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Work Environment for Game Developers Must Change
Christopher Reimer writes "C|Net is reporting from the GDC that the video game industry will have to improve its work environment as the working population gets older and unionization becomes an issue. From the article: 'Numerous studies have shown that developers and other workers putting in 12-hour days routinely make more mistakes as the midnight oil burns, said Francois Dominic Laramee, a freelance game developer and author. That means any extra productivity is eaten up by hits to product quality. "If your company is in crunch mode, drunken zombies may be checking your code right now," he said.'"
Not even remotely true. I work for Lockheed Martin, as a software engineer no less, and we have a union that gets us all kinds of good stuff. Unpaid overtime, for example, is strictly forbidden. Admittedly, I'm told Lockheed was already pretty good to their workerbees to begin with (I wouldn't know - I've only been with the company for a few months), but engineers can and do unionize. With the way game developers get creamed, it's bound to happen sooner or later.
That's standard everywhere in the tech industry.
When I got started working in the video game industry six years ago, crunch time was usually for a few weeks every three months or so. Now it's crunch time all the time and you're lucky to get a vacation for longer than a few days.
The video game industry has a history of burning through people from when they come in at 20 until they leave at 30. I honestly don't know if I could another job testing video games since I'm 35 and I'm not willing to work 80 hours for months on end. The best and the brightest typically leave the industry after 10 years. It's no wonder we have shovelware instead of good quality games.
You do have a good point there. But on the flip side, how many people do you know that do jobs like that for 20 hours a day, for several weeks at a time?
I know several nurses. In and of itself, it can be very demanding work, both physically and mentally, especially depending on what subfield one goes into. However, even with the great shortage of nurses, they do not have to work overtime.
Some of the game programmers I know have to though. And it isn't the fact that the work is fundamentally different. It's the fact that working conditions like this (18-20 hour days, for several weeks) are extremely detrimental to a person's health.
The wife of a ex-gametester has talked to me about visiting the company during crunch time. People there would be wearing jackets and several comforters off of beds, while they were working in a normal temperature room. Do you know why? Because they had been awake and working for so long, there body was starting to shut down. They could no longer produce sufficient body heat.
Anyone who says that the video game industry doesn't need to change, or that makes light of the problems in it doesn't fully realize what those problems are, and how drastically major changes are needed.
Death marches (as they're affectionately known) aren't "I'm in the groove and can't possibly stop" all night coding binges. They suck the life out of you. You're typically fighting lots of bullshit (the same BS that got you behind schedule in the first place) and your morale is drained because you're never, ever on time. You're asked to the impossible; not a "I'll just work really, really hard" impossible, but "even if I never take breaks to eat, sleep, or use the restroom I'll never make that dealine" impossible. This isn't cool and the sign of a vibrant programming population. Death marches are typically the the sign of large, beaurocratic, grossly mismanaged companies with terribly managers, a complete lack of plans, and no real hope of accomplishing anything.
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Isn't that attitude the reason that so many games are buggy pieces of crap with half the promised features missing?
Unless you're writing VBA for a living, software development is a mentally challenging process. It's physically not possible to keep up the same rate of coding for 20 hours. Your brain needs time to relax and process data.
Personally, I tend to come up with better solutions to problems a few hours after I stop working on them and my subconcious has had time to process.
Crunch coding is not only a bad idea for the workers, it's bad for the company too.
There are many fields of game development that could and should probably be covered by the IATSE. Audio editing and sound design (an area especially close to me) is one. Union sound editors are covered in a contract when they work for TV and Film hiring union labor. As yet, there is no union for game audio editors and sound designers. Should it fall under Local 700? Or should there be a new union of Interactive Entertainment Employees? I don't know, really ... just pay me for what I do. And well, please.
*AppleTRON*
Sure, doctors and nurses work 12+ hour shifts. They even do it for 3-4 days at a time. However, they then get a day or two where they don't have to come in to work at all.
Game developers on the other hand, get to work 12+ hour shifts, 7 days a week, for weeks on end.
And for the people out there who say, "You aren't doing 'hard' work like digging ditches!", I say, "You're right, I'm not digging ditches. If I were digging ditches, I'd work a 6-8 hour shift, 5 days a week, with paid overtime."
false alarm, there's still hordes of sharp young'uns beating down the door trying to replace your lazy ass.
dont go into the game industry expecting a nice cushy job. expect hell, like fending off the fifth of all computer science students who would probably kill to get a gaming industry job.
definately an exagguration, but i imagine google and pixar to be the only similarly employer-driven markets out there.
-Myren