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This story is great. Starts off with you on their side and then there's a point, and you'll know when you hit it, where you just wonder "what the fuck is wrong with you?"

Fuck me...that, that right there is why when I got laid off at shitty Midway at the end of 2002 I quit outright. My brother has been a pingpong ball to that bullshit for years going from EA, Sega Sammy, Rockstar, THQ/Volition, to Pipeworks/Foundation9 currently and I'm sure I left something out. All those and probably plus one more over a decade time period.

The Video game industry is run like shit. They live in the fantasy that you go all hollywood on budget, don't justify shit, screw time tables, and live by the hair of the margin if that one big game you have out that year eats shit and dies, so does the company entirely or mostly through a devouring merger.

It wasn't always like that, pre-HD era of gaming mergers and deaths were not common. People used to have a fucking brain how to run a game company and they were stable. After that shit went down on me I got away from it entirely in a ways, I did freelance game media writing/reviews instead for a few years and didn't base a paycheck out of it as I knew it was just a ticking timebomb.


Billy Connolly - Statement of the Century
"If women are so bloody perfect at multitasking, how come they can't have a headache and sex at the same time ?"

People running the companies know what they're doing. They're in it to make money and if they're publicly traded, make their shareholders happy. It makes perfect business sense to run operations the way so many game companies operate (which is why they've moved to that model), simply because the artists/programmers/etc are purely expendable.

The story where the family keeps popping out kids despite a totally unstable lifestyle in a volatile industry is just one of many that show how much bullshit people are willing to put up with to say that they make games. Grass roots, indie/sharware-style development is where it's at if you're in it for the love of it, but unfortunately avenues like Kickstarter have been highjacked by larger companies that have turned it into a new preorder market instead of a direct pipeline for small scale VC raising.

The only way the current system is going to ever change is if young, impressionable developers grow a god damn pair of balls and stop fucking applying at these fucked up companies in this fucked up industry. Work small scale on shoestring budgets, do shit in your spare time while working a real job, or just chase the dollar signs and work in the oil industry. They need tech savvy people there and they pay real. fucking. well.

> People running the companies know what they're doing. They're in it to make
> money and if they're publicly traded, make their shareholders happy. It makes
> perfect business sense to run operations the way so many game companies operate
> (which is why they've moved to that model), simply because the
> artists/programmers/etc are purely expendable.

A-FUCKING-MEN to that. I've worked across pretty much the entire entertainment industry (video games, film, music) and it's just unbelievable how expendable people really are.

What's worse is if, like me, you're not on the 'creative' side of the studio or company - you're in IT, dealing with the unrealistic whims and demands of people who are treated like rockstars (yet don't realise that they're on ice as thin as anyone else is), management that demands top-dollar solutions to every bloody problem while offering no budget whatsoever to implement them on, and a baffling refusal to staff according to the actual needs of the department rather than having one person working 70-hour weeks as the norm.

I'd like to say that this experience is confined to a specific employer, but it's not. It's the entire damn industry, and there's a reason why I absolutely will not work in it again. I'm not a commodity to be used when needed then treated like shit when I'm not - and neither are the people I have to manage.

> The only way the current system is going to ever change is if young,
> impressionable developers grow a god damn pair of balls and stop fucking
> applying at these fucked up companies in this fucked up industry. Work small
> scale on shoestring budgets, do shit in your spare time while working a real
> job

This. Unfortunately, Hollywood is also a magnet for those wanting to do the same.

> or just chase the dollar signs and work in the oil industry. They need tech
> savvy people there and they pay real. fucking. well.

Which is precisely what I am doing to remedy the situation, though not necessarily in the oil industry.

By the way: all of my griping above is written by someone who has worked his way up into management through an engineering background. It's appalling how poorly the people I've had under me have been treated by management above me, and I really feel for them given the utterly unreasonable situations (both personally and professionally) that they were put in by that same upper management. I really hope that they've gone on to better things for better employers, because there sure as hell aren't any in entertainment.

Pro-Tip: if a company tries to woo you (either in person, on their website, or otherwise) by telling you what a cool company they are to work for because they have fully-stocked kitchens, happy hours, free massages, etc., run away. RUN, AND RUN FAST. That place is going to treat you like an indentured servant and no company trip to the go-kart track will make up for the time taken out of your life or the shit you'll have to endure.