6 ms·

You would recommend working at a AAA game dev company? I've heard the work-life balance is terrible... Not sure you would even have time for a side project.

meibo 3y ago
It's pretty good in that regard in my experience, in Europe anyway. Everything else pretty much still applies though, out-of-touch execs and all.
hesdeadjim 3y ago
It’s no better in smaller studios frankly. Best bet if you want balance is to not work in games at all and then make games on the side. Edit: I have a US-centric viewpoint and I can’t speak to other countries.
Cthulhu_ 3y ago
The companies still seem to prey on naive but excited employees who want to work in the gaming industry so badly they will accept the risk of low pay and overwork; it's still an employer's market. Indie games - once established anyway - seem like a better bet, some of the bigger titles in the space nowadays in terms of sale - I'm thinking Hollow Knight, Hades - seem all right, in that their current games are still a steady income stream, allowing them to take the time with the - guaranteed successful - sequels. Only a matter of time before they get bought up by a bigger studio / publisher though, one big payout. Happened to KSP, and while I had faith in the new developer studio, the sequel is off to a disappointing start.
- OkayPhysicist 3y ago
  The progress on KSP2 is promising enough to maintain my interest, but they definitely went into early access way too soon. It's a really bad look to launch a sequel with ~10% of the content of the original.
teamonkey 3y ago
In my opinion, the conditions in AAA are considerably better now than they used to be 5, 10 or 15 years ago, in general. Not everywhere, certainly, but overtime culture is lessening and there’s a more supportive attitude to employees. Average pay for the average employee is slowly improving too, and getting more evenly spread, though still a lot lower than equivalent jobs in other tech sectors. Better pay for most, but fewer Ferraris in the car park.
klik99 3y ago
There's a lot of VC money from firms formed by ex-game folks that are investing in teams that come from AAA. I do contract work for a few examples of this and I have to say they are the best large team projects I have worked on - because investment from these types of firms tend to be in the team rather than the project and the prevalence of early access there's way less crunch pressure.

meibo 3y ago

It's pretty good in that regard in my experience, in Europe anyway. Everything else pretty much still applies though, out-of-touch execs and all.

hesdeadjim 3y ago

It’s no better in smaller studios frankly. Best bet if you want balance is to not work in games at all and then make games on the side. Edit: I have a US-centric viewpoint and I can’t speak to other countries.

Cthulhu_ 3y ago

The companies still seem to prey on naive but excited employees who want to work in the gaming industry so badly they will accept the risk of low pay and overwork; it's still an employer's market. Indie games - once established anyway - seem like a better bet, some of the bigger titles in the space nowadays in terms of sale - I'm thinking Hollow Knight, Hades - seem all right, in that their current games are still a steady income stream, allowing them to take the time with the - guaranteed successful - sequels. Only a matter of time before they get bought up by a bigger studio / publisher though, one big payout. Happened to KSP, and while I had faith in the new developer studio, the sequel is off to a disappointing start.

OkayPhysicist 3y ago
The progress on KSP2 is promising enough to maintain my interest, but they definitely went into early access way too soon. It's a really bad look to launch a sequel with ~10% of the content of the original.

teamonkey 3y ago

In my opinion, the conditions in AAA are considerably better now than they used to be 5, 10 or 15 years ago, in general. Not everywhere, certainly, but overtime culture is lessening and there’s a more supportive attitude to employees. Average pay for the average employee is slowly improving too, and getting more evenly spread, though still a lot lower than equivalent jobs in other tech sectors. Better pay for most, but fewer Ferraris in the car park.

klik99 3y ago

There's a lot of VC money from firms formed by ex-game folks that are investing in teams that come from AAA. I do contract work for a few examples of this and I have to say they are the best large team projects I have worked on - because investment from these types of firms tend to be in the team rather than the project and the prevalence of early access there's way less crunch pressure.