-
Hey Guest. Check out your NeoGAF Wrapped 2025 results here!
Darksiders II dev: 'Working at Vigil was a nightmare'
- Thread starter vaelic
- Start date
ItWasMeantToBe19
Banned
The reaction in this thread is strange and seems more based on the liking of Darksiders then anything else. I wonder what the reaction to the Rockstar San Diego stories would have been if it came out after everyone loved Red Dead Redemption instead of before.
Haunted
Member
Even if he comes across as whiny (I don't really care about how he appears) - doesn't he have a point regardless? Disregarding the issues raised because of the tone of the messenger seems counterproductive.
The best part is that he didn't even get that. Fired and swept under the rug.
I don't know why it's bothering me so much in this thread, but yes.
whalleywhat
Member
Where was this?
The Faceless Master
Member
it's pretty normal in the gaming industry. it's something that really needs to change. there have been quite a few stories about this over the years. people who have been working since day 1 and left mere weeks before a game ships and they get no credit at all.
EternalGamer
Banned
No they don't. I was an overnight stocker at Walmart for a long time and I didnt put up with any of the kind of shit he describes. I have worked all sorts of shitty jobs at fast food, retail management, graduate assistant, etc. Unless you have a job that basically demands that you sleep at your desk with no job security and no credit for the work you do then you have no room for comparison.
GungHo
Single-handedly caused Exxon-Mobil to sue FOX, start World War 3
Not just a studio. Any IT department is going to have crunch times for projects, whether it's a small shop or a big corporation and whether business revolves around IT, energy, health care, waste management, government... you name it. We're all over-worked and over-stressed. There are no free rides in IT any more. It may seem like it's a nerd paradise, but nothing could be further from the truth.
Always-honest
Banned
yeah, well that's how you start making name for yourself.
It sucks, but in most cases it pays off later on.
The only way to avoid this is if everyone would protest... including the people in countries where they can renovate a house from what we make in a week.
It sucks, but in most cases it pays off later on.
The only way to avoid this is if everyone would protest... including the people in countries where they can renovate a house from what we make in a week.
this post doesnt have all the WII-u trash talking
EternalGamer
Banned
It it infuriates me that so many people in this thread have more empathy for a company brand whether it be Vigil, THQ or Wii U or even the game industry as a whole than they do for actual people.
It is absolutely fucking infantile to get more angry that a brand that you like is possibly being besmirched than you do do at the way people are being treated. Get your fucking priorities straight. I just hope the people making these comments are just narcissistic kids that will grow out of it and learn to to have actual empathy for other human beings. I don't mean that as a harsh judgement call but merely a state of life that is passed through. I know when I was just entering college I was pretty apathetic. At the time I just thought I had came to some sort of existential conclusion about how pointless it was to care about larger social issues or people in the abstract. I gradually realized I was just too immature in my thinking to be truly capable of putting myself in another person's shoes.
It is absolutely fucking infantile to get more angry that a brand that you like is possibly being besmirched than you do do at the way people are being treated. Get your fucking priorities straight. I just hope the people making these comments are just narcissistic kids that will grow out of it and learn to to have actual empathy for other human beings. I don't mean that as a harsh judgement call but merely a state of life that is passed through. I know when I was just entering college I was pretty apathetic. At the time I just thought I had came to some sort of existential conclusion about how pointless it was to care about larger social issues or people in the abstract. I gradually realized I was just too immature in my thinking to be truly capable of putting myself in another person's shoes.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=40971713&postcount=658
though i guess the reaction here is a combination of the US working body's indoctrinated self-hatred and rabid nintenthings in full panic mode.
hey_it's_that_dog
benevolent sexism
Thanks
Mackenzie 92
Member
Just cause you were fortunate doesn't mean everyone is. Millions of people work at thankless jobs with no job security and worse. Billions if you go worldwide. He's not special.
And I don't mean to be a jerk, but working as a night stocker at walmart doesn't really qualify you to say what other people's working conditions are like, and as you work more jobs and get more experience I think you will understand.
Pyrrhus
Member
Dude, based on your name, you're like, what? 19? 20? You have no idea what you're talking about.
Haunted
Member
He doesn't want to get credited because he assumes that the other guy completely reworks the UI... but then it turns out that UI ending up in the game is his after all and he feels he should get credited for his work.
It's really straightforward.
If the replies in this thread are any indication of where the US opinion is on that point... developers will continue to get fucked over and exploited by the corporations - and if anyone dares to cry out about the fact he/she will get ridiculed and bashed.
The stances shown here are so inhumane, I'm actually feeling disgusted right now. I'm out of this thread to cool down a bit.
Schweinehund
Member
I'm familiar with crunch time, it just seems like they're managed really bad to be overhauling the UI a month before launch, on a delayed game.
hey_it's_that_dog
benevolent sexism
He'll understand that because it's commonplace for corporations to treat their employees poorly and hope that they won't speak up out of fear for their reputations in the industry, employees should just lay down and take it?
Always-honest
Banned
I don't think that's true
hey_it's_that_dog
benevolent sexism
People telling him to shut up and stop whining and justifying it by saying it's common could be perceived as tacitly prioritizing corporate interests over human interests, don't you think?
EternalGamer
Banned
Go look at that other thread and all the people in a huff because he said something that may not seem nice about the Wii U. Or even the first page of this one.
For many people the Wii U comments seemed to bother them far worse than anything that was going on with the actual people working there.
That's my way of understanding it. Outside of them being just simply incapable of real human empathy or not actually reading the article, I have no other way of explaining their attempt to defend the type of treatment that guy and others received.
And though I shouldn't need to even say this, I love Darksiders and I bought Darksiders 2 and am looking forward to playing it. But that is completely separate issue from how the devs were treated.
whalleywhat
Member
Interesting, thanks. I noticed similar comments in the Kamiya thread, which I thought were just laughable, but the first page of this thread is a shitstorm of anti-whistleblower sentiment.
Flachmatuch
Member
No, it could also be people just being honest.
Edit: Okay some people here are starting to get on their high horses.
hey_it's_that_dog
benevolent sexism
Being honest about what? Their prioritizing of corporate interests over the individual?
I don't really understand how your response relates to my statement.
Do developers want a union?
I understand what you mean, and yes, I agree he should have been credited.
Still, he gave it up, and this seems to me that it's one of the things in life you cannot simply claim back...
I hope he knows we are just joking about that... At least I am. Ive seen people take the metric stuff and his other examples seriously. But I dont think I have ever seen anyone mention the bagged milk thing in a serious context.
It would depends on who you speak to, as with all things.
Being honest that IT, programming and creative work on this level are hard jobs. You are going to have crunch time, You are going to work overtime and there is no guarantee that you will work at one studio until you die. Especially if once you leave a studio, you throw everyone under the bus. If I was hiring at a studio, especially on a WiiU game I would never touch this guy. He is burning bridges
Pointing that out is not elevating corporate interests. it's just a fact.
Teletraan1
Banned
Can you please multiquote these comments please. I am having a hard time finding more than a few posts out of 79 that were really negative towards the guy or even defending this practice. Most of the posts were realists and said yeah this industry sucks for any sort of rights in the workplace. We had someone ask if this is a good idea to publicly bash a previous employer. The rest of the posts are people like you with hyperbolic comments like shitstorm of anti-whisteblower sentiment.
Really shitty trend here on GAF. 1 or 2 idiots make a quick comment and they get quoted 100 times and "the thread has gone to shit"
Lostconfused
Member
To be fair they might have a point. Because bagged milk is almost as awful as some of the comments being throw around in this thread.
EternalGamer
Banned
I don't understand what is unprofessional about it. He actually speaks highly about the talent of the people on the team and he even gives an argument in favor for the guy that replaced him and "promised them the moon." He came off as pretty fair in my opinion. He avoids dragging other people into it out of respect for their privacy and he mainly only talks about his own experience. He even wishes the company and the game well.
captainnapalm
Member
Does anyone else find it amazing that an AAA title decides to completely overhaul its UI 30 days before release? You'd think with the millions of dollars at work here these things wouldn't be left so last minute.
Kind of explains why some games often feel unfinished. Kind of flying by the seat of their pants.
Kind of explains why some games often feel unfinished. Kind of flying by the seat of their pants.
the point that he even posted it. Trust me.
Actions speak louder than words to me, and starting a union is not very hard. Sony Imageworks is trying to do so right now. Any of the dozens of new iOS and mobile startups that we are constantly being told is better for the industry, even in this interview could start a union. No one has.
WTF is this shit? How did people manage to transform this into a nationalist debate?
Haunted, it is indeed straightforward: He asked not to be credited based on an assumption he made entirely on his own. If Vigil had promised him that his work would be redone, it stands to reason that he would've mentioned that key fact. Since he didn't, we can assume that he wasn't promised anything and he just asked not to be credited. Your entire argument thus far has been based on the premise that he was shafted out of a credit; now that it's clear that this was his own choice, why are we here again? What is the controversy worthy of labeling people as inhumane?
Seriously, what is the controversy?
Flachmatuch
Member
Yes, it's super easy, this is why so many people are in unions and union membership is increasing so much all the time. All the union-friendly legislation passed in the past decade or two also helps. /o\
whalleywhat
Member
No, I'm not going to pull a bunch of posts. I found 5 that backed up my point within the first 10. I regard telling somebody who complains about their workplace conditions to shut up as anti-whistleblower. I regard celebrating the fact that somebody who makes these kinds of complaints will face troubles with future employment as anti-whistleblower. So maybe we're stumbling over definitions.
Why?
Why are people not allowed to speak out against company practises? Why must he pretend that everything went well for him, it clearly did not? He no longer works there and wants the share how difficult the process was for him, a process almost all of us know nothing really about.
The gaming community's stance on anyone not liking something, anything about making a game and the challenges and unfair ways that are there is absurd. Gamers can openly complain about the games they play but developers cannot complain about the games they develop.
hey_it's_that_dog
benevolent sexism
Ok, I get you. I agree that his way of handling this is probably not serving him well. However, how do you propose an employee who feels abused should express it? Even if he said this stuff more politely, saying it publicly is, essentially, burning bridges, throwing people under the bus, etc. These complaints have to be made public, in my view. A corporation is not entitled to treat people badly and enjoy secrecy about it as well.
What do you see as the professional approach?