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I think the core point of "don't allow yourself to be exploited in pursuit of your dreams" is pretty uncontroversial. It feels like folks are reacting more to the tone than the content. People should refuse to crunch 60+ hours weeks for many months at a time. Enabling companies to do this is bad and unnecessary. Most places don't actually do this, though. All that said, I feel like 26 days strait of work doesn't sound all that terrible as an isolated incident. I'd do that without regret at the end of a project I was passionate about. What I wouldn't do is 60+ hours a week for 6 months.
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Nov 25, 2014 20:45
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At one game company I worked at, the entire studio had to do 'sympathetic crunch' if one of the teams had to crunch for a milestone. gooooood times explaining to your wife that you have to work until midnight because the designers wanted a new UI and that team has to stay late for 2 weeks.
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Nov 25, 2014 20:48
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Anything more than 13 days straight without a break is a loving nightmare. I'd rather work 6 day weeks with 12 hour days than 7 day weeks at 8 hour days - not having a day of rest is brutal and it starts to slow you down.
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Nov 25, 2014 20:53
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DancingMachine posted:All that said, I feel like 26 days strait of work doesn't sound all that terrible as an isolated incident. I'd do that without regret at the end of a project I was passionate about. What I wouldn't do is 60+ hours a week for 6 months. If I had made Mega Man X or Ocarina of Time it would have totally been worth it. It's also worth noting that much of that was 12 hour days, Saturdays were at least 8, Sunday was only like 4 though!
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Nov 25, 2014 20:55
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My feelings towards crunch have evolved a bit over the years, and I feel like how the term is even defined has also changed in that time. There was a period where "crunch" was used to describe what we call "deathmarch" now but these days any amount of work above and beyond the 9-5 (which is a totally arbitrarily made up period of time in and of itself, by the way) is called "crunch". I've also looked a bit at industries other than my own and found that most career paths have periods of crunch and periods of rest. My brother-in-law is an accountant and he has crunch every year in the form of tax season (which can mean he doesn't see much of his family for a couple months), even when he was younger and didn't make all that much more than me. When he tells people about his crunch, they nod and go "oh yeah, that makes sense, that's normal" and when I tell people about my crunch they go "ew, gross, that sounds awful". Then again, I love my job 90% of the time. I feel like it's often times a grass-is-greener situation. Now I'm not saying that crunch is good, and I will certainly never stop bringing it up as something that needs to be improved on, because it does. It can certainly be abused and treated poorly, and those instances should absolutely be called out. I always will want less crunch, and when crunch is gone, I'll start lobbying for 6-hour work days. But poo poo happens, humans can't predict the future, and that goes for most if not all industries, not just games.
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Nov 25, 2014 21:15
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Just found out that Sony Imageworks got super hacked and the hackers potentially have every file listed on their server and are making demands. Holy molie.
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Nov 25, 2014 21:17
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Buckwheat Sings posted:Just found out that Sony Imageworks got super hacked and the hackers potentially have every file listed on their server and are making demands. Got any info on this? I can't find an article on it.
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Nov 25, 2014 23:54
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Sigma-X posted:Got any info on this? I can't find an article on it. http://thenextweb.com/insider/2014/11/24/sony-pictures-hacked-employee-computers-offline/
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Nov 26, 2014 00:17
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Sigma-X posted:Got any info on this? I can't find an article on it. https://deadline.com/2014/11/sony-computers-hacked-skull-message-1201295288/ Sorry it's Sony Pictures
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Nov 26, 2014 01:03
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DancingMachine posted:I think the core point of "don't allow yourself to be exploited in pursuit of your dreams" is pretty uncontroversial. It feels like folks are reacting more to the tone than the content. People should refuse to crunch 60+ hours weeks for many months at a time. Enabling companies to do this is bad and unnecessary. Most places don't actually do this, though. Also, the idea that it doesn't happen outside of games is ridiculous. If you think the programmers getting headhunted for $300k/yr are working casual 40/hr weeks in supportive, creative environments, that's extremely funny. I have a good non-games programmer friend currently getting shat on, and he's an experienced programmer, and his salary is well south of $150k/yr. Also also, the idea that those of us founding startups work 40/hr weeks is equally hilarious. I've worked through the last... I don't even know how many weekends. Startup life is ROUGH. Mind you, I love my work, my job, my team, etc, and we're all super excited to finally release this thing, but "it's ok just start your own business and then you'll have an easy schedule" is the biggest crock of poo poo I think I've ever seen about entrepreneurship. We work MORE, not less, we just happen to be able to do so in a flexible way that makes it easier to work 60hrs/wk without destroying our home lives. It's even worse if you're doing consulting, because then you're at the beck and call of a company that generally doesn't respect your time and will happily make random demands with bizarre deadlines - you just put up with it because the pay is good enough. EDIT: And don't even get me started on how doing work-for-hire (whole-studio contracting as a means of funding your studio) amounts to getting hung by golden handcuffs in front of the world's cruelest and least attentive dominatrix. Shalinor fucked around with this message at 02:07 on Nov 26, 2014 |
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Nov 26, 2014 02:03
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down with slavery, I wonder if you became a consultant because nobody could be arsed to work with you in person for a full dev cycle. Holy hell.
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Nov 26, 2014 02:03
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And come 2015, us cruel taskmasters in MA have to give people sick leave by law. Jeez, what's next? Vacation time? Weekends? The madness will never end!
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Nov 26, 2014 02:23
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devilmouse posted:And come 2015, us cruel taskmasters in MA have to give people sick leave by law. Jeez, what's next? Vacation time? Weekends? The madness will never end! You could always just be a scofflaw like the smallish developers in CA.
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Nov 26, 2014 02:34
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ceebee posted:down with slavery, I wonder if you became a consultant because nobody could be arsed to work with you in person for a full dev cycle. Holy hell. How could you tell? Shalinor posted:Also, the idea that it doesn't happen outside of games is ridiculous. If you think the programmers getting headhunted for $300k/yr are working casual 40/hr weeks in supportive, creative environments, that's extremely funny. I have a good non-games programmer friend currently getting shat on, and he's an experienced programmer, and his salary is well south of $150k/yr. I never said it didn't happen outside of games, I said it's rampant IN games and not at all the standard outside. Believe what you want but if you're an experienced programmer with skills you can easily pull down $150k while maintaining a really cushy work environment. Tell your friend to try hired.com or so careers Not sure where the $300k came from, that's pretty ludicrously high, even for a programmer. Shalinor posted:Also also, the idea that those of us founding startups work 40/hr weeks is equally hilarious. I've worked through the last... I don't even know how many weekends. Startup life is ROUGH. Mind you, I love my work, my job, my team, etc, and we're all super excited to finally release this thing, but "it's ok just start your own business and then you'll have an easy schedule" is the biggest crock of poo poo I think I've ever seen about entrepreneurship. We work MORE, not less, we just happen to be able to do so in a flexible way that makes it easier to work 60hrs/wk without destroying our home lives. It's even worse if you're doing consulting, because then you're at the beck and call of a company that generally doesn't respect your time and will happily make random demands with bizarre deadlines - you just put up with it because the pay is good enough. I'm not saying going on your own is easier, I'm saying you'll be better rewarded for the work you put in and have more creative control. Uhh and no, we don't just "put up with it", if you don't have standards for your client's behavior you're doing it wrong. I charge extra for weekend work, for rush work, etc "random demands" = "higher bill" down with slavery fucked around with this message at 04:16 on Nov 26, 2014 |
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Nov 26, 2014 04:07
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leper khan posted:You could always just be a scofflaw like the smallish developers in CA. It's almost like you've experienced this happening  EDIT: btw I'm going to be at Beer Wednesday this week so if you're still in town because they wouldn't let you leave (which I'm sure is what happened) you should be there.
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Nov 26, 2014 04:49
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Sigma-X posted:Freelance Artists are the same as Programmer Consultancies / Contractors, right? Im just really glad it wasn't something big like Zynga finally shutting down or EA closing some giant studio
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Nov 26, 2014 08:07
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wait is leper khan a beergoon?
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Nov 26, 2014 08:25
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Sigma-X posted:wait is leper khan a beergoon? Only when I'm allowed to leave my cubicle.
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Nov 27, 2014 03:13
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leper khan posted:Only when I'm allowed to leave my cubicle. As a cubicle occupation consultant I've found freedom from the oppressive practices of the traditional model.
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Nov 27, 2014 03:18
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Can anybody in the know give me an estimate of how much money I could hope to make as a senior / lead game designer in California (LA or San Fran)? This would be in the f2p mobile market because I am an evil manipulator of innocents. I don't live in America so I'm not really sure what the market is like there. I read the average salary for designers was 73k according to Gamasutra which seems really low for California living costs and I definitely wouldn't move there for that. I've been straight up asking recruiters how much they pay, but they all play coy with the "we want to evaluate you first". Which means I'm spending time doing design tests and soon to be flying in and out which wrecks havoc with my schedule. I want to know if the end game is actually there or not. I'm looking for something in the neighborhood of 120k. Is that unreasonable? Bicuspid fucked around with this message at 05:33 on Nov 29, 2014 |
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Nov 29, 2014 04:41
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Bicuspid posted:Can anybody in the know give me an estimate of how much money I could hope to make as a senior / lead game designer in California (LA or San Fran)? This would be in the f2p mobile market because I am an evil manipulator of innocents. I don't live in America so I'm not really sure what the market is like there. I read the average salary for designers was 73k according to Gamasutra which seems really low for California living costs and I definitely wouldn't move there for that. You can try glassdoor.com for competitors and see if you get any specific hits.
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Nov 29, 2014 06:48
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Bicuspid posted:Can anybody in the know give me an estimate of how much money I could hope to make as a senior / lead game designer in California (LA or San Fran)? This would be in the f2p mobile market because I am an evil manipulator of innocents. I don't live in America so I'm not really sure what the market is like there. I read the average salary for designers was 73k according to Gamasutra which seems really low for California living costs and I definitely wouldn't move there for that. You could pull that for a lead / director-level position, depending on team size. Average for designer is going to be low because the entry level salary is really low for someone who is just churning out content and has no management or decision making responsibilities, and there's not a lot of pressure from other industries driving it up like you get with engineers. That's for salary though actual income can vary so wildly depending on how the company does and what their profit sharing / bonus / stock granting policies are.
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Nov 29, 2014 06:58
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1) Join company who makes successful games with profit sharing 2) Profit Pro-tips for the industry. 3) Get laid off when gigantic successful title isn't such a big hit anymore
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Nov 29, 2014 07:01
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Thanks guys. I checked glassdoor which is not too shabby, especially if the average is being weighted down by junior designers. We'll see how it goes. My main leverage is that this year I released a top 5 grossing game as a lead, although to be truthful I can't really take too much credit because I think mobile success is driven by luck and circumstance as much as any revolutionary design ideas. At best I can say I didn't gently caress anything up. At first I was pretty happy since this was beyond my expectations but then as a reward HQ gave us ... t shirts. No raises, just TSHIRTS. While the executive team halfway across the world decided their contributions (zero) warranted millions of dollars of stock options for themselves. So yeah I'm salty, gently caress these guys.
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Nov 29, 2014 08:44
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Signs an unpaid internship may no longer be available: 1) The company lays off employees due to troubles 2) The recruiter sends an e-mail going "We're not hiring anymore, but I'll double check the internship" 3) All of the formerly hiring positions, including the internship, are no longer listed. Ah well, time to hunt more internships!
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Nov 29, 2014 08:57
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You should not be accepting an unpaid internship anyway.
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Nov 29, 2014 09:20
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mutata posted:You should not be accepting an unpaid internship anyway. Probably, but I'm set for school and it'd be a fun way to fill my free time. Also do you have a paid internship for me, if so I'll gladly accept it. If not, that's not a particularly useful statement (though I agree with it)
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Nov 29, 2014 09:29
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Not my job to find honest, non-exploitative jobs for you, mate. There are tons of legit internships out there. I worked 2 of them while I was in school and applied to dozens more. Unless you're going for some rare position like sound engineer or something, I guess . And some people assume that internships are all unpaid unless the company is doing you a favor and graciously offering payment, so I threw that out there. I wasn't sure what your knowledge of things is. In fact, unpaid internships are against federal labor laws and also super scummy. It's the kind of scam I expect cut rate, dishonest, skeezy outfits to pull (hence the mass layoffs, perhaps?) , but hey, to each their own! Enjoy! mutata fucked around with this message at 10:45 on Nov 29, 2014 |
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Nov 29, 2014 10:40
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Yeah, in software in general you should never have to take an unpaid internship. There are just too many good, paid opportunities out there.
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Nov 29, 2014 10:44
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mutata posted:Not my job to find honest, non-exploitative jobs for you, mate. There are tons of legit internships out there. I worked 2 of them while I was in school and applied to dozens more. Unless you're going for some rare position like sound engineer or something, I guess . I have my seasonal paying job (that is in games), I have school, I'm totally content with an unpaid internship that let's me branch out and get resume fodder while working for a company I think I'll like. I'm not going for anything on the software side or dev so finding internships has been difficult, especially since my return to school was fairly sudden. Would I take an unpaid when I graduate? Hell no, I know my time is worth money when I commit 40+ hours a week. Right now though it's not a huge impact. As far as I'm aware there's a list of rules internships can follow to be unpaid, though most don't. And I really do think that unpaid internships are a nightmare that many students get trapped in. Working too many hours, doing menial errands, and earning nothing. I don't mind walking out of that internship though.
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Nov 29, 2014 11:12
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Bicuspid posted:Can anybody in the know give me an estimate of how much money I could hope to make as a senior / lead game designer in California (LA or San Fran)? This would be in the f2p mobile market ... I'm looking for something in the neighborhood of 120k. Is that unreasonable? No, that's perfectly reasonable for that position in that location. The jump between "senior" and "lead" will greatly affect it and your bonuses though.
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Nov 29, 2014 13:51
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devilmouse posted:No, that's perfectly reasonable for that position in that location. The jump between "senior" and "lead" will greatly affect it and your bonuses though. Nice, I'll be sure to push the lead angle. I'm not sure when exactly it happened but I got into games wanting to make WoW / work for Blizzard, and now my main goal is to out-earn Candy Crush. I guess I missed the original mark, but where I ended up hitting turns out to be interesting to me as well ... so now I just want to get paid comfortably while doing it. And even though this is 3 weeks ago, just so I can bring some contribution to this thread: Diametunim posted:Goons, I'm in need of some Internship advice. The bad news is everyone is correct when they say Blizzard is not an employer you start your career with. The typical new grad has no chance when competing with the hordes of talented and experienced applicants they get, except maybe in hardcore engineering roles. The good news is that those hordes can't apply to be interns, so the vast majority of applicants for these roles will be kids with more or less your level of credentials. So I think if you go to a good school there's a decent chance if you can catch somebody's eye with your passion. I know from personal experience Blizzard will talk to you even if all you have is a ridiculous fanboy cover letter with pictures of beiber, bane, and carly rae jepsen (i.e. my first cover letter). The truth about internships ANYWHERE is that nowhere do interns need to be anything other than 1) basically competent and 2) always enthusiastic. I don't need a super keener genius because you'll be getting mostly work I don't feel like doing and then provided you can do that without screwing up, I might throw you a bone with more important work that I (still) don't want to do. I'd much rather hire a no-experience humble intern towards whom I can toss something like minor balancing (i.e. boring to me, but new to them, so they really approach it with gusto), rather than a guy who thinks he's already lead designer material because they know all about games. The news you should know is that when doing an internship, you should really be doing it in whatever it is you want to do after you graduate. If you want to be a designer and you choose this systems admin internship, it's a wrong move regardless of where it is. After you graduate you'll be applying to design positions against other designers that have done it professionally for 6 months (or a year or whatever) and if they're any good they'll blow you out of the water. You'd be way better off taking a design internship at a lesser company (plus at other companies you might actually get hired on afterwards). Thinking to just get my foot into the door was a mistake I made which took years and several sacrifices to correct. As the game industry matures and expands, people are increasingly silo'd and you want to avoid career plans that involve radically changing what you do because that opportunity might not come up for a long time. Good luck and if you need any help with stupid cover letters / resumes hit me up. Bicuspid fucked around with this message at 16:29 on Nov 29, 2014 |
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Nov 29, 2014 14:59
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Studio posted:I have my seasonal paying job (that is in games), I have school, I'm totally content with an unpaid internship that let's me branch out and get resume fodder while working for a company I think I'll like. Listen, if someone is offering an unpaid internship, it's a surefire sign that they're not taking the position seriously. Odds are the resume fodder you will get will be "changing the water cooler bottle", "watering the plants", "tending the reception desk while the actual receptionist is on a 2 hour 'smoke break'" and other grand odds and ends. You are better off getting UE4/Unity and working on something in your spare time than you are getting an unpaid internship.
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Nov 29, 2014 15:49
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Jan posted:You are better off getting UE4/Unity and working on something in your spare time than you are getting an unpaid internship.
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Nov 29, 2014 17:53
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His past posts suggest that he's looking for community manager gigs, so he is perhaps not best situated for production kind of stuff?
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Nov 29, 2014 18:46
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Ah, one of those guys.
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Nov 29, 2014 19:13
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Shalinor posted:Yeah, why aren't you doing this instead? Unless the unpaid internship is with a recognizable name (and it almost certainly won't be) That's the thing, it was .
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Nov 29, 2014 19:50
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Studio posted:That's the thing, it was Well, that's not surprising. Even (especially?) big name companies have exploitative anti-employee business practices.
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Nov 29, 2014 20:06
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What the hell is a seasonal job in games? There are plenty of transitory jobs (hell, with a product cycle, you could argue they all are), but I'm not really familiar with a gaming season and I'm at a loss at what seasonal work there would be. Customer Support around the holidays or something?
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Nov 29, 2014 21:58
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Sigma-X posted:What the hell is a seasonal job in games? Gamestop expert 
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