Video Game Sweatshop.

[The Red Next Door]

http://www.cartoonbrew.com/games/is-rockstar-a-sweatshop.html#comments

My sister had made me aware of this article about the abuse of workers at rockstar san Diego, Should we boycott Rockstar until they start to treat their workers with respect or should we smash them and should we start focusing attention on the conditions of workers in the gaming and animation industry?

[Invincible Summer]

Boycotts aren't exactly effective, and I'm not sure what you mean by "smash[ing]" them...

But yes, their work conditions are questionable and Rockstar should be challenged. Do video game workers have a union?

[Kaze no Kae]

It's not just Rockstar, workers all over the video games industry are forced to opt out of workers' protection laws like the EU Working Time Directive as a condition for working in the industry and they're expected to work rediculous hours (48-hour days aren't unknown... seriously), and because so many people believe they want to work in games - however quickly they might lose that belief once they start - individual workers are basically expendable, so it would be almost impossible to unionise. That's one of the reasons why I decided to change my degree (I was originally studying video games development).

Rise Like Lions: There's the "International Game Developers' Association", but it's never (ever) taken action against a company, and it doesn't even claim to be a union (they call it a "professional society")

[piet11111]

It's not just Rockstar, workers all over the video games industry are forced to opt out of workers' protection laws like the EU Working Time Directive as a condition for working in the industry and they're expected to work rediculous hours (48-hour days aren't unknown... seriously), and because so many people believe they want to work in games - however quickly they might lose that belief once they start - individual workers are basically expendable, so it would be almost impossible to unionise. That's one of the reasons why I decided to change my degree (I was originally studying video games development).

Rise Like Lions: There's the "International Game Developers' Association", but it's never (ever) taken action against a company, and it doesn't even claim to be a union (they call it a "professional society")

48 hour days i need to get me one of those time machines that make that happen.

48 hour workshifts are a pain though.

also i am surprised that rockstar is such a bad studio i thought they where better then that.

[Axle]

I don't find this all that shocking in truth...a video game business is still a business, and a business is going to fuck its workers for every thin dime it can. Besides, Grand Theft Auto is one of the biggest and most profitable franchises in the video game industry...we should automatically expect a company to treat their workers like shit in order to get more out of a cash cow that big.

I hope there's a few Rockstar employees that take initiative toward the company. Maybe turn "International Game Developers' Association" into a legitamate union.

[Tablo]

I understand that some of the smaller independent companies will have the developers working those types of hours(since they lack the large dev teams), but I never expected that of big companies like Rockstar. As much as I love coding I would kill myself if I had to stare at code for 48 hours.

[Kaze no Kae]

I hope there's a few Rockstar employees that take initiative toward the company.
They'd just get sacked (or technically, not get hired again). Like I said, individual workers are basically expendable in the games industry, even if they got half the studio on board there'd still be a horde of people waiting to take their places.

[Yazman]

This is very common practice in the gaming industry. Even the quality assurance (testers, essentially) have really fucked up conditions.

[Axle]

They'd just get sacked (or technically, not get hired again). Like I said, individual workers are basically expendable in the games industry, even if they got half the studio on board there'd still be a horde of people waiting to take their places.

Way to be defeatist.

Video game workers aren't special in the regard that they're seen as expendable. Your post is basically the story of every industry in the world, and yet workers have still found ways around it.

[Kaze no Kae]

Maybe I was made too cynical by the fact that just about everyone else in my games dev class of 50/60-odd people were implacably apathetic, even about the exploitation of games workers. I suppose actual experience can have more of a radicalising effect than just knowledge, so its not necessarily representative of the industry itself. I will admit my experience of doing games at uni did make me very defeatist about the possibility of building resistance in the industry.

[The Vegan Marxist]

Wow, I'm a student in video game design, & just have another year & a half left until I become part of the game industry, but I was never aware of such things like this. This is truly disturbing. :(

[Dr Mindbender]

That's one of the reasons why I decided to change my degree (I was originally studying video games development).


Thats crazy. You shouldnt let the actions of a minority of developers determine your own future.

If anything maybe it shows even more than ever that we need more leftists inside the game industry not only to raise the profile of left thought through games but also to agitate and challenge these working conditions.

[Bitter Ashes]

Rockstar used to be quite good when it was still in Scotland I heard.

For the best example of exploitation in the video games sector though, check out the Korean kids selling gold on WoW.

[The Red Next Door]

Wow, I'm a student in video game design, & just have another year & a half left until I become part of the game industry, but I was never aware of such things like this. This is truly disturbing. :(
Maybe you should be an independent like my little sister. she is an novice animator.

[The Vegan Marxist]

Maybe you should be an independent like my little sister. she is an novice animator.

Me & friends are thinking about forming up our own company later on.

[Dr Mindbender]

Rockstar used to be quite good when it was still in Scotland I heard.


arent they still there?

[Kaze no Kae]

Thats crazy. You shouldnt let the actions of a minority of developers determine your own future.
It's not a minority. Like I said, it's the same all across the games industry. And that was only one of the reasons, I also didn't find it nearly as motivating as I'd thought I would, and I discovered a passion for languages I hadn't previously realised I had when I took an online Esperanto course for a couple of weeks. There were other reasons too, but I can't remember what they were now.


Me & friends are thinking about forming up our own company later on.
When I first started hearing the horror stories from my tutors (industry veterans) - and actually, even before I started the course - I was thinking of forming a co-op when I graduated, with some of the other people from the course, but then I got to know the other people on the course :P You must have been lucky, none of my coursemates had any interest in challenging the industry norms, some of them were very reactionary in fact. Good luck, comrade ^^;

[Axle]

Wow, I'm a student in video game design, & just have another year & a half left until I become part of the game industry, but I was never aware of such things like this. This is truly disturbing. :(

It sucks to know, but really, being aware of this gives you an opportunity in the next year and a half to try to build up support for a video game industry union and work towards stopping this sort of thing from happening.

[Kaze no Kae]

Axle's right, especially if people in your class are actually interested in their own welfare (mine weren't, unfortunately :rolleyes:)

[Kamerat]

I agree with Kaze no Kae, its the same conditions all across the gaming industry. Funcom a local company here, has been in the news because of bad working conditions. 15 hours a day, 7 days a week, no overtime pay. And if you try to complain to your boss or talk to some of your co-workers about these conditions (some of them it seems would happily squeal to your boss about your opinons), you will immediately be replaced by someone else.To justify these condition the employers repeat, "You should be glad you get to work in the gaming industry".

I am done with my degree in computer science in June and was hoping to get to work as a game programmer. But when i read about these workers conditions, i am glad i took a more general course instead of a course focusing on game development, which i had in mind before i started.

[The Vegan Marxist]

My classmates are communists, socialists, & liberal-socialists, so I've considered myself lucky. Our teacher even asked us to do a report on how the mainstream media has lied about certain subjects & how the video game world reflects towards the mainstream media as well.

[Dr Mindbender]

I agree with Kaze no Kae, its the same conditions all across the gaming industry. Funcom a local company here, has been in the news because of bad working conditions. 15 hours a day, 7 days a week, no overtime pay. And if you try to complain to your boss or talk to some of your co-workers about these conditions (some of them it seems would happily squeal to your boss about your opinons), you will immediately be replaced by someone else.To justify these condition the employers repeat, "You should be glad you get to work in the gaming industry".

I am done with my degree in computer science in June and was hoping to get to work as a game programmer. But when i read about these workers conditions, i am glad i took a more general course instead of a course focusing on game development, which i had in mind before i started.

Again how do leftists hope to combat these conditions which they defeatistly avoid by simply staying out of the game industry?

PS: I know defeatistly isnt a word but it should be.

[Bitter Ashes]

I agree with Kaze no Kae, its the same conditions all across the gaming industry. Funcom a local company here, has been in the news because of bad working conditions. 15 hours a day, 7 days a week, no overtime pay. And if you try to complain to your boss or talk to some of your co-workers about these conditions (some of them it seems would happily squeal to your boss about your opinons), you will immediately be replaced by someone else.To justify these condition the employers repeat, "You should be glad you get to work in the gaming industry".

I am done with my degree in computer science in June and was hoping to get to work as a game programmer. But when i read about these workers conditions, i am glad i took a more general course instead of a course focusing on game development, which i had in mind before i started.

Ironic for a developer that makes a game called Anarchy Online isnt it?

[Kamerat]

Again how do leftists hope to combat these conditions which they defeatistly avoid by simply staying out of the game industry?

PS: I know defeatistly isnt a word but it should be.
I don't know. But 15 hours a day, 7 days a week, no overtime pay, don't sound very tempting. And either way i would be fired, if i some how got to work in a gaming company and started combating these conditions.

Ironic for a developer that makes a game called Anarchy Online isnt it?Yupp.

[Kaze no Kae]

Again how do leftists hope to combat these conditions which they defeatistly avoid by simply staying out of the game industry?

PS: I know defeatistly isnt a word but it should be.
Had at least a few of my classmates been reasonably socially conscious, I might (like I said, there were other reasons for my change of course) have stayed and formed a co-op with them after graduation, and that example might have contributed to a wider change in the shape of the industry. It's a long shot, but it's the only way I can see any real change happening in the games industry between now and the revolution, I can't see any way to check the traditional games companies from within while there's so many people who's ambition is to work in the games industry.

I agree, defeatistly should be a word :P


Ironic for a developer that makes a game called Anarchy Online isnt it?
Yup :rolleyes: I wonder if the corporate arses who OK'ed that name know what anarchy actually means lol

[Sendo]

it's been in video game mags for a long time. Of course, presented in a neutral, can't-change-it attitude. They always said you had to have a passion for it.

Even without the info that's been coming on game testers, you KNOW the conditions are shit. Just look at how awful of a job they are able do. Games are rushed out so quickly these days. I've stopped playing, because other than the Wii and the arcades, everything else is over-financed same-old same-old with hefty price tags and bugs galore.