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Making Video Games Is Not a Dream Job (nytimes.com)
The video game industry is richer than it has ever been. Its revenue in 2018 was $43.8 billion, a recent report estimated, thanks in large part to hugely popular games like Fortnite and Call of Duty. These record-breaking profits could have led one to think that the people who develop video games had it made. But then the blood bath began. From a story, shared by an anonymous reader: In February, Call of Duty's publisher, Activision Blizzard, laid off 8 percent of its staff, or nearly 800 workers, in a cost-cutting massacre. A few weeks later, the game studio ArenaNet cut dozens of positions, while smaller layoffs hit companies like Valve and the digital store operator GOG. And just last week, the video game giant Electronic Arts announced that it was laying off 350 people across the globe.
This brutal start to 2019 followed the closures of major game companies like Telltale, the makers of games based on The Walking Dead, and Capcom Vancouver, the large studio behind the popular action series Dead Rising in 2018. All in all, thousands of video game workers have lost their jobs in the past 12 months. In many of these cases, laid-off employees had no idea what was coming. One developer at a major studio told me in February that he and his colleagues had been crunching -- putting in long hours, including nights and weekends -- for a video game release, only to be suddenly told that security was waiting to escort them off the premises.
Worker exploitation has always been part of the video game industry's DNA. Executives with multimillion-dollar stock packages often treat their employees like Tetris pieces, to be put into place as efficiently as possible, then promptly disposed of. For many kids who grew up with controllers in their hands, being a game developer is a dream job, so when it comes to talent, supply is higher than demand. Some people who make video games receive decent salaries and benefits (experienced programmers at the richest studios can make six figures), but many do not.
This brutal start to 2019 followed the closures of major game companies like Telltale, the makers of games based on The Walking Dead, and Capcom Vancouver, the large studio behind the popular action series Dead Rising in 2018. All in all, thousands of video game workers have lost their jobs in the past 12 months. In many of these cases, laid-off employees had no idea what was coming. One developer at a major studio told me in February that he and his colleagues had been crunching -- putting in long hours, including nights and weekends -- for a video game release, only to be suddenly told that security was waiting to escort them off the premises.
Worker exploitation has always been part of the video game industry's DNA. Executives with multimillion-dollar stock packages often treat their employees like Tetris pieces, to be put into place as efficiently as possible, then promptly disposed of. For many kids who grew up with controllers in their hands, being a game developer is a dream job, so when it comes to talent, supply is higher than demand. Some people who make video games receive decent salaries and benefits (experienced programmers at the richest studios can make six figures), but many do not.
Essentially game development is now using a engine (like Unreal, etc) and hooking up scripts and creating assets. That is why so many "big" games look like clones at this point.
If everyone and their dog want to do it, then there's lots of cut-throat competition and employers know they can treat you like crap. My relative found this out in the clothing designer industry.
Table-ized A.I.
Technically it could still be a dream job. Not all dreams are enjoyable.
"Worker exploitation has always been part of the EVERY industry's DNA"
There, FTFY
Bad headline.
Making video games CAN be a dream job.
But, probably not if you are doing so for a huge company. That's the same with almost any work that can be pleasurable, until you mix in a giant organization you have to please with a million bosses above you who all have a say.
The thing is, there has never been a better time to be a game developer and make games in a very small (sometimes just yourself) company.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I hear lots of kids say that they want to be game developers because they like to play games and they need a job when they're adults.
These same kids may enjoy fishing too (some of them get outside...) but very few have aspirations of becoming commercial fishermen. Somehow they know that's a very rough job that's not for most people.
*Anybody* considering a career really needs to think through the work/life balance and pay, from clerk to physician, and do their research. Somehow I don't think most gamers ever do that when they decide to go to school to be a game dev.
I've told a few high-schoolers about EA Widows and they were really surprised to hear it.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
But that's like ~SocIALisM~ bruh, we'll all slip down a slope where innovation stops and every video game is basically the same.... oh wait.
I always give younger people starting out their careers the same general advice that I was given and subsequently failed to heed as early as I should have: Find something you are good at and seek a job in whatever industry needs that skillset and will allow you to develop it further. Basically, I try to tell them to keep their "passion" for a particular cause or industry at bay, and develop their skills and resume instead. This is for two reasons.
1) You aren't going to become CEO of Sustainable Tech Incorporated because you loved what they stood for so much you took a job in the mail room. Sorry, it just isn't going to happen.
And, 2) You will learn to appreciate the benefit that different industries provide, and how just being good at something helps out your coworkers and customers.
The video games industry is notorious for running sweat shops that prey on the young and naive, people who would do better to find a steady, "boring" gig with a 401k and reasonable chances for advancement. Maybe something union, if that floats your boat.
The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
My interest ended when it was no longer possible for a single programmer (or a very small group) to make games anymore. When I was a kid growing up with my Atari 400 and Apple II I dreamed of possibly being able to come up with a new game idea, programming it, and getting it published somewhere. However by the time I was in college and getting my computer science degree I realized that those days were long over and games were far too complex to make by yourself. Not to mention the whole industry had changed drastically by that time becoming the meat grinder it is today.
Personally I don't know why anyone would want to make games for a living anymore. Even if you don't mind the grueling hours, crappy management, and relatively low pay, it sucks the fun out of what you used to enjoy.
When the hiring manager has starry-eyed young hopefuls lined up out the door and around the block, who view a game developer job as the culmination of their lifelong dream, of course working condition will be shit. Because you're all easily replaceable. So you put in unpaid overtime during crunch time and get laid off after the product ships. Contrast this to someone who does non-glorified skilled work and has a reliable job and decent work/life balance.
Game testers are treated even more like garbage, often they are employed by a separate company, and crammed into the basement for minimum wage.
This really isn't specific to the gaming industry.
My first job (printer company) I lost because we were acquired and they wanted to cull the herd.
My second job (storage company) I lost because we outsourced everything.
My third job (HPC company) I lost because our CEO was an idiot and ran the company into the ground.
My fourth job (storage company) I lost because we bought our biggest competitor, put them in charge of my division, and then strangely we took the brunt of the cuts.
experienced programmers at the richest studios can make six figures
Experienced programmers pretty much anywhere should be making six figures. If they're not, they're probably being taken advantage of.
This is hardly a new problem or something that people haven't been aware of for decades. The EA Spouse blog is almost 15 years old at this point and its the same story.
With the rise of Steam and in a broader sense digital distribution itself, there's no reason you can't make your own game. Minecraft became one of the biggest and most successful games of all times. More recently, Stardew Valley has sold millions of copies, and it too was made by an independent developer. You can even make big 3D games thanks to things like Kickstarter. Kingdom Come Deliverance raised money through crowdfunding and produced a title that's similar in scope to an Elder Scrolls games, so you're hardly limited to just 2D sprite graphics. I think Star Citizen raised more than any other Kickstarter project ever.
So if you think working for the man sucks, then quit and start your own company, make your own game, and be the one to reap the rewards of your own effort.
In order to have a middle class life - support a family of four ( own a house, own a car, health insurance (and dental & vision), retirement savings), all on a single income requires a six figure salary in most places in the USA.
My grandfather did all that ( a family of seven!) on a BLUE COLLAR pay check - and all he had was a ninth grade education.
What's different? Aside from the fact that there were more opportunities back then and that about 10% of people went to college (and college was much cheaper back then), he was in a union.
The union made sure people got training, acted as a buffer for technology changes, and made sure management didn't abuse the workers too much. I'm not saying it was perfect but it was better than today.
Back then, they had stakeholder capitalism. Everyone - investors, workers, local residents (government) - had a say in the company.
Now it's all investors' interests and everyone else can go screw. Wealth rules - everyone else drools.
Miner wants to destroy the local environment and pollute the drinking water and destroy the fisheries downstream?
It's all good. Pretest and then you hate: jobs, capitalism, and America! Tough shit if the residents of that mining town have to drink bottled tap water out of plastic bottles.
Stakeholder capitalism = good.
Shareholder capitalism = evil.
Working long hours for a company that doesn't give a shit about you is strictly for suckers. Get in at 8:30, leave at 5:30, take an hour for lunch. Go home and enjoy the money you make. Encourage everyone else to do the same. You will be fine.
-- Give me ambiguity or give me something else!
It _can_ be part of massive companies, but there's plenty of companies people actually like working for.
But that is equally true of companies that make video games - some can be great to work for.
It's kind of absurd to claim video game jobs are bad, when what we are all rather obviously saying is "working under EA is bad". Why not just say that rather than trying to mislead someone who may want to develop games for a living?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Exactly, if a few people start letting the companies exploit them like that then the companies will start to perceive it as normal and expected.
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This is why I only play indy games these days. I get more fun out of Rimworld, Cataclysm, & Dwarf Fortress as I ever did out of any of the AAA games spewed out these days.
Grandfather had a 1200 sqft house.
1 car
B/W TV or no TV
Radio
You can EASILY do that on min wage or slightly more in most of US. What you are bitching about is big screen TV, Netflix, Hulu, 3 cars, going out drinking multiple times a week, multiple cell phones, and on and on.
Compare apples to apples. You don't need a 3000 sqft house otherwise you DO need six figure.
Not all game developers are game programmers. Artists, animators, designers, audio engineers, they're all game developers, too. Many statistics that talk about game developers could be better broken out by discipline. Programmers are the highest paid of all the game development disciplines, and at senior levels they're comparable to other fields. I don't mean the trend of "senior" being applied to someone with three years experience, I'm referring to people with a decade or more of work experience working at established companies.
At the junior levels --- where there is more supply than demand and many young eager applicants are willing to work for exploitative companies --- programmers are often paid less than similar industries. There are many bad companies who churn-and-burn. This means a large number of junior developers have bad experiences because those abusive companies churn through so many.
At senior levels --- where demand is greater than supply and workers are generally savvy enough to not be exploited by the abusive companies --- pay rates are good. They're not investment banker or well funded Internet Startup good, but on par with programmers in many other industries.
The good companies that pay well also tend to grow slowly and have low turnover, meaning people are secure in their higher paying jobs, but the openings are less common (because of the low turnover) so they are less visible.
The "six figures" comments others are making are location specific and misleading. $100K in Silicon Valley is not a living wage. $100K in Des Moines is high. £100K in Yorkshire is an amazing rate.
//TODO: Think of witty sig statement
Some years back there used to be a (US?) print magazine titled "Game Developer Magazine". It existed from 1994 to 2013. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
I read it at the time because of a general interest in programming and computer games. I didn't ever really expect to get a job doing it. And reading that magazine didn't really change that expectation...
There was basically about three kinds of articles they generally had:
--One was about new game hardware, software or related tech coming soon.
--One was called "Post Mortem" where after a game was released, they would have a manager talk about all the major problems they had along the way.
--The last was general management articles about running computer game production.
From reading this magazine occasionally for a couple years I gathered two things:
1. Many people who got hired to code were recent college grads in LA or Austin TX, who really just took the job to put something on their resumes. The lower coding jobs were low salary and long hours with little benefits, and they left as soon as they found anything better.
2. There were constant problems with employee turnover. Many articles were about how to set up content management systems so that it was as easy as possible to get new people up to speed and working productively.
I often wondered who the target audience for this magazine really was. From reading it, working at a game company really didn't sound like much of a dream job.
I spent over 13 years in Game Development, with Paradigm Entertainment, Ensemble Studios, Microsoft then my own company. Looking back, it was a terrible career decision. It was non-stop death marches, many co-workers had ridiculous egos, by the time you shipped, you hated the game. I should write a book. I would not recommend anyone game development as a career to anyone. The budgets required for a triple A title can only be financed by corporations, and they expect you to live at work. It is a lifestyle. If you do go into game development, go to work for Microsoft so there is lateral mobility.
Okay, put aside things like EA Widows and excessive overtime and layoffs. Take those things off the table entirely and ask the question: is game development a dream job?
Answer (unsurprisingly): no. It's a job. It's a job with slightly different parameters than normal programming, but I've been doing this for over 15 years, and I use the same tools most other programmers do (emacs, Visual Studio, a PC) and I work on teams with other programmers, I have to live with the decisions of managers that I disagree with, etc. Particularly as a developer of AAA games, it's not much different than when I worked at an oil company. A lot of the development is not very interesting. It's just code, man. Occasionally you get to scratch a creative itch, but most of the time it's just the same programming that you do anywhere else. (Except, usually, the pay is worse.)
There are some things that are better about the games industry than other industries. You might actually have fans of your work, people will find out about a game you made and express some joy they had in playing it. People are always interested in your job, and you get to mingle with artists and animators and writers.
But don't come to this industry expecting like it's not work just because the end product is entertainment. Think about what it really means to have a 'dream job'. You probably won't change the world here, or get rich, or become influential. If you're lucky, you'll work on a decent project with decent people, get paid passably well and make something that other people find entertaining or useful. Just like any other job.