You said six days x 12 hrs. I said 12 hr days, no mention of six days a week. What are you talking about? This is the last reply to you I will make.
You said six days x 12 hrs. I said 12 hr days, no mention of six days a week. What are you talking about? This is the last reply to you I will make.
It's not a cop out.
There's nothing wrong with wanting to play the game, buying the game, and yet continuing to call Rockstar out on their bullshit.
People are more inclined to care and emphasize more with someone who could be their neighbors, family, or even themselves, than situations in other countries. Not to mention that this discussion we have more power and sway in not buying this game than not buying a phone.
This type of rhetoric is really stupid to be honest. It's like saying "why care about your government when others are so much worse, double standard much???" It completely misses the point.
It's totally a cop out. It's 100% totally supporting the shitty practices of Rockstar, but he can feel like his conscience is clean because he admonished the practice on a public forum.
Not when the only people it will impact are those who have done all this overtime. If the boycott is to show solidarity for the workers but the workers are saying please don't boycott, then I'm gonna listen to those staff.
Obviously Rockstar need pulling up on this and the best way is to 1: unionise. 2: keep pulling them on their shit and the industry as a whole until it listens. They're (R*) obsessed with their own image and PR, the more this keeps in the conversation the more they will probably look into making changes.
I explained why.
If you think it is, elaborate as to why instead of just asking "how is it not?"
The more we educate ourselves about the environment these games were made in and decry said conditions, the more pressure gets put on these companies to change.
I mean, I don't feel like the burden is on me to explain why absolving yourself from supporting a company who's labor practices you are against enough to speak out on is a cop-out.
If you're gonna make it a point to continue to ask the question after someone's laid out their perspective, yeah, the burden is on you. Otherwise, why am I talking to you? Lol and that's not an insult. Just not sure what it is you want here.
And yes, that pressure. Which is the reason they've already made some change since the days of GTA IV and Red Dead. Enough change? Hell nah. But a step in the right direction. And no one is satisfied with it, which is why we're still talking about it. Which is why they've relaxed their social media practices with employees. Which is why they've started having conversations about needing to better lay out what they expect from employees during crunch. Which is why they're spending time they want to be using marketing their blockbuster game responding to the questions people are demanding they answer to.
No one's absolving Rockstar of anything here. They run a shitty ship, and they need to change, now, but acting like us pushing the conversation forward on social media is good for nothing is intellectually dishonest.
Maybe your fielding a lot of replies, but I never saw you lay out a perspective other than it's okay to buy and play it and complain on social media about thier labor - some people seem to think a boycott could hurt the employees more than it wouldn't (which doesn't sound like it's based in any proof, as this is not an unskilled labor pool in a sweathshop in Bangladesh). Is that your perspective?
I'm not working in video game development. But isn't that hard for people at higher position with all that experience and knowledge of efficiency to understand that people you remember their name with the badge they also have life. I have an employee, he have a cat at his place, must I lock him down. Go home. He comeback and finish a two week projects in 6 days. You want to make people productive while they are worried about their cat. Some managers will say time to grow up now, get a grip it's just a cat. Na, you don't know his coping mechanism. Some it's booze, drugs, etc...Well, I'm assuming your career field is different than video game development. Video games can't have a "simple ratio efficiency" because they are crafting a piece of art just as much as a consumer project. And, there is no simple time frame for when a piece of a project will be completed. When will the AI in God of War stop being weird and work? When will the axe throw finally be playable? When will the glean off the water look just right? When is the writing for the story actually great? There are unknown factors that can't be calculated to a simple efficiency ratio and why it can be hard to judge performance in the field.
I mean, I don't feel like the burden is on me to explain why absolving yourself from supporting a company who's labor practices you are against enough to speak out on is a cop-out.
I'm not really sure I get you. Are you saying that people who buy the product and support the company should *not* also push for better conditions for the workers at that company? Are you saying that you look into the labor conditions of every company from whom you purchase goods and make sure you fully support them before going forward with the purchase? What are you writing your posts on?
He's saying it makes your outrage over working practices ring hollow when you reward the intended results of said working practices.
Don't bother, some people have their theories how to handle those situations. Just theories.I still see posts saying that "it isn't that bad" or "see, it's not everyone". It actually is bad. And no, it was never going to be everyone. But that doesn't de-legitimatize any of the claims.
Is it too far fetched to say this is a perception problem between younger employees being single and willing to sacrifice their personal life for their dream VS employees having a family/girlfriend and a life outside work?
You shouldn't said SACRIFICE. A work place is never about sacrifice. I will give you a quick example, not video game related. He told me: I told you I don't like the sun. Asked HR to have some closed office without sun. I leave him at the office most of the time, just remind him all the time to follow the security protocol. He have ADHD, extremely smart. Job done in due time, he will be fired in most company. He prefer to crunch alone. I'm giving you guys how complex it is to manage teams, different backgroung, different skills. When you manage to have tha mix, you are good to go. The one with ADHD is well with the team.Is it too far fetched to say this is a perception problem between younger employees being single and willing to sacrifice their personal life for their dream VS employees having a family/girlfriend and a life outside work?
"The overall tone at Rockstar is that what the company values most is not the bugs you fix but the hours you put in," said one current employee, echoing a view shared by most of the people interviewed for this article.
"If you left early on a weekday or weekend, you'd get dirty looks," said one former employee of Rockstar San Diego who told me they worked an average of 70 hours a week during Red Dead Redemption. "You'd feel the stare down, and sometimes you'd see it as you were leaving. There was this culture of, if you don't put in the hours, you're not worth working here."
"The temperament from these guys has always been: It should be a privilege to serve in this organization," said a person who was there. "And if you don't agree with that, there's a long line of people waiting to take your place."
Those who had worked fewer than 60 hours were marked with the word "Under" in red letters
"It was mandatory 80 hours for basically the whole studio," said one person who was there. "If you don't have any work to do on Red Dead 2, just test GTA V for another eight hours." Said a second: "Maybe they didn't tell anyone 100 hours, but they definitely told us 80. Concept artists were sitting there being glorified QA."
One common fear at Rockstar is that if you leave during a game's production, your name won't be in the credits, no matter how much work you put in. Several former Rockstar employees lamented this fact, and Rockstar confirmed it when I asked. "That has been a consistent policy because we have always felt that we want the team to get to the finish line," said Jennifer Kolbe. "And so a very long time ago, we decided that if you didn't actually finish the game, then you wouldn't be in the credits."
They also like people staying for dinner and you do see a bit of shame if you haven't stayed until dinner (7:30) in a few weeks.
"I think one of the big misunderstandings that I see a lot in comments and articles is that this isn't number crunching," said the employee. "We have an understanding that we're trying to make a work of art more than just churning out a product. If I was just churning out a product, [at] 5 p.m. I'm heading out. But we're making something you've never seen before."
Rockstar's Jennifer Kolbe confirmed these details, saying in an e-mail, "We believe that the vast majority of our team in Lincoln feels positively about work conditions there, and these specific difficulties mentioned are either not generally considered real hardships or are not based on any current reality."
I wouldn't say it's a perception problem. I'm sure younger people also have plans themselves and ambitions. I would like to hope they at least want a good work life balanceIs it too far fetched to say this is a perception problem between younger employees being single and willing to sacrifice their personal life for their dream VS employees having a family/girlfriend and a life outside work?
Someone is literally making up claims about being visited by rockstar without any corroboration or reaching out to the press so yeah forgive me being skeptical. Also the real focus here should be on rockstar condition, not this attention seeker
Why should we believe this guy without providing any single proof ? I'm being serious... this thread is about the shitty working conditions in rockstar but this guy made it about himself
Welp, "fine" it is but if you have little kids you go to work when they are still sleeping and probably go back home when they are in bed again.
People are still stuck in the 2000's where they still complain about Kotaku?Also, what did Jason Schreier do wrong to end up at Kotaku and why is he still there? It's like Anderson Cooper working at a school newspaper.
Why should we believe this guy without providing any single proof ? I'm being serious... this thread is about the shitty working conditions in rockstar but this guy made it about himself
Why should we believe this guy without providing any single proof ? I'm being serious... this thread is about the shitty working conditions in rockstar but this guy made it about himself
Because this isn't a new thing? Rockstar has done this kind of garbage since San Andreas Hot Coffee mod.Why should we believe this guy without providing any single proof ? I'm being serious... this thread is about the shitty working conditions in rockstar but this guy made it about himself
Call me insensitive, but this constant lionizing and boo-hooing of the poor game developers is super embarrassing.
People speak as if these heroic programmers are somehow facing conditions that don't exist in every other salaried, project-based industry in the country. Every damn vertical has their own version of crunch. Healthcare? Open enrollment. Retail? Holidays. Engineering? Project deadlines. My Dad owns a construction company that builds and remodels schools. His hours double during the summer when students are out. You think accountants work 40 hours a week during tax season? Students crunch before finals. Teachers crunch after finals.
"Crunch time" is a reality of the workplace, and it's not even always this terrible thing like some are suggesting. Hourly workers have the opportunity to earn overtime. Salaried workers often earn more in the long run because companies can pay individuals more without having to inflate their staffs based on the busiest 10% of their workload.
Plus, nobody's forced to be anywhere.
In today's society, with resources like Google, Glassdoor, and LinkedIn, there's little excuse to know what you're getting into when you accept a job, especially when it's with a company as big as Rockstar, with a public history of long hours. Between the consoles, Steam, iOS, and Android, there has never been more opportunity for game developers, and nobody is forcing anybody at gunpoint to program an electronic cowboy game.
These people aren't victims. They have an advanced education and marketable skills, which puts them in a better place than a huge portion of the U.S. population. I'll save my tears for the rural coal workers and career truckers who are going to have a genuinely tough go of things in the coming decade.
Working at Rockstar is a choice. If the relationship is abusive, find a new working relationship that treats you better.
And if you don't have the stomach to work 45-60 work weeks in 2018 America, particularly early in your career when you're building your skills and resume, I've got bad news for you. You're going to get left in the DUST by the line of people behind you who are willing to do the work.
You are a liar and shame on you for wanting to use this for attentionI don't have to come in here and spill proof to some random antagonistic ResetEra user. I've talked with the people that I need to talk to.
I'm not really sure I get you. Are you saying that people who buy the product and support the company should *not* also push for better conditions for the workers at that company? Are you saying that you look into the labor conditions of every company from whom you purchase goods and make sure you fully support them before going forward with the purchase? What are you writing your posts on?
Yes.
These are people who are wrongly not guaranteed compensation for their overtime. They depend on bonuses from the game selling well (which, it is going to; the few people who decide not to buy this game are not going to change that). In a world where this game is successfully boycotted, these employees would miss out on the bonuses they want to receive for the game doing well. They themselves have said as much, and it's happened at Rockstar before, I believe with Max Payne 3. That's not speculation on my part, it's just me pointing out a fact; these employees would be hurt in the short term by a large scale boycott of Red Dead Redemption 2. That doesn't make a boycott wrong or right or whatever. Do what you feel you must do!
But it is ok to buy the game. It is ok for your main contribution to this issue to be making sure everyone in the gaming industry knows this is an important topic to you. That is why we're having this convo in the first place.
You are a liar and shame on you for wanting to use this for attention
I get it, and I still think it's a cop-out.
Is there proof that devs rely on bonuses to make ends meet? If that's really the case, how is that not another labor issue feeding right back into the crunch culture?
I guess I just want to hear people say: I care enough to complain on social media platforms that are free, convenient, and earn me prestige, but not enough to deprive myself of an enjoyable experience - because that is ok, and I suspect a bit more honest.
If that was the case, Jason would had said something already but he hasn't... again my issue with this person is that he is distracting us from the real issue which is rockstar working conditions... if he wanted to talk about the alleged incident maybe make a separate threadWait until later to know if Jason or some other site publish something about it to see if he is lying or not. As of now you should be at least giving him the benefit of the doubt instead of saying he is a liar.
What could he gain from lying?
If that was the case, Jason would had said something already but he hasn't... again my issue with this person is that he is distracting us from the real issue which is rockstar working conditions... if he wanted to talk about the alleged incident maybe make a separate thread
If that was the case, Jason would had said something already but he hasn't... again my issue with this person is that he is distracting us from the real issue which is rockstar working conditions... if he wanted to talk about the alleged incident maybe make a separate thread
It sounds like you didn't read Jason's article. Given this thread is about that, you should probably do so.
Depriving yourself of the game isn't helping anyone, nor is it the best way to force change. That's the honest truth, but you're certainly welcome to believe what you want.