L.A. Noire

[lobotomy42]

A salaried position is not "some weird regulatory status." Suddenly being asked to work a weekend is standard in many white-collar professions, albeit far more common in the games industry.

[Thrik]

http://www.shacknews.com/article/69093/igda-to-investigate-la-noires

Im just confused why the IGDA decided to single this out this one time when that's pretty much the same way every Rockstar game is made among many other companies in the industry.

“Reports of 12-hour a day, lengthy crunch time, if true, are absolutely unacceptable and harmful to the individuals involved, the final product, and the industry as a whole,” Brian Robbins, chair of the IGDA Board of Directors

This is just hysterical to me.

This is a more extreme case of crunching than is typical and to be honest I think the focus is more on the general crappy treatment of staff rather than the crunching, but regardless of why they chose to focus on these guys all I care about is that this shit is being spotlighted so that employers are discouraged from engaging in it due to the media hellfire that'll potentially come their way. If it happens enough times hopefully things will improve.

[Murdoc]

This is a more extreme case of crunching than is typical

I've had a really shitty career then.

But yeah, the treatment didn't sound good, but sounds like what was going on in every Rockstar studio. The treatment is outrageous and isn't typical of the industry though, so discouraging it is always good. However, it seems like this style of treatment is coming from a very small group in the industry and as long as they are successful, it'll never change their attitude.

I'm more focused on the standard of living stuff that is common throughout the industry, they say its the only way games can be made, but its fundamentally exploitative(sometimes in big ways, most of the time small ways) to the workers. However, in my experience, which isn't the be and end all, so its just an educated opinion, it has always seemed to be this standard in the industry simply because its a young and most studios haven't figured out a good balance.

It's a bit akin to the start of the industrial revolution; workers and business owners had to find a middle ground so everyone is happy. I don't think the games industry(and this probably goes for all creative for profit\technology industries right now) have really figured it out and no one appears to be really interested in improving it.

[syntheticgerbil]

Well something's gotta be changed sooner than later, but that will only stop when workers stop being fans of megalomaniac companies and start treating a job as something to do and retain an amount of dignity.

But that's just wishes. I also have nothing to say about this game.

[Thrik]

Looks like even Rockstar thought Team Bondi's management were dickheads:

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-07-05-rockstars-disdain-for-la-noire-dev

Rockstar also made a huge contribution to the development; their producers were increasingly influential over the last two years of the game's development, and overruled many of the insane decisions made by Team Bondi management [...] Rockstar used to be very keen on making Team Bondi something like 'Rockstar Sydney' - the more they worked with Team Bondi management, the more they came to understand that this was a terrible idea.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Wow, so I totally missed this. Looks like despite all the hardwork of the staff, and the success of the game, a good portion of the staff never got the cash they were promised by McNamara.

http://www.computerandvideo games.com/321609/team-bondi-creditors-owed-pound900k/

What a total schmuk. Even those that followed his gruelling masterplan ended up losing.

[elmuerte]

I've been playing this game occasionally. In the beginning it was all great, but it's starting to become quite tedious. It's pretty much the same stuff over and over again.

[toblix]

[Lu]

It misses the frame where I die of boredom and uninstall the game.