch was hire more people and/or push games out in development time.

That costs more money and the costs are unsustainable.

The video game media led by Jason Schreier have fought a decades-long battle against crunch and they were winning that battle until these layoffs started to happen. They weaponized public sentiment that favored game developers over game publishers in order to obtain a policy victory. Especially with today's youth.

After multiple years of devastating layoffs (which aren't over mind you) crunch is back. Yeah, I think we'll see games get shorter again, but the key here is that game development time has to decrease and the hours people might have to throw into it will increase.

I created a topic back in September asking people how much they would pay for a game that they felt like was a 10/10 or 11/10. The vast majority said 70 dollars or less. The market can't handle more monetization and they know it. The result was layoffs.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

What has hurt console focused devs IMO is the grindy cycle of high production value gaming. And to get that you need budget and very likely crunch. MS and Sony (to a lesser extent Nintendo) promote their consoles with splashy first party games. High cost, can be hit and miss reviews or sales, but they depend a lot on wow factor games for their ecosystem. Then what happens is the big third party companies need to do that too because they want big sales. So all the big companies are swing their dick swords hoping gamers pick their big budget game.

It looks like it's got to a point the budgets are scaling higher than sales so the profit margins are tanking. Maybe the absolute dollars are fine, but the % is getting dumped in the dirt.

All the while, Valve makes a couple games here and there and dont give a shit. PC game companies make big, medium or small games and the platform has a breadth of gamers across genres, low and high powered PC riggers and the platform hums along without needing Valve to showcase the e-store with AAA budget busting first party games to get gamers to use Steam.

 

[tommycronin]

Way too many people who got hired in the last 10 years should have ever been left near any kind of video game. It sucks that people are losing their jobs however I see this as purely course correcting.

 

[lh032]

I disagree about ff 7 remake ,I think the trilogy is one the best decision SE made

 

[Astray]

The industry's answer to avoid crunch was hire more people and/or push games out in development time.

That costs more money and the costs are unsustainable.

The video game media led by Jason Schreier have fought a decades-long battle against crunch and they were winning that battle until these layoffs started to happen. They weaponized public sentiment that favored game developers over game publishers in order to obtain a policy victory. Especially with today's youth.

After multiple years of devastating layoffs (which aren't over mind you) crunch is back. Yeah, I think we'll see games get shorter again, but the key here is that game development time has to decrease and the hours people might have to throw into it will increase.

I created a topic back in September asking people how much they would pay for a game that they felt like was a 10/10 or 11/10. The vast majority said 70 dollars or less. The market can't handle more monetization and they know it. The result was layoffs.

I don't disagree with any of this, but I think a lot of this needs to be in the OP imo.

I have a lot of issues with how games are being reported on, like, how come we don't get detailed analysis on whether AAA games are successful or not in the vein of what happens with the film and TV industry?

You look at say, the Hollywood reporter and how they report on films succeeding and tanking and you wonder why people aren't reporting on whether Death Stranding or Hi-Fi Rush is successful or not. We get reporting on DEI stuff and crunch etc, but we don't get reporting on these key things? It only adds to the console warring when we don't have any real insight into the context of how well the industry is doing.

The games industry has waaaaaaay too much control over game journalism and it shows in spades.

All the while, Valve makes a couple games here and there and dont give a shit. PC game companies make big, medium or small games and the platform has a breadth of gamers across genres, low and high powered PC riggers and the platform hums along without needing Valve to showcase the e-store with AAA budget busting games to get gamers to use Steam.

Valve has the luxury of not having to manufacture, subsidize and distribute a console, their customers take the hit for hardware (and massively I might add, even a reasonable rig costs at least as much as a console), they only really subsidize the Deck, and they keep quantities low too.

If they ever release one in a similar vein, then expect their platform to change greatly imo. I honestly wouldn't be surprised to see service subscriptions for things like cloud saves etc come into play.

 

[Damigos]

Semi open, like God of War, is my sweetspot

 

[hyperbertha]

What hasn't really been reported in all of this news about layoffs is that the return of crunch culture is going to return and I doubt when it does it will get anywhere close to the reporting it has recently.

Returnal 2 confirmed

 

[ADiTAR]

I think it's ok if crunch happens in peaks, but the truth is crunch happens because of bad management and bad talent (which in itself is caused by bad management).

I'm starting to work at an advertising company and was told one of the employees was a mess, he came in at 2pm and left at 5pm, even though they allowed him to start late at 11am. Since he was talented they allowed this. He resigned. He wasn't fired, he resigned. That's bad management and bad talent.

 

[Mibu no ookami]

The games industry has waaaaaaay too much control over game journalism and it shows in spades.

That's because gaming journalists aren't real journalists. They're hobbyists that were in the right place at the right time that and influencers.

They have an incestuous relationship with game publishers but especially game developers, and many of them hope to one day work on game development.

You'll see a lot of influencers turn into writers, consultants, or community managers.

Alanah Pearce and I don't mean to pick on her necessarily, but she has a communications degree. She became a "gaming journalist" and parlayed that into becoming an influencer. Then she got herself a job at one of the most prestigious studios in gaming... That's a massive problem. And you have to realize that with 8% job cuts across SIE, if she still has a job, the cuts probably weren't deep enough and all evidence suggests that she still has a job.

I'm not saying that someone needs a certain degree to get into the games industry, but you need a solid wall between journalism and the industry itself. You also need to have influencers take a much smaller role in the industry if any at all, but that is why we don't have e3 and big game showcases anymore, because they rely on influencers to peddle games. Mind you there is little to no disclosure by these influencers on what they've received in return.

 

[Mibu no ookami]

I think it's ok if crunch happens in peaks, but the truth is crunch happens because of bad management and bad talent (which in itself is caused by bad management).

I'm starting to work at an advertising company and was told one of the employees was a mess, he came in at 2pm and left at 5pm, even though they allowed him to start late at 11am. Since he was talented they allowed this. He resigned. He wasn't fired, he resigned. That's bad management and bad talent.

You blame management but likely that's an HR problem. Maybe you don't see a difference between HR and management, but saying bad management is like a catch all. It's so vague that it doesn't really mean anything.

I can tell you that as a manager it can be EXTREMELY difficult to fire people and that HR pretty much across the board is the worst thing in the world.

In the 90s and early 2000s everyone hated lawyers, but who they should really hate now is HR.

 

[Jinzo Prime]

That's a massive problem. And you have to realize that with 8% job cuts across SIE, if she still has a job, the cuts probably weren't deep enough and all evidence suggests that she still has a job.

I agree, I cannot see what value Alanah Pearce or others in the media bring to a studio like Sony Santa Monica. What expertise do they have that Sony doesn't already possess?

The influencers, private chefs, diversity experts, and endless layers of management are sucking up tons of money and time at these studios. They absolutely have to trim the fat.

 

[cormack12]

The problem is there is a concerted effort by people like Schreier to push 'prolonged periods of hard work' as crunch. The term really needs a proper definition. Like 3 consecutive periods of time where an employee is asked to work sixty or more hours a week. Pushing to get something as complex as a video game into production is always going to require a period where all teams overlap and push because the nature of games spawn very severe, interlinked dependencies. This is no different to a lot of other major projects or deadlines that people face. Spare a thought for those doctors and nurses who have to crunch every Friday or Saturday night in the ER when the weekend drunks pile into hospital, and they are required to do extra shifts, or can't leave their patients until handover is complete.

I agree that - as we see the experienced pioneers leave the field, either due to retirement or seeking other areas of interest - the standard of people coming through is not of the same quality in volume. The exceptional talent is being snapped up by the tier 1 studio's but there will only ever be a finite number of those at the top of the pyramid. Speaking broadly, when we see a lot of these companies pluggint heir gsame with dev interviewsd with free canteens, people rocking into work mid morning or walking round in their plaid shirts and khaki's it just looks like it's a campus rather than a place of work to me.

I am also a firm advocate of return to office (at least partially). Productivity is down pretty much everywhere. And this doesn't have to be a malicious 'blame the feckless and workshy' stance. What you lose from an office where everyone is together in close quarters can't even be remotely replaced via teams or IM. It just doesn't work in the same way. Everyone is blaming Covid for quality of games and delays, I think it would be better to explore what initiatives and policies were introduced during Covid and place them under more scrutiny. They were needed at the time during a period of great uncertainty but the truth is people are advocating for this because they know their personal situation is much better than previous. There is a balance to be found - maybe 5 days inb the office isn't the happy medium, but neither is always working from home.

I do agree about those online who try to turn any loose affiliation with video games into a chance to leapfrog into the industry. Whether that be prominent redditors, influencers or youtubers. Was ProZD really the best VA SSM could find for Ratatoskr for example, out of all the available and experienced talent? Was Yong Yea really the best mocap actor for a cameo in Spider-Man 2? Influencers were meant to cleanse the industry of an unpalatable and corrupt relationship between games outlets, journalists and publishers. Instead, they've actually created something far worse with a greater influence.

 

[Griffon]

AI is gonna be used a lot more to make up for the loss of people.

 

[Panajev2001a]

AI is gonna be used a lot more to make up for the loss of people.

In some cases to great results like GTA remastered hehe.

 

[Yoboman]

Job cuts are a response to a conservative stock market responding positively to companies laying off employees. Companies will return to hiring to fill the gap once the market situation flips back to growth focus

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Job cuts are a response to a conservative stock market responding positively to companies laying off employees. Companies will return to hiring to fill the gap once the market situation flips back to growth focus

Pretty much.

It’s no different than commodity markets. When the price of oil zooms the companies make a lot of money and they go on hiring sprees. When the price of oil shits the bed, the companies lays off people and oil projects go dormant.

Key difference is the typical oil worker isn’t loud on social media. And their livelihood is kind of out of their control as it’s based a lot on the spot price of oil which is also the same oil 50 other petroleum companies sell.

Gaming is different as they control their own game making and quality and timeliness releasing a game. They have a lot more control of their destiny.

 

[Alexios]

Crunch didn't go anywhere, just egregious cases corrected to save face.

 

[Zathalus]

Return of crunch culture and salary reductions would just lead to the game industry hemorrhaging more talent. Outside of California most game developer salaries are not that great anyways.

 

[Gaiff]

Crunch never left so how can it go away?

 

[three_muffins]

The answer is to force people to do unpaid work, or overwork them?

If a certain amount of work needs to be done, that means you (as an amployer) should pay for every single hour of work done. No matter if it is one person working 12 hours per day, or 3 people doing 4 hours of work!

[edit] If crunsh is another work for unpaid work, than f that shit. No game is worth that. Other than that it should not matter if one person does 12 hours of work or 2 people do 6 hours of work. Why is there a "need" for crunsh?

 

[crackajack]

That costs more money and the costs are unsustainable.

Crunch isn't sustainable for most people either. Some can do two weeks of extra hours and are already drained afterwards, some might do two months or whatever. But crunch burns out almost everyone and requires then some hiring circle, always getting new inexperienced people, new learning curves, new integration in the team and into the corporate work pipeline. You might milk young people of their most enthusiastic and cheapest years, but you never built the next Miyamoto when you have to change beginners all the time with new recruits before they can mature into some more senior roles and or turn some maybe great talent into some obedient worker bee that does their job, but with a murdered uncreative soul.
Crunch will always only work for some few weeks before release, ideally not even that should be required, since the next project needs also energized people and not people needing a few weeks of vacation and or working at half steam. Resulting in a looming delay already kickstarted at the very beginning.

 

[The artful mincer]

But Long term crunch isn't productive..... it's retarded.

It leads to mistakes, which leads to more crunch, which leads to burnout, which leads to quitting, which leads to rehiring, which leads to more training which leads to more crunch....

Saying crunch is productive is like saying weight training is more productive training 7 days a week as opposed to 4 days.

No 7 days will lead short term gain followed by overtraining, burnout and injuries.

 

[midnightAI]

Just curious OP, do you have any evidence of anything that you said or is it just 'its obvious' or 'just a hunch'? Not having a go, just wondering if you have any documents we can read, or insider info, or if you are a business analyst or anything. Just that with you saying it hasn't been reported in the news, just curious where you are getting your information from.

 

[StereoVsn]

Return of crunch culture and salary reductions would just lead to the game industry hemorrhaging more talent. Outside of California most game developer salaries are not that great anyways.

Yep. A decently competent software engineer working in gaming industry could probably leave and get 20-30% raise pretty much immediately.

And that would come with a lot less crunch time. Sometimes you have to work extra to push a project out the door, but that’s just more rare in normal industries (unless it’s Amazon or Google).

 

[Kenpachii]

What hasn't really been reported in all of this news about layoffs is that the return of crunch culture is going to return and I doubt when it does it will get anywhere close to the reporting it has recently.

Those who complain about crunch are going to be let go.

These layoffs are honestly just the start of a recalibration of salaries in the industry and a reanalysis of redundant positions. For example, you see a lot of community managers losing their jobs. Companies have to ask whether or not games need community managers and how much that augments game sales. In reality, it's probably a job you could have an intern do.

Games need to come out more polished and less bloated. I don't care about games being 20+ hours. Most of the best games I've ever played are 16 hours or shorter. This is especially true of single player games. These shorter games I've played multiple times over because there is no bloat to them. The most bloated part of Metal Gear Solid was the wolf mission and the key card, both were agonizing back then, but compared to the bloat in games today? I'll take it.

You can beat Super Metroid in 8 hours. Metal Gear Solid in 11.5.

Open world games have been one of the worst advancements in gaming, because not everyone puts the time into building them like Rockstar. Until AI can help fill out these worlds, the industry needs to take a step back from open world.

The original FF7 could be beat in 36 hours, and Square felt the need to extrapolate that in a remake which will cover at least 3 games and probably 120+ hours.

We need to return to tight story telling, tight gameplay mechanics, polished games that are ready for prime time on day 1.

Start playing more indie games mate.

 

[ADiTAR]

You blame management but likely that's an HR problem. Maybe you don't see a difference between HR and management, but saying bad management is like a catch all. It's so vague that it doesn't really mean anything.

I can tell you that as a manager it can be EXTREMELY difficult to fire people and that HR pretty much across the board is the worst thing in the world.

In the 90s and early 2000s everyone hated lawyers, but who they should really hate now is HR.

How is it HR problem? HR can give you options to choose from and the manager makes the decision according to merit of the person (as it should). The issue is most managers don't ask the right questions in an interview and don't trust their gut.

It's also management that needs to steady the ship of development, making sure things are on the right track, kill things early when they don't work, etc. It has nothing to do with HR.

 

[Ozriel]

Way too many people who got hired in the last 10 years should have ever been left near any kind of video game. It sucks that people are losing their jobs however I see this as purely course correcting.

Some of you people say this the time but there’s no basis for this.

Games need to come out more polished and less bloated. I don't care about games being 20+ hours. Most of the best games I've ever played are 16 hours or shorter. This is especially true of single player games. These shorter games I've played multiple times over because there is no bloat to them. The most bloated part of Metal Gear Solid was the wolf mission and the key card, both were agonizing back then, but compared to the bloat in games today? I'll take it.

Games are getting more complex. Hard to argue for more polish (which means more QA and dev time) while preaching for much shorter development times.

Open world games have been one of the worst advancements in gaming, because not everyone puts the time into building them like Rockstar. Until AI can help fill out these worlds, the industry needs to take a step back from open world.

And not everyone should have to put the time or detail Rockstar spends in their open world games. Thats something consumers need to know and realize. People shrieking about how every Open world game doesn’t have the level of detail and immersion as RDR2 are part of the problem.

Threads like this, for example

Opinion - Clickbait - Red Dead Redemption 2 and Grand Theft Auto 4 DESTROYS Cyberpunk 2077

When comparing Cyberpunk 2077 to CD Projekt RED's earlier success, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, it's easy to see how the latter trumps the former's immersion. It's a shame since the developer touted this to be a much deeper role-playing experience and even “that one last, big, exceptional looking...

www.neogaf.com

 

[Hohenheim]

This industry is so weird. Where else do you find fans "fighting" to make sure that folks don't work overtime.
I wish we had a Jason S in my line of work too! Or, no I really don't when I think about it..

 

[Boaty McBoatface]

What hasn't really been reported in all of this news about layoffs is that the return of crunch culture is going to return and I doubt when it does it will get anywhere close to the reporting it has recently.

Those who complain about crunch are going to be let go.

These layoffs are honestly just the start of a recalibration of salaries in the industry and a reanalysis of redundant positions. For example, you see a lot of community managers losing their jobs. Companies have to ask whether or not games need community managers and how much that augments game sales. In reality, it's probably a job you could have an intern do.

Games need to come out more polished and less bloated. I don't care about games being 20+ hours. Most of the best games I've ever played are 16 hours or shorter. This is especially true of single player games. These shorter games I've played multiple times over because there is no bloat to them. The most bloated part of Metal Gear Solid was the wolf mission and the key card, both were agonizing back then, but compared to the bloat in games today? I'll take it.

You can beat Super Metroid in 8 hours. Metal Gear Solid in 11.5.

Open world games have been one of the worst advancements in gaming, because not everyone puts the time into building them like Rockstar. Until AI can help fill out these worlds, the industry needs to take a step back from open world.

The original FF7 could be beat in 36 hours, and Square felt the need to extrapolate that in a remake which will cover at least 3 games and probably 120+ hours.

We need to return to tight story telling, tight gameplay mechanics, polished games that are ready for prime time on day 1.

Finished Tomb Raider 1 the other day, first time I've actually played it start-to-finish as an adult (as opposed to when I was a kid and just used cheats all the time) - I was shocked how 'short' the game felt, like in my head it was a super long epic. But honestly, it still feels 'AAA' and not like it was too short or low value for the price.

We need more games like this, 'short' but so well designed and tight.

The irony of using TR as an example is the fact Core went through horrible crunch and it even ruined marriages lol. Maybe we need another way to make games...

 

[MrRibeye]

Personal story:
It's really upsetting that our office HAS to be in downtown Los Angeles or in central London, because your God of Wars and Arkham Knights are built by balding dudes in their 40s who wear shorts and sandals. Those guys don't need to hangout in downtown LA. You could cut salaries in half and move the office to Boise, Idaho and our quality of life would improve.

To prove my point:
The Ferrari sports car factory is not in downtown Rome, but in the tiny village of Maranello, 5-hour drive away.
The European Space Operations Centre is not in London or Berlin or Paris, but it's in the small town of Darmstadt, Germany.

Just look at the office list of Riot Games.
^why do most studios have to be in downtown capital cities?

They should make a Riot Boise, and a Riot Wichita and not pay people 100K salaries because they need apartments in Singapore.

 

[rhodesianshepard]

The industry's answer to avoid crunch was hire more people and/or push games out in development time.

That costs more money and the costs are unsustainable.

The video game media led by Jason Schreier have fought a decades-long battle against crunch and they were winning that battle until these layoffs started to happen. They weaponized public sentiment that favored game developers over game publishers in order to obtain a policy victory. Especially with today's youth.

After multiple years of devastating layoffs (which aren't over mind you) crunch is back. Yeah, I think we'll see games get shorter again, but the key here is that game development time has to decrease and the hours people might have to throw into it will increase.

I created a topic back in September asking people how much they would pay for a game that they felt like was a 10/10 or 11/10. The vast majority said 70 dollars or less. The market can't handle more monetization and they know it. The result was layoffs.

The industry's answer to avoid crunch was hire more people and/or push games out in development time.

That costs more money and the costs are unsustainable.

The video game media led by Jason Schreier have fought a decades-long battle against crunch and they were winning that battle until these layoffs started to happen. They weaponized public sentiment that favored game developers over game publishers in order to obtain a policy victory. Especially with today's youth.

After multiple years of devastating layoffs (which aren't over mind you) crunch is back. Yeah, I think we'll see games get shorter again, but the key here is that game development time has to decrease and the hours people might have to throw into it will increase.

I created a topic back in September asking people how much they would pay for a game that they felt like was a 10/10 or 11/10. The vast majority said 70 dollars or less. The market can't handle more monetization and they know it. The result was layoffs.

Big AAA games are not unsustainable. And they are not what are causing massive layoffs. It is the smaller AAA and double AA games that are getting squeezed. This, imo, has more to do with the oversaturation of big AAA releases every year.

Just look at last year, pretty much every 100+ million dollar budget game sold incredibly well(Starfield, Zelda, Jedi Survivor, Resident Evil 4, Spider-Man 2). It's the smaller AAA games like Alan Wake 2, Immortals of Aveum, and Prince of Persia that are not selling

Square Enix president and one other major publisher(i forget) recently came out acknowledging this problem. They are going to focus on "quality over quantity". Big AAA games have no problem being greenlit, especially known IP's

For smaller AAA games, especially new IP's, I would be ok with them having shorter length. I would hope these games be at least 15+ hrs if they are selling for 70$, though

When it comes to Sony, it is mostly unsustainable with their current model. They are mostly struggling because COD, Fifa, and Fortnite are all on last gen consoles. So, not only are less PS5's being sold, but less people will buy their PS5 exclusives because of it. If they go PC day 1(sounds like they will), their games will easily sell 5-10million more copies, which would cover most of development costs. So even a 300+ million budget game wouldn't be much of a problem

 

[geary]

That's because gaming journalists aren't real journalists. They're hobbyists that were in the right place at the right time that and influencers.

They have an incestuous relationship with game publishers but especially game developers, and many of them hope to one day work on game development.

You'll see a lot of influencers turn into writers, consultants, or community managers.

Alanah Pearce and I don't mean to pick on her necessarily, but she has a communications degree. She became a "gaming journalist" and parlayed that into becoming an influencer. Then she got herself a job at one of the most prestigious studios in gaming... That's a massive problem. And you have to realize that with 8% job cuts across SIE, if she still has a job, the cuts probably weren't deep enough and all evidence suggests that she still has a job.

I'm not saying that someone needs a certain degree to get into the games industry, but you need a solid wall between journalism and the industry itself. You also need to have influencers take a much smaller role in the industry if any at all, but that is why we don't have e3 and big game showcases anymore, because they rely on influencers to peddle games. Mind you there is little to no disclosure by these influencers on what they've received in return.

In the era or social media, most of the companies don't need to have a marketing budget, because the word of mouth and a sponsorship to a streamer or a youtuber is way cheaper than having classical marketing campaigns. It a relationship in which neither of them come short, the streamer/youtuber/journalist company gets ads and traffic money for they channel and sometimes a boost in the popularity. On the other side, for few bucks the game/ dev company get unbelievable popularity.

None of them wants to alienate the relationship with the other. And because of this, we as a consumer wont get the real state of a game. It will be always overhyped or underhyped, or right out review bombed (for games which do not have the power of keeping up to date this kind of relationship).

 

[hemo memo]

How can it return when it never left to begin with?

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

is time to accept sony was a mistake all along

 

[DryvBy]

I said it originally when people complained about crunch. It's the NcDonalds worker demanding $20 an hour. You'll get it until the CEO can fire you to get cheap, robotic and automated labor. Crunch sucks but it's part of the gig.

 

[Beer Baelly]

Quadruple crunch

 

[The artful mincer]

Seriously anyone who's thinks Crunch is the answer to shipping games quicker is a brain dead simpleton.

What you think just doubling working hours doubles productivity!?

Why stop there let's triple working hours actually fuck that employees don't get to sleep they can do 172 hour weeks and ship a game in quarter of the time beacause that's how it works!

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Personal story:
It's really upsetting that our office HAS to be in downtown Los Angeles or in central London, because your God of Wars and Arkham Knights are built by balding dudes in their 40s who wear shorts and sandals. Those guys don't need to hangout in downtown LA. You could cut salaries in half and move the office to Boise, Idaho and our quality of life would improve.

To prove my point:
The Ferrari sports car factory is not in downtown Rome, but in the tiny village of Maranello, 5-hour drive away.
The European Space Operations Centre is not in London or Berlin or Paris, but it's in the small town of Darmstadt, Germany.

Just look at the office list of Riot Games.
^why do most studios have to be in downtown capital cities?

They should make a Riot Boise, and a Riot Wichita and not pay people 100K salaries because they need apartments in Singapore.

Certain kinds of industries usually gravitate to downtown slick offices in expensive cities..... entertainment, advertising agencies, big law offices, bank skyscrapers. It's probably a combo one part skill set needed and one part image to impress people. If the company has the money, go for it. If they dont, move to a cheaper place.

You'll notice the vast majority of giant retailer and manufacturing company head offices are in modest cities and not downtown. it might be in a big metro area and maybe in an expensive province or state, but very likely it'll be a suburban location which is a lot more cost effective than a downtown skyscraper at top dollar leasing costs. And if any kind of companies have money to burn making billions of profit it's these kinds of stable blue chip kinds of companies. Yet they still dont blow their wads of money on this kind of stuff.

 

[mckmas8808]

The industry's answer to avoid crunch was hire more people and/or push games out in development time.

That costs more money and the costs are unsustainable.

The video game media led by Jason Schreier have fought a decades-long battle against crunch and they were winning that battle until these layoffs started to happen. They weaponized public sentiment that favored game developers over game publishers in order to obtain a policy victory. Especially with today's youth.

After multiple years of devastating layoffs (which aren't over mind you) crunch is back. Yeah, I think we'll see games get shorter again, but the key here is that game development time has to decrease and the hours people might have to throw into it will increase.

I created a topic back in September asking people how much they would pay for a game that they felt like was a 10/10 or 11/10. The vast majority said 70 dollars or less. The market can't handle more monetization and they know it. The result was layoffs.

You are WRONG here! The battle against crunch were from developers themselves. It's a pure lie to make it seem like it was a fight that the media started. I can't believe we have gamers on gaming forums that like to lie like this. WTF is happening to everyday people today?

Are you serious man? Like for real.......are you saying this stuff just to get attention or do you honestly believe it?

 

[simpatico]

You are WRONG here! The battle against crunch were from developers themselves. It's a pure lie to make it seem like it was a fight that the media started. I can't believe we have gamers on gaming forums that like to lie like this. WTF is happening to everyday people today?

Are you serious man? Like for real.......are you saying this stuff just to get attention or do you honestly believe it?

Here's the thing about crunch: anyone who doesn't like it is free to leave the company mandating it. It's always 100% optional.

 

[mckmas8808]

Big AAA games are not unsustainable. And they are not what are causing massive layoffs. It is the smaller AAA and double AA games that are getting squeezed. This, imo, has more to do with the oversaturation of big AAA releases every year.

Just look at last year, pretty much every 100+ million dollar budget game sold incredibly well(Starfield, Zelda, Jedi Survivor, Resident Evil 4, Spider-Man 2). It's the smaller AAA games like Alan Wake 2, Immortals of Aveum, and Prince of Persia that are not selling

Square Enix president and one other major publisher(i forget) recently came out acknowledging this problem. They are going to focus on "quality over quantity". Big AAA games have no problem being greenlit, especially known IP's

For smaller AAA games, especially new IP's, I would be ok with them having shorter length. I would hope these games be at least 15+ hrs if they are selling for 70$, though

When it comes to Sony, it is mostly unsustainable with their current model. They are mostly struggling because COD, Fifa, and Fortnite are all on last gen consoles. So, not only are less PS5's being sold, but less people will buy their PS5 exclusives because of it. If they go PC day 1(sounds like they will), their games will easily sell 5-10million more copies, which would cover most of development costs. So even a 300+ million budget game wouldn't be much of a problem

Sony never said this for all PS5 games. Plus they have a vested interest in people buying games on the PS store and not on Steam. 1st party games they get 100% of the money on PSN. On Steam they only get 70%. Plus they get money selling PS controllers, PS Portals, PS+, PSVR2, etc.

Never forget that Sony makes more money from PS gamers on Playstation, than PC gamers buying 2 or 3 PS games on PC a year.

 

[Mibu no ookami]

You are WRONG here! The battle against crunch were from developers themselves. It's a pure lie to make it seem like it was a fight that the media started. I can't believe we have gamers on gaming forums that like to lie like this. WTF is happening to everyday people today?

Are you serious man? Like for real.......are you saying this stuff just to get attention or do you honestly believe it?

Losing a lot of respect for you as a poster.

Obviously, it came from developers themselves, but they used the media and public perception in order to win that policy battle. Who do you think leaked information to Jason Scheier?

 

[mckmas8808]

Here's the thing about crunch: anyone who doesn't like it is free to leave the company mandating it. It's always 100% optional.

True, but that's a terrible thing to set up as a company and industry. You'll end up losing your best workers over time, just because you are "forcing" them to work 16 hours a week for 2 years straight. This doesn't have to happen like this. Making games doesn't have to be this way.

Will short term crunch happen at times? Yes, but I feel like the type of crunch WE are talking about is the bad kind. The kind that............

- Crunch that doesn't pay people overtime money for extra hours worked
- Crunch that last for 6 months or more straight
- Crunch that lies to the employees on how long it'll take because the execs are horrible in project management
- Crunch that happens because a company simply doesn't want to hire the proper amount of people for the job.

 

[mckmas8808]

Losing a lot of respect for you as a poster.

Obviously, it came from developers themselves, but they used the media and public perception in order to win that policy battle. Who do you think leaked information to Jason Scheier?

I'm sorry you feel that way, but the way you wrote it was just bad. You made it seem as if it was a media creation. Go back and read how you wrote that. It wasn't fair what you said. So, thank you for understanding and stating that it was from the devs themselves first and foremost.

You tend to post a lot and people on GAF really like engaging with you, so it hurts when people like yourself start pushing an anti-media narrative that isn't needed. So, yes the devs did give information to the media to win a policy battle. In America, the media is the 4th estate. They are necessary to have a proper democracy and a proper society. They have a role to play and it was done well.

 

[The artful mincer]

-Crunch that doesn't pay people overtime money for extra hours worked
- Crunch that last for 6 months or more straight
- Crunch that lies to the employees on how long it'll take because the execs are horrible in project management
- Crunch that happens because a company simply doesn't want to hire the proper amount of people for the job.

The real slap in the cock is this type of crunch isn't even productive long term.

All the studios that are famous for crunching don't even release games in a timely manner I.e. Naughty Dog, CD project red and Rockstar etc.

 

[Wildebeest]

Crunch isn't important. What is important is tighter scope for games with clearer design vision and teams that pull in the same direction instead of all riding their own personal hobby horses into the sunset.

 

[Cyberpunkd]

. I don't care about games being 20+ hours. Most of the best games I've ever played are 16 hours or shorter.

Unfortunately for you the market thinks otherwise, which is a major contributor to huge budgets of modern videogames.

 

[Mibu no ookami]

I'm sorry you feel that way, but the way you wrote it was just bad. You made it seem as if it was a media creation. Go back and read how you wrote that. It wasn't fair what you said. So, thank you for understanding and stating that it was from the devs themselves first and foremost.

You tend to post a lot and people on GAF really like engaging with you, so it hurts when people like yourself start pushing an anti-media narrative that isn't needed. So, yes the devs did give information to the media to win a policy battle. In America, the media is the 4th estate. They are necessary to have a proper democracy and a proper society. They have a role to play and it was done well.

The way I wrote it? Do I have to spell everything out or can I assume that people on a gaming forum have some base level knowledge.

I specifically cite Jason Schreier and everyone knows he has made a career out of grievance and clickbait, much of that sourced from developers.

He is a parasite gaining financial security in the gaming industry, not acting as the 4th estate but rather by acting as toxic media. I doubt he cares about crunch. He cares about access. He has long complained about a lack of access in the industry. So how does he get additional access? He writes one sided stories that let individuals share their outrage and feelings about a subject without full context from any other sides.

This is well documented and anyone reading the thread knows that going in when he is used as an example.