Yup. It creates a weird unspoken competition that can be a real problem for some folks.
On another note, one of the most ridiculous things I’ve heard in my professional career was a new Logistics Director telling everyone, “Supply management and inventory control are my passions.” No, they’re fucking not. You may like your work a lot and value your position, but no one’s “passion” involves logistics processes unless you’re a psychopath.
The dude actually said that? Unbelievable.
As you well know, Logistics Officers, career ones never say that. The say, “Its a living”.
Damn, I can barely work 60 hours in a week, let along 100.
That’s just too much time always from the kids.
When I worked at Auran Games you could tell who was a native Australian and who was a foreigner (mostly American) because the foreigners all got there before 8am and were there way after 5pm. The aussies for the most part never got there before 8 and all left by 5.
I remember one time I was tired from one of our go lives I wound up showing up to work in my slippers. I didn’t even realize it. I know at least one person who stayed and night and showered there too. It’s not like teams like mine won’t do it, it’s just ultra rare. For people who do that constantly, it’s so unhealthy.
Our industry has some peak hours (Mid January to March 15th, and September to October 15th), and I will usually have a few days a week that I am pulling 10 or 11 hours or a Saturday, but I doubt any of those weeks broke 60 hours.
Heck, these last 2 weeks, I was begging for things to do (well, not begging, because that leads to too much work. I just let people know I was free to help with projects). Sadly, that won’t be the case anymore, since I got traded up to new business. New Business has the fewest plans but longest hours. My supervisor thinks it will be a good fit and it looks like their most junior member got burned out, hence the trade.
Hopefully, I will get a raise with this trade. Either way, it will be interesting.
Lol. You can see that as “laziness”, or you can see that as refusal to be exploited. It is unreasonable to do overtime if it is not on your employment contract. Sure I can’t be bothered to file for overtime if it is just half an hour every once in a while, but by right I can file for overtime. And if it is an ongoing overtime issue, it is not a matter of employee laziness but employer exploitation.
People in Asia, especially in China, Korea and Japan, are all expected to do unpaid overtime work. That is not diligence but exploitation
I’m not going to make assumptions for other game development related jobs, but it’s pretty nuts to me that any software engineer worth his salt would put up with the terrible conditions that are always outlined about game companies. There is so much mobility in the market for software engineers it’s nuts, and while I’m not particularly proud that in the last decade I haven’t held a job at a single company for more than 3 years (seems to be my average), the fact of the matter is that every time I have left a job it’s because I saw the writing on the wall and I could see things going downhill. In every case it was a mere 2-3 weeks of taking my time to find a new gig before I got several offers and put in notice. Unsurprisingly most of those companies have gone defunct or into zombie mode since and it turns out I beat the bad times.
There’s only 1 job in the last 10 years that I’ve worked more than 40 hours on a regular basis for, and that’s because it was for a startup I helped build and it’s one of the reasons I quit. Hell as a SE you don’t even have to move, I’m not the only one who is working remote for a company in a major metropolitan area making a major metropolitan area salary while living in an extremely low COL area (Orlando FL). I have a friend who refuses to leave Wyoming (a tech desert with dirt cheap COL) who always finds $120k+ remote jobs.
If a union forms it’s not going to be from engineers, because if they are really that upset about their situation they have all the tools to improve their lives already.
Oh trust me. When I worked there I laughed about it but in reality they had the right idea. Work to live > live to work.
The time signature of this song is really weird. Can anyone figure out what it is?
Sorry, a bit mystified about what the contention is here. I just didn’t want the conversation about unions to be purely about crunch, so I was bringing up some of the other issues that I expect unions could have a role in.
I’ll be very explicit about it, if it helps: The games industry is like a lot of other industries in multiple ways. Comparisons to other industries with regard to business practices and unionization can be very useful. I never said otherwise and don’t think I implied it.
So where does that leave us? Are you using this question to argue that game devs should be part of a larger tech union or film union? That might make sense. I don’t have any preconceptions on that front, except to say that one of those groups has a union and the other doesn’t.
Where are you going with this? Are you saying that because games are like tech and because tech isn’t unionized, games don’t need to be unionized? If that is what you’re saying, well, maybe it also just means that tech should be unionized, too. (If that isn’t what you are saying, then please clarify for me.)
I thought I made that clear. That is what I was advocating. Games alone? Won’t do it.
Rod, this sounds very wise and promising. Best of luck to you in your attempt!
Am I understanding right that in your model you outsource most of the bulk content production? Who would you have on your staff in, say, an art capacity? Just a director? If you were making a game with a lot of levels, how much of level design would be in or outside the organization? Would you bring a writer in as part of the core team if you were making a heavily narrative game?
It’s not “unpaid”.
We’re salaried workers. We don’t get paid an hourly wage. Our salary involves working more than 40 hours a week.
I don’t really know how it works in US, but here in New Zealand, on your employment contract, you are told exactly how many hours you are working, and how much you are paid per hour. There will be overtime provision. Then you do exactly what is stated in your employment contract. That’s what a contract is about. Anything more the employer, by right, needs to pay extra.
PS: this is what I am talking about, unpaid hours.
I don’t know what you think unions can do about a fan culture. Gaming is not the only industry that deals with customers that might get a little out of hand. As for social media, well… maybe. I don’t think any employer is really well equipped with how to handle that. Hell even our celebrities, people who often do their own thing, answer to few, wind up falling flat with their attempts. Many companies though have PR departments, people who generally deal with the public, hopefully are equipped to deal with the public, and they don’t throw everyone into that bucket.
Being a “creative” industry, well I am not sure what you’re trying to solve or what the issue is by bringing that up either. I suspect most the employees fit better in the tech industry than trying to compare to say those in the movie and tv industry. This doesn’t mean the union can’t borrow from those industries too.
I can’t speak for others, but salary generally means 40 hour work week. Sometimes you work more than that, sometimes you work less. Your pay doesn’t change based on the hours you work outside of actual time-off. I could go into exempt / non-exempt stuff but that probably doesn’t mean as much outside the USA, and that can vary by state too. In practice though, it’s cultural and based on the nature of your work. For example, I usually work somewhere between 8-10 hours a day, on average, 8-5 / 9-6 sort of thing. During certain system upgrades, I might be up at 3 in the morning to update the system while end-users are off and it is the least disruptive time to perform the update. That’s just the… nature of the job. During Go-Live weeks, I might work 14 days straight, longer or shorter depending on how well that goes
it’s not a contract.
In comparison, my sister is a full-time salary employee. She works 35 hours a week; that’s her schedule. She puts in more than that but when she hits 40, she’s actually working more than is written down.
There are flexibility in work hours in New Zealand, i.e. it need not be 9-5. But zero-hour contract is illegal, i.e. contract at least has to say you will have X hours per week. Anything else, e.g. start and end time etc. is up for negotiation.
Sorry, to be clear, I’m referring to something like the Guild Wars/Jessica Price situation (or what happened recently to Chuck Wendig with Marvel Comics). What a union theoretically does is protects an employee from being axed to appease a fan-mob with an agenda.
Is that a reasonable thing to expect a union to do? I don’t have enough experience to know. I have seen others in the dev community claim it is.
For whatever it’s worth, it doesn’t seem like the kind of issue a union that’s used to protecting folks who make mobile storefront apps or backends for insurance databases would often deal with. Whatever union game devs hypothetically end up organizing with, they might want to see how that kind of thing is handled in movies and TV.
So, we’re in agreement?
Were you and @Navaronegun basically both just advocating for video game developers to join up with a broad tech industry organization? If I was being obtuse and missed that message, I apologize. That might make a lot of sense. (Well, except that as far as I know there isn’t a strong tech workers union to join presently…)
Basically, No. That is all code of conduct issues that vary company to company. Te average Joe’s safest bet? Stay off of SM.
The Hollywood example is a poor one. That is a localized industry with VERY specific skill sets that aren’t transportable to other industries (Cinematography. Sound-stage lighting and sound people, etc.). The members of those various unions and guilds are also largely geographically defined to a specific area. That is a very unique outlier in today’s economy.
People in the gaming industry work in the Tech industry. Their end product is an entertainment product, but their labor force swims in the same water as the rest of the tech industry (largely).
What do the game devs do? Work with software? Well, if they don’t organize with others who do the same thing (tech) then the organization won’t matter. Unions organize workers with broad skill sets in broad industrial groupings… Forget what the business does. What are the skill sets of what the people at the business do? Software Design? Doesn’t matter for what.
Comic book Printer? Book Printer? Newspaper printer. doesn’t matter, it’s a Printer’s Union.
And Tech is unorganized at present. That industry (tech) has kept labor organization out successfully for quite some time.
I’m not sure on this one. I don’t think any company is going to want to negotiate where their employees can say whatever they want however they want it and they can’t be penalized for it. On the other hand, I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect every employee to be properly equipped to engage the public on behalf of or clearly linked to their place of work. I am sure 20 and 30 somethings think they’re ready but… they’re not.
On the other hand, a union in the tech arena would be kind of new so, I am not sure what exactly they would ask for or think is reasonable so I wouldn’t demand it’s off the table, entirely.
I think we’re in the same ballpark. If there was a larger tech union in place or being created, it seems like the bulk of the gaming industry should be a part of that. Because they kind of have that project by project thing going on, like the ongoing work or support work might not be as strong as other industries, I don’t see the harm in evaluating industries like the entertainment industry for inspiration but really most the employees being discussed are tech. I don’t have a lot of high hopes in gaming tech doing their own union so if a tech union was being formed it seems like that would be a great opportunity, for a lot of reason… size being one.
It seems like gaming has reached the point where it wants and needs a union. The tech people in my industry is not small, but I don’t think we’re there. Consulting is strong. The ability to ask for raises, training and move from one place to another is there. It varies a little from site to site but I think minorities and women get a fair salary and are seen in some of the top positions. I would be curious though because no matter what happens, the existence of any tech based union would grab attention.
I mean we have several unions around us all the time. I don’t know anyone who isn’t aware of what they’re doing or asking for or, perhaps more importantly, how management responds to things when they fall apart.