Board 8 > Thoughts on Rockstar bragging about 100 hour work weeks before RDR2?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Boy did that backfire on them.

Some executive at Rockstar bragged about the team on RDR2 having to pull 100 hour work weeks in order to make deadline and acted like it was some badge of honor and the internet turned on them over it. Myself included, kind of.

A 100 hour work week is insanely unhealthy and bragging about making your employees do that is atrocious. The most I've ever worked in a week was just under 70 this summer for about two weeks straight and it was MISERABLE. I can't imagine multiple 100 hour weeks, even if it was doing something I really loved.

Rockstar tried to walk the comments back but people have come out of the wood work in the games industry to talk about how volatile and brutal the business is for lower level employees. Some of these stories are peak capitalism failure to be honest and it makes me really consider what companies I wanna support with my money.
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Was this mandatory overtime? If so, that kind of sucks. If it was just people being passionate about the game, not as bad.
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They're salaried. There's no way any of them, apart from the small percentage that may be union (voice actors?) got overtime.

Anyway, while consecutive 100-hour weeks aren't normal, I've come to understand it as the standard in many white collar corporate American industries to work well over 40 hours per week under stressful conditions. I'm putting between 55-80 at my new job (many of those hours are stressful, which makes it way worse) and have already begun struggling with anxiety and depression. It's a miserable spot to be in and I feel for game designers who work even crazier schedules during crunch time. I only hope they're passionate about their jobs, because that probably makes it at least somewhat better.
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I think it's a showcase of mismanagement. Even if the employees are passionate and enjoying the work, crunch is bad for everyone in the long term. I'd much rather they set a realistic release date, even if it were a year later, than force employees to kill themselves with 100 hour work weeks.
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it's kind of unbelievable someone would say that in an interview, let alone brag about it, and not expect it's going to backfire
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CaptainOfCrush posted...

They're salaried. There's no way any of them, apart from the small percentage that may be union (voice actors?) got overtime.

Anyway, while consecutive 100-hour weeks aren't normal, I've come to understand it as the standard in many white collar corporate American industries to work well over 40 hours per week under stressful conditions. I'm putting between 55-80 at my new job (many of those hours are stressful, which makes it way worse) and have already begun struggling with anxiety and depression. It's a miserable spot to be in and I feel for game designers who work even crazier schedules during crunch time. I only hope they're passionate about their jobs, because that probably makes it at least somewhat better.

It can be potentially deadly I think.

I went from a job I hated doing 50 a week where I was miserable and sick all the time to working 40 a week at my new job and honestly my health has drastically improved and those changes were only minor.
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Peace___Frog posted...

I think it's a showcase of mismanagement.

Possibly (and partially), but it's also a part of the culture. Does anyone wanna guess how long this game has been in development? Like... five years? Even if that were stretched to six, crunch time would still be madness. Many people in these fields are just imprinted to think of these work schedules as the norm, and they wear their worst work stories as badges of honor (like when I had a former coworker brag about his "104 hour week" during the audit close period at Caesars Palace). I feel like the Millennial/Gen Y demand for more work-life balance is changing things, but that change is coming slowly.

ExThaNemesis posted...

It can be potentially deadly I think.

I went from a job I hated doing 50 a week where I was miserable and sick all the time to working 40 a week at my new job and honestly my health has drastically improved and those changes were only minor.

Oh absolutely. Stress is a killer. Two weeks ago, when I was working consecutive 17-hour days to push through monthly deadlines, I called my brother just to emotionally vent, which is the first time I've ever done something like that (I dunno what an anxiety attack would feel like, but I was going to the bathroom and felt myself physically shaking, so I was probably on the verge of one). It was one of the worst feelings of my life, and my bro and sis (medical professionals both) advised me straight up to quit if things don't improve within a month.

Hope no one else here is working a schedule like this.
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CaptainOfCrush posted...

Oh absolutely. Stress is a killer. Two weeks ago, when I was working consecutive 17-hour days to push through monthly deadlines, I called my brother just to emotionally vent, which is the first time I've ever done something like that (I dunno what an anxiety attack would feel like, but I was going to the bathroom and felt myself physically shaking, so I was probably on the verge of one). It was one of the worst feelings of my life, and my bro and sis (medical professionals both) advised me straight up to quit if things don't improve within a month.

Hope no one else here is working a schedule like this.

On my second week of doing 70 hours I had a total breakdown at work and had to leave.

Never in 15 years have I left during a shift, but that did it to me.
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what jobs do you guys have?
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I just started in corporate accounting a couple months ago after being in public accounting for a few years. My days are filled with thoughts of quitting and taking a job with a state park for a 60% pay cut. I could probably make it work out.

Anyway, since this topic is serving as a therapeutic venting zone for me atm (legit thanks, Extha), I want to add that the biggest factor is not necessarily the number of hours worked, but the number of stressful hours. When I had a tutoring job in grad school, I'd work over 40 hours (all of them busy) helping undergrads prepare for finals, and I fucking loved it. If you pay me to play video games at home, I can give you 60 hours per week happily.

But no matter how much these guys at Rockstar love what they do, I guarantee those 100 hours weeks were STRESSFUL and took a toll on their mental and physical health.
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I can relate. I work 60 - 70 hours a week quite frequently.... it's never that stressful, but I literally live at work and I'm on call 24/6 with only one day that I'm really allowed to plan anything, or go out to take care of things like grocery shopping. It's pretty crazy. I wouldn't be able to handle it, except I get four months off a year.
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They really couldnt have picked a worse time to brag about this too, as labour issues are a big talking point in the game industry at this specific time
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Has it ever occurred to you, that perhaps this is the ONLY video game, Rockstar perhaps is working on?

No way in hell someone is spending 100 hours into making a video game if they were working on multiple projects.

TexasZea posted...

what jobs do you guys have?

I was a waiter in a restaurant.
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Lolrockstar
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And yeah, the timing on this is especially bad and their walkback on it is really weak.

This will change nothing once RDR2 comes out though and the reception of the game will be the same either way.
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Hey, Yo didn't you think corporate accounting would be an improvement over public. I'm sorry it's turning out like this :(
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yo, were you the one who made the salary negotiation topic (or was that ngamer)? i know that vegas has a low cost of living, but you do not make enough to justify 70-80 hour weeks, pretty much at any point.
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@metroid_composite

MC, do you have any stories like this from working on GTA 5?
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Bump
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I thought stuff like this had been going on since forever in the industry?
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Seems like a terrible thing to mention in this time. I mean there is literally 0 positive gain and a ton of negative comments and stuff

Man I used to hate doing 60 hour weeks but at least I got to move around doing it...couldn't imagine being stuck looking at a screen for that long I feel like my retinas would fry

shane15 posted...

I thought stuff like this had been going on since forever in the industry?

It has, and it's all software (not just games).

Doesn't make it any less goddamn disgusting.

While is it terrible at the end of the day people should really know this is the sort of stuff you sign up for. Anyone going into it with that school kid dream of working on their favs games 9-5 is a bit of an idiot.
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I can understand putting in some extra hours but expecting employees to do 100 hour weeks is nothing but poor planning on the part of the management.
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we're not allowed to work more than 40 hours week
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Honestly you're probably not even getting much more productivity than you would out of a 60 or 70 hour week with 100. The amount of burnout you're going to get there is going to seriously hamstring the productivity.
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There's a few things to account for here instead of the internet/gamers/people just irrationally losing their shit like they are want to do over things so they can feel morally superior.

1) This kind of excessive overtime shit is well documented in the industry working for big devs. If you take a position with one of these guys and you don't think something along these lines is going to happen at some point, you're dumb for not doing your research.

2) It is just as well that this guy made this tweet as a form of support for his employees / giving them public recognition. If I worked for a company like this I would damn well want my employee to give me a public shout-out / recognition for killing myself like that for the company. I would feel way worse going through those working conditions and never being recognized for it.

3) You don't know what the trade-off / comp is for this stuff. Maybe they are not making more in wages, but they may very well be getting reduced hours in future weeks etc. after the grind. I put 60 hours in sometimes at my job. When I have a slow week I can say hey I'm working 20 this week and I don't get any shit for it.

4) If they are this stressed for employee hours it's as simple as walking out the door if it's too much of a burden for you to take part in. They're not firing someone who's only working 60 hours a week when they have people going 100 to get this shit done.

There's other numbers too but nah just get out the torches. Fuck this guy right.
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HotDogButts posted...

1) This kind of excessive overtime shit is well documented in the industry working for big devs. If you take a position with one of these guys and you don't think something along these lines is going to happen at some point, you're dumb for not doing your research.

so you're sayin... they were askin' for it, they knew what they were getting into, etc etc

i mean yes, you can be aware that a bad situation is likely, but that doesn't mean it's okay

this is parallel to getting mugged in a bad part of town. you could argue "well, you should've expected to be mugged if you went there at night", but that doesn't make it okay to mug people.
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Not the best of looks, but won't affect sales one iota.
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banananor posted...

HotDogButts posted...

1) This kind of excessive overtime shit is well documented in the industry working for big devs. If you take a position with one of these guys and you don't think something along these lines is going to happen at some point, you're dumb for not doing your research.

so you're sayin... they were askin' for it, they knew what they were getting into, etc etc

i mean yes, you can be aware that a bad situation is likely, but that doesn't mean it's okay

this is parallel to getting mugged in a bad part of town. you could argue "well, you should've expected to be mugged if you went there at night", but that doesn't make it okay to mug people.

It's not parallel to that and you should feel bad for thinking that it's a comparable argument. You can also apply this throwaway garbage line to literally anything that has ever transpired over the span of time. Personal responsibility is real. If I take a job as a window washer and then complain about having to go up 70 stories I'm an idiot.

There were also a multitude of other points made. The reality is you have no idea about the specific nuances of the situation as it unfolded and trying to kill a guy over 1% of insight into this situation makes you a turd.
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Just another reminder of how generally shitty and exploitative the game industry (or really anything involving programmers) is. Like all the other reminders, nobody will do anything about it and it'll be quickly forgotten.
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The hilarious thing about ExTha making this topic is he will go off about people taking sexual assault victims claims at face value but then this
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HotDogButts posted...

Fuck this guy right.

Oh, whoooo, was worried about all that total horseshit you posted for the first 90% of your post. Glad we can agree.
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Those kids who needed to climb into running machines back in the 1800s knew the risk of being ground up was part of the job. If they didn't want to do it, they could just quit! Why did we bother making that illegal? Exploitative and horrendous conditions are fine just as long as they're the norm, after all. No need to call things out or try to improve anything.
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Im more on the hotdogbutts side on this one, but really the blame lies equally with us gamers, game prices have stayed the same for pretty much ever (arguably theyre cheaper now than theyve ever been) obviously if you're paying 30% of the price for a game thats thousands of times more expansive than a game from the mid ninties, someone out there is getting shit on. If you really cared, you would organize a boycott of games where you don't feel the employees are well compensated, and make more of an effort to but games at full price on release from developers you support. But none of you will. its just like child labor on gym shoes. You'll make a face, claim "oh thats terrible!" And then continue to pay cheap prices for shoes made by toddlers because it fits your budget.
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They just need to stop making games that cost this much.

As long as people demand MORE POWER MORE GRAPHICS it's never gonna end.

Most of the best games of the last few years cost less than 10% of a AAA release to make.
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As someone who's worked 60-80 hours regularly as a programmer in the past, come closer to agreeing with HotDogButts than not on a lot of things. It really is a field where you're paid well with an understanding that you'll work long hours when needed-- even making it explicit during interviews in many cases. It's also a field where you feasibly can be productive that long without completely imploding, and I would argue in fact it's optimal for a lot of people to work longer days because you can really hit breakthroughs where you get a lot of stuff done at once and just clocking out right at 8 hours during those times is going to waste so much potential productivity if you're approaching it with the mindset of always work 40 hour weeks and no more, cause while you can restart tomorrow there's a reset period to get back in the groove, particularly if you're working with a nuanced problem. You could probably take one single 11 hour day to do the work of two 8 hour days with certain things, depending on the circumstances.

100 hours is well beyond a point where overtime is even actually useful though. People even claiming to work that many are probably outright wasting dozens of hours doing literally nothing because they're braindead from fatigue and working a job where being able to think is pretty damn important. It's also nothing that would ever be planned for and is indicative of a comedy of time mismanagement than anything to be proud of. You'd rather just build up to that point with a stream of 60 hour weeks instead. 60 hour work week isn't really quite as bad as it sounds. Especially if you're working on the weekend. I mean it does suck in the sense that you lose your social life that week but you're (at least potentially) paid well and as long as literally every week isn't 60 you'll value that money for making the most of your weekends where you actually can be social.

On the general point though I feel like most people complaining about it are the moral outrage squad who don't really know what they're talking about having never worked in it, or entitled people in the field who aren't very good at maintaining the focus required for to do well at their job or simply don't properly value the money they're making.
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LapisLazuli posted...

They just need to stop making games that cost this much.

As long as people demand MORE POWER MORE GRAPHICS it's never gonna end.

Most of the best games of the last few years cost less than 10% of a AAA release to make.

This is an actual answer but yeah the masses are way too dumb to accept developers easing off the graphical gas pedal at this point.

Especially dumb because current consoles are already cracking under the pressure of running currently existing games. Console hardware just isn't designed to output the kind of graphics people are clamoring for even at 1080p, and yet there's this huge push for 4K gaming. Even top-end PCs can barely do 4K at this point, the idea that there's any kind of push for it on consoles is laughable.
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Lopen posted...

100 hours is well beyond a point where overtime is even actually useful though. People even claiming to work that many are probably outright wasting dozens of hours doing literally nothing because they're braindead from fatigue and working a job where being able to think is pretty damn important.

Which is exactly the point that guy is missing

Oh yeah, for sure. I'm not by any stretch attempting to defend this particular situation. I'm just speaking out against the "oh no the overworked programmers~" soap boxers that were starting to crawl out of the woodwork. 100 hours should never be approached in any circumstance and it's not even a matter of being humane or whatever-- it's just a matter of being practical.
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redrocket posted...

@metroid_composite

MC, do you have any stories like this from working on GTA 5?

Well, I couldn't reply to this before but look at this:

https://kotaku.com/red-dead-redemption-2-developers-speak-out-after-rockst-1829835034

I can respond, yaaay.

Yeah, I've been on RDR2 for five years. It's actually a pretty well-managed project. The nature of American labour laws is that they don't count lunch or exercise breaks, so...my typical day on RDR2 has been 9 hours working 1 hour lunch, 1 hour exercise cause I want to exercise before the sun sets. This does mean 11 hours at work. I very rarely worked weekends. So...55 hour work weeks when we add in breaks or 45 if you don't (most would count that as 55). Did that go higher than 55 near big deadlines? Yeah, to like...60, maybe 65 (usually in short bursts).
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Oh, yeah, as for GTAV, it's managed a lot better than GTAV was, actually.
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I'm kinda amused that it appears Rockstar lifted their social media ban because one of their executives was an idiot.
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metroid composite posted...

redrocket posted...

@metroid_composite

MC, do you have any stories like this from working on GTA 5?

Well, I couldn't reply to this before but look at this:

https://kotaku.com/red-dead-redemption-2-developers-speak-out-after-rockst-1829835034

I can respond, yaaay.

Yeah, I've been on RDR2 for five years. It's actually a pretty well-managed project. The nature of American labour laws is that they don't count lunch or exercise breaks, so...my typical day on RDR2 has been 9 hours working 1 hour lunch, 1 hour exercise cause I want to exercise before the sun sets. This does mean 11 hours at work. I very rarely worked weekends. So...55 hour work weeks when we add in breaks or 45 if you don't (most would count that as 55). Did that go higher than 55 near big deadlines? Yeah, to like...60, maybe 65 (usually in short bursts).

Oh wow, would you look at that.
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HotDogButts posted...

Oh wow, would you look at that.

You're still getting rightfully shit on for defending the absolute and utter excess that was reported, not for defending the concept that developers occasionally have to work 50+ hour weeks

You're still ignoring my entire point of having no insight into what was actually transpiring. Confirmed wrong by a person who actually works on RDR2 and still acting smug. Stay righteous.
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HotDogButts posted...

4) If they are this stressed for employee hours it's as simple as walking out the door if it's too much of a burden for you to take part in. They're not firing someone who's only working 60 hours a week when they have people going 100 to get this shit done.

I think HotDogButts wasn't directly defending a narrative of forcing 100 hour work weeks as much as saying "the people who chose to work that much literally did choose to work it" and "forced 100 hour work weeks almost certainly didn't happen"

Like in this context he's saying "walk out the door" in the sense of "walk out the door, recharge, and come back next week and put in another 60 if needed" (hence why he said they're not firing those people) not "walk out the door and resign"
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correct
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