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I'm not sure Riot is experience that would make me trust someone's advice on running a company, even where the contents seem reasonable. Their work culture has

by Macha 5y ago

I'm not sure Riot is experience that would make me trust someone's advice on running a company, even where the contents seem reasonable. Their work culture has led to some pretty public problems.

toaster222 5y ago
Would you elaborate? I'm curious about public problems you mentioned.
- sdedovic 5y ago
  Disclaimer: I am not voicing any opinions about Riot or the people mentioned in the articles below. Just compiling what I’m aware of and letting people make their own opinions. - https://kotaku.com/inside-the-culture-of-sexism-at-riot-games-1828165483 https://kotaku.com/inside-the-culture-of-sexism-at-riot-game... - https://kotaku.com/current-and-former-employees-sue-riot-games-for-gender-1830262786 https://kotaku.com/current-and-former-employees-sue-riot-gam... - https://kotaku.com/top-riot-executive-suspended-without-pay-following-inve-1831084598 https://kotaku.com/top-riot-executive-suspended-without-pay-... - https://www.espn.com/esports/story/_/id/26686991/riot-games-employees-stage-walkout-protest-forced-arbitration https://www.espn.com/esports/story/_/id/26686991/riot-games-... - https://www.vice.com/en/article/dy8g87/league-of-legends-fake-anime-pop-star-is-sad-tweeting-about-genocide https://www.vice.com/en/article/dy8g87/league-of-legends-fak... - https://www.polygon.com/2020/7/29/21347587/riot-games-saudi-arabia-neom-partnership-league-european-championship-lec https://www.polygon.com/2020/7/29/21347587/riot-games-saudi-...
  - bomdo 5y ago
    From your sources [1]: > COO, Scott Gelb [...], as a comedy bit, [...] has repeatedly touched subordinates’ balls or butt or farted in their faces. [...] his punishment—two months of unpaid leave and training. [1] From OP's interview with CTO Mike Seavers: > Every time we sat down to go through the past quarter and plan the next one at Riot Games, we came up with a leadership theme for the quarter. For example, we weren’t going to make decisions for others for a month. This put all of us on the same page, and we got everyone to think about it and talk about it. When my direct report came to me asking, “Can I do this thing?” It was easy for me to say, “I’m not going to answer that question. You know the theme of the quarter, so you need to at least think it through before I give you an opinion.” At least they are consistent. [1] https://kotaku.com/top-riot-executive-suspended-without-pay-following-inve-1831084598 https://kotaku.com/top-riot-executive-suspended-without-pay-...
    - adamors 5y ago
      Per his Linkedin he is still with the company. All these "suspensions without pay" are just for PR.
- dafelst 5y ago
  "Toxic boys club" sums up a lot of the historical problems, but a quick Google of "riot games culture problems" will give you literally dozens of articles to read. I have work with a few ex rioters and have interviewed a few (at the time) current ones, and have heard personal confirmation of many of these problems. It's a big company though, so some departments are better or worse in this respect. But yeah, it's not really a great place to emulate if you're trying to build a healthy culture, at least IMO.
  - virtue3 5y ago
    I interviewed with them a few months ago. They are really -really- putting work into 180'ing their culture. I'm sure it's not there yet but there is a serious effort being made, even from the hiring side.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
jrm415 5y ago
I think most HN readers are intelligent enough to be able to consider the quality of advice as something separate from its source. That is, a source need not be perfect to be worth listening to. Riot's obviously far from perfect, but this advice seems reasonable to me. Do you think following it is likely to lead to problems similar to Riot's? If there's some sort of causal link between empowering teams and failing to build an inclusive culture, I'd really find that interesting.
- fulafel 5y ago
  Good point, and to penalise companies practicing transparency also means boosting those that work to hide problems and fake the context in these kinds of interviews.
  - user-the-name 5y ago
    What transparency are they being penalised for?
    - colonwqbang 5y ago
      The implication is that many companies have the problems which Riot are notorious for. They are just better at hiding them from public view.
      - user-the-name 5y ago
        Riot wasn't transparent about them either. They just failed at hiding them.
        colonwqbang 5y ago
        I think that's what I wrote?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
HideousKojima 5y ago
Even without considering the "boy's club" stuff, LoL never seemed to be very competently programmed back when I played it (admittedly I've hardly touched it since ~2012). I wouldn't really trust them for engineering and programming expertise either, except maybe from whoever manages their servers/online infra.
- kayimbo 5y ago
  You're not wrong. Their engineering seems incredibly incompetent. I've often postulated that they have like 500 junior developers and like 12 people with more than 5 years programming experience. There is probably like 2 people who keep the game engine running and when they quit the game will fall apart.
  - HideousKojima 5y ago
    I think all the Riot employees on this thread are down voting us, sorry
    - elithrar 5y ago
      No, I down-voted each of you because your comments are anecdotal at best and don’t add to the discussion at all. Saying the game doesn’t appear to be “competently programmed” is analogous to the “coded badly” that gets thrown around, not taking into account that all successful consumer software has tech debt and inefficiencies. (I don’t work for Riot and have no affiliation with them)
  - Kihashi 5y ago
    You should look at some of their dev blogs. Their engineering team has done some pretty remarkable things, like re-writing the game server to be deterministic so they could better deal with problems that occur in pro play[1]. They've also talked a bit about the past and future of the game engine specifically [2]. They also have blogs talking about operations- taking the game from something written by 2 dudes in a dorm room to being one of the most played games in the world- how their stack has changed, how they're set up to do patches and rollbacks, how they do their internal testing and playtesting, etc. [1]: https://technology.riotgames.com/news/determinism-league-legends-introduction https://technology.riotgames.com/news/determinism-league-leg... [2]: https://technology.riotgames.com/news/future-leagues-engine https://technology.riotgames.com/news/future-leagues-engine
esyir 5y ago
Whatever their problems, their results are pretty damn consistent. League of Legends remains the premier e-sport, dethroning all competitors in viewership rates and numbers. Valorant is rapidly rising, and threatens the long-incumbent direct rival Counter-Strike Teamfight Tactics, while not an e-sport, still remains in the top 10 streamed games on twitch. 3 releases, all (at least by twitch streams) major successes. From the product point of view, they're clearly doing something right, and whatever work culture issues they're claimed to have, they're certainly outperforming. Note: As most of riot's releases target the e-sport crowd, I'm using twitch viewership numbers as an analogue for success. Sports, after all, are judged by popularity amongst viewers above all.
- dafelst 5y ago
  Success isn't everything. It is very possible (and arguably more likely) to be a successful company and still have a shitty culture and/or work environment. Riot is a prime example of this, but unfortunately they are hardly the exception - it is a fairly common pattern amongst the AAA game companies and publishers. The specifics are not the same from company to company, but arguably the end result is. People are unfortunately willing to endure a lot just to get into their "dream industry".
- zapnuk 5y ago
  That's debatable League of Legends is a premier e-sport more so because of marketing than game design or engineering. In fact, their game client remains worse than dota 2's in every way. It's actually pretty hard to take them seriously considering their client is still such a buggy mess after about 10 years. While the viewership of casual Valorant is greater than CS-GO, it's also not "rapidly rising" - https://sullygnome.com/game/Valorant/365/summary https://sullygnome.com/game/Valorant/365/summary And the esport viewership of CS-GO is much larger compared to Valorant. And while Teamfight Tactics was an success, Legends of Runeterra wasn't. So they are 3/4... which is still pretty good - but can also be explained by good marketing and IP handling. Similar to the new Activision-Blizzard.
  - tester34 5y ago
    >League of Legends is a premier e-sport more so because of marketing than game design or engineering. Indeed, it's debatable because it sounds weird I don't play LoL for close to decade due to their marketing (is it even marketing? or actually their Esport stuff?) For me LoL is great game because it changes often, so you don't get bored fast, also it's highly competitive with decent ways to express your skill
ehnto 5y ago
As a counterpoint, they have had those lessons and so could have learned from them if they were perceptive.
mtnygard 5y ago
Not to mention they've had money flowing like water. When you don't have to worry about being financially efficient a lot of management structures and unstructures seem like they "work". It's when the money dries up that cracks in the foundation are evident.

by Macha 5y ago

I'm not sure Riot is experience that would make me trust someone's advice on running a company, even where the contents seem reasonable. Their work culture has led to some pretty public problems.

toaster222 5y ago

Would you elaborate? I'm curious about public problems you mentioned.

sdedovic 5y ago
Disclaimer: I am not voicing any opinions about Riot or the people mentioned in the articles below. Just compiling what I’m aware of and letting people make their own opinions. - https://kotaku.com/inside-the-culture-of-sexism-at-riot-games-1828165483 https://kotaku.com/inside-the-culture-of-sexism-at-riot-game... - https://kotaku.com/current-and-former-employees-sue-riot-games-for-gender-1830262786 https://kotaku.com/current-and-former-employees-sue-riot-gam... - https://kotaku.com/top-riot-executive-suspended-without-pay-following-inve-1831084598 https://kotaku.com/top-riot-executive-suspended-without-pay-... - https://www.espn.com/esports/story/_/id/26686991/riot-games-employees-stage-walkout-protest-forced-arbitration https://www.espn.com/esports/story/_/id/26686991/riot-games-... - https://www.vice.com/en/article/dy8g87/league-of-legends-fake-anime-pop-star-is-sad-tweeting-about-genocide https://www.vice.com/en/article/dy8g87/league-of-legends-fak... - https://www.polygon.com/2020/7/29/21347587/riot-games-saudi-arabia-neom-partnership-league-european-championship-lec https://www.polygon.com/2020/7/29/21347587/riot-games-saudi-...
- bomdo 5y ago
  From your sources [1]: > COO, Scott Gelb [...], as a comedy bit, [...] has repeatedly touched subordinates’ balls or butt or farted in their faces. [...] his punishment—two months of unpaid leave and training. [1] From OP's interview with CTO Mike Seavers: > Every time we sat down to go through the past quarter and plan the next one at Riot Games, we came up with a leadership theme for the quarter. For example, we weren’t going to make decisions for others for a month. This put all of us on the same page, and we got everyone to think about it and talk about it. When my direct report came to me asking, “Can I do this thing?” It was easy for me to say, “I’m not going to answer that question. You know the theme of the quarter, so you need to at least think it through before I give you an opinion.” At least they are consistent. [1] https://kotaku.com/top-riot-executive-suspended-without-pay-following-inve-1831084598 https://kotaku.com/top-riot-executive-suspended-without-pay-...
  - adamors 5y ago
    Per his Linkedin he is still with the company. All these "suspensions without pay" are just for PR.
dafelst 5y ago
"Toxic boys club" sums up a lot of the historical problems, but a quick Google of "riot games culture problems" will give you literally dozens of articles to read. I have work with a few ex rioters and have interviewed a few (at the time) current ones, and have heard personal confirmation of many of these problems. It's a big company though, so some departments are better or worse in this respect. But yeah, it's not really a great place to emulate if you're trying to build a healthy culture, at least IMO.
- virtue3 5y ago
  I interviewed with them a few months ago. They are really -really- putting work into 180'ing their culture. I'm sure it's not there yet but there is a serious effort being made, even from the hiring side.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]

jrm415 5y ago

I think most HN readers are intelligent enough to be able to consider the quality of advice as something separate from its source. That is, a source need not be perfect to be worth listening to. Riot's obviously far from perfect, but this advice seems reasonable to me. Do you think following it is likely to lead to problems similar to Riot's? If there's some sort of causal link between empowering teams and failing to build an inclusive culture, I'd really find that interesting.

fulafel 5y ago
Good point, and to penalise companies practicing transparency also means boosting those that work to hide problems and fake the context in these kinds of interviews.
- user-the-name 5y ago
  What transparency are they being penalised for?
  - colonwqbang 5y ago
    The implication is that many companies have the problems which Riot are notorious for. They are just better at hiding them from public view.
    - user-the-name 5y ago
      Riot wasn't transparent about them either. They just failed at hiding them.
      - colonwqbang 5y ago
        I think that's what I wrote?
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

HideousKojima 5y ago

Even without considering the "boy's club" stuff, LoL never seemed to be very competently programmed back when I played it (admittedly I've hardly touched it since ~2012). I wouldn't really trust them for engineering and programming expertise either, except maybe from whoever manages their servers/online infra.

kayimbo 5y ago
You're not wrong. Their engineering seems incredibly incompetent. I've often postulated that they have like 500 junior developers and like 12 people with more than 5 years programming experience. There is probably like 2 people who keep the game engine running and when they quit the game will fall apart.
- HideousKojima 5y ago
  I think all the Riot employees on this thread are down voting us, sorry
  - elithrar 5y ago
    No, I down-voted each of you because your comments are anecdotal at best and don’t add to the discussion at all. Saying the game doesn’t appear to be “competently programmed” is analogous to the “coded badly” that gets thrown around, not taking into account that all successful consumer software has tech debt and inefficiencies. (I don’t work for Riot and have no affiliation with them)
- Kihashi 5y ago
  You should look at some of their dev blogs. Their engineering team has done some pretty remarkable things, like re-writing the game server to be deterministic so they could better deal with problems that occur in pro play[1]. They've also talked a bit about the past and future of the game engine specifically [2]. They also have blogs talking about operations- taking the game from something written by 2 dudes in a dorm room to being one of the most played games in the world- how their stack has changed, how they're set up to do patches and rollbacks, how they do their internal testing and playtesting, etc. [1]: https://technology.riotgames.com/news/determinism-league-legends-introduction https://technology.riotgames.com/news/determinism-league-leg... [2]: https://technology.riotgames.com/news/future-leagues-engine https://technology.riotgames.com/news/future-leagues-engine

esyir 5y ago

Whatever their problems, their results are pretty damn consistent. League of Legends remains the premier e-sport, dethroning all competitors in viewership rates and numbers. Valorant is rapidly rising, and threatens the long-incumbent direct rival Counter-Strike Teamfight Tactics, while not an e-sport, still remains in the top 10 streamed games on twitch. 3 releases, all (at least by twitch streams) major successes. From the product point of view, they're clearly doing something right, and whatever work culture issues they're claimed to have, they're certainly outperforming. Note: As most of riot's releases target the e-sport crowd, I'm using twitch viewership numbers as an analogue for success. Sports, after all, are judged by popularity amongst viewers above all.

dafelst 5y ago
Success isn't everything. It is very possible (and arguably more likely) to be a successful company and still have a shitty culture and/or work environment. Riot is a prime example of this, but unfortunately they are hardly the exception - it is a fairly common pattern amongst the AAA game companies and publishers. The specifics are not the same from company to company, but arguably the end result is. People are unfortunately willing to endure a lot just to get into their "dream industry".
zapnuk 5y ago
That's debatable League of Legends is a premier e-sport more so because of marketing than game design or engineering. In fact, their game client remains worse than dota 2's in every way. It's actually pretty hard to take them seriously considering their client is still such a buggy mess after about 10 years. While the viewership of casual Valorant is greater than CS-GO, it's also not "rapidly rising" - https://sullygnome.com/game/Valorant/365/summary https://sullygnome.com/game/Valorant/365/summary And the esport viewership of CS-GO is much larger compared to Valorant. And while Teamfight Tactics was an success, Legends of Runeterra wasn't. So they are 3/4... which is still pretty good - but can also be explained by good marketing and IP handling. Similar to the new Activision-Blizzard.
- tester34 5y ago
  >League of Legends is a premier e-sport more so because of marketing than game design or engineering. Indeed, it's debatable because it sounds weird I don't play LoL for close to decade due to their marketing (is it even marketing? or actually their Esport stuff?) For me LoL is great game because it changes often, so you don't get bored fast, also it's highly competitive with decent ways to express your skill

ehnto 5y ago

As a counterpoint, they have had those lessons and so could have learned from them if they were perceptive.

mtnygard 5y ago

Not to mention they've had money flowing like water. When you don't have to worry about being financially efficient a lot of management structures and unstructures seem like they "work". It's when the money dries up that cracks in the foundation are evident.