The former 343 employee uploaded another video. Watch it on your own to get a better understanding of the context, in short though, he's not happy with the rough translation posted here and what the media made out of that. He regrets to make the first video, he says that working at 343 was an "happy experience" for him and he does not agree what the made made out of that for clicks.
- "Were there rough days? Sure. Most game jobs have rough days. People I know work really hard on the game. Because we care."
- "Slipspace is getting better every day. People are working really hard. You can achieve amazing graphical results. More features are getting added, performance is getting better, I'm sure it has improved even more after I left."
- He never once was forced to crunch. "Many of us just want to go the extra mile to do the best we can (...) because we care"
- He also says the new working-from-home environment does not always allow people to work within their usual schedule (kids at home etc.)
- in general he often says "people here care (for Halo)"
- He's especially mad about the media taking one sentence of a 15min video. He says there is no studio-wide crunch culture at 343 and once again says he never was forced to crunch once. If you crunched or went hard because you wanted to or needed to reach a deadline, "you are allowed to take a day off to decompress"
- He's very genuine in the way he expresses the things above, the videos he creates are meant to be positive
I hope he's fine with me trying to summarise it like that in a better way, but at the end of the day, if you want the full context, watch the video. The video is good and honest and is also a big blow towards click-bait media sites.
I posted this in the 343 thread, if anyone didn't have the chance to watch the video (which you should):
He hasn't been able to sleep or eat because of the stress of news sites and channels miss-attributing quotes and publishing partial/misleading forum quotes to him. He's worried that people at 343 are going to think he's smearing them because of this misreporting, while also being worried about what his future employers might think about it.
Direct video quotes:
"All because people took a few sentences out of the contexts of a 15mins long video, wrote about an article about it for clicks."
Clarifying the video :
"So I wanted to make this video, to clarify some of the things in other video I shared. To bring some actual context to the things people partially translated and quoted on. So the very first things I need to say and I said it in my last video, is that I do not represent 343. Everything is my own opinion, I shared my own experience working at 343 and it was overall a very happy experience. I am not and shouldn't be a Halo news source , I repeat I am not and should not be a Halo news source. I am one employee in this big development team, my experience does not represent everyones experience there. I live in Washington state, I love it here. But my experience with Washington state is not going to be the same as my experience next door. The same thing applies here, some people might have better experience than I do and some people might have it worse I don't know. I can't speak for everyone at 343, secondly my knowledge of the project is limited. Even though I work on this game, I don't know everything about it. I can share with you my overall experience, but that is not going to be the full story. I don't even know everyone in the studio, either way no one should take a single experience from a single former employee to judge the whole studio and their game. That's not fair and genuine, I was genuinely happy when I was at 343. If it was that bad I wouldn't stay for 8 years, where there rough days? sure most job have rough days. I stated in the video, that I was very grateful to do what I do. People I know work very hard for the game because we care, I left 343 because it was time for me to move on. The 343 "baggage" I was talking about, is the fact that I will not be able to work on any other IP as long as I'm at 343. I want to try new things, and with 343 I can't and thats fair because Halo is the only IP they're working on. I left 343 in a good term, there was no bad blood. I mentioned in the video that I all most cried on my last walk in the studio because I'm really... really going to miss the place and the people there.
On project ambition/content cutting :
The articles also mentions that I said the game is overly ambitious and stuff, do I think the game was overly ambitious? yes. But that is my opinion, was I sad that some of the work I did got cut? sure, but that happens to almost every form of entertainment, movies, tv shows, events and video games you name it. We watch the deleted scene from good movies all the time, this shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. While I didn't make any of the decisions, we can all agree that is better to have a good solid game without fillers. I remember watching a deleted scene from Revenge of the Sith, that scene is about Yoda arriving at Dagoba. In the DVD the person who work on the shot felt really sad that this shot got cut from the final movie, he said he actually begged George Lucas to put that in the movie but it got cut. It's the same thing here, the contents being cut in the game. This does not mean they do it on purpose to upset the artist, this happens all the time in video games and movies and television shows and so on.
On the "masterpiece" comment :
The forum and the press mentioned don't expect it to be a masterpiece and the reason I say that is because we are in the age of games that can get hyped up so much and fans starting to have unrealistic expectation about it. It does not mean it's not going to be a good game, I said it in the video I still look froward to play it and I will always support game because I know how hard people worked on it. We got good writers working on it, the story is going to be great. Semi- open world is going to be fun, in my video I just suggest that the audience should have an open mind going into this video game after all it is the very first time Halo in a semi-open world form. it might not check all the checkboxes that you have for the game, but it can still be a good game.
On the engine (SlipSpace) comments :
And about the engine, some article says I said the engine is defective. This is a misleading way to saying this, what I said is that engine still needs updates. There are still improvements to be made and again that happens to every game engine. Unreal 4 still have updates and patches despite them already announcing unreal 5 already and that is an engine thats been here for decades. I stated in the video that the Halo engine is getting better every day, everybody is working really hard on it. It can achieve amazing graphical result, everyone is working hard to implement new features in it. Performance is getting better, I'm certain it will improve even more after I left.
On the crunch comments :
And finally the crunch, this is what upset me the most. It is one sentence in a 15 mins long video, which wasn't even a point of the video and that got brought out to be the headline of these articles. I really need to clarify that I never said that there was a constant crunch, nor did I say I was forced to crunch in the video. Everyone crunch for a different reason, some could be the deadline sure. But many of us just want to go the extra mile to do the best we can, sometime an artist like me got into a zone and they just want to continue. I some time got really into what I was working on and I forgot to eat and I was eager to finish while I had the momentum going. I didn't want to stop creative juices from flowing, when ever that happens an artist could easily loose their sense of time and keep in mind we have been working from home for over a year now. Lots of time I wasn't able to focus on work during the day fully because kids are running around, I have to do tech support because they're doing remote learning. Sometime I need to go help out in the kitchen because dinning out wasn't really safe. So often I start to focus on after the kids are asleep, which is around 9pm so I work through midnight very easily. Either way I really need to clarify that I wasn't forced to crunch and It's definitely not a constant thing. But the press make it look like 343 has a crunch culture and that really made me mad because everyone have different experience. some people do crunch a little bit more than the other, but that is not across the studio and that is not happen constantly. People who work in 343 including myself are allowed to take a personal day off to decompress and spend time with family. Think about it if I really crunch for a project every single day how in the world do I have time to keep this Youtube channel running and another channel on BilliBilli? The purpose I said my colleague and I had experienced working over midnight is because I want to show people that we care about this project, we are passionate about it. Maybe sometime we do need to hit the deadline, but that is a very rare thing for me for the past eight years I was there. once again I can only speaK for my self, I don't speak for other employee or their schedule. So don't just take what I said in my personal experience and apply it to the whole studio. It doesn't work like that.
Press/channel coverage of the partially translated and misleading forum post/translation :
So, I understand that big game websites and channels need content to run, you want to get more clicks. I understand as I am running a youtube channel myself, but to take a partially translated forum post and run a full article on it is not responsible and honestly is pretty lazy because things I shared in that video nobody, no press, no creator reached out to me personally to get more context. I actually sent email message to some of the websites and the youtube creators wanting to offer more context for what I said and neither of them got back to me. Why is that? it really made me upset that my video which was intended for positivity and encouragement, somehow turned into this. If you're working with the press or running a game news channel please be responsible with your source. And if you're a halo fan take my word with a pinch of salt because as I can not talk for everyone in a huge project in a studio like this."
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