http://www.livejournal.com/users/ea_spouse/

I know similar topics have been covered here but was curious to hear more insight on the subject from everyone here. At my last studio we had crunch for a year and was told it was mandatory and if you're not here you're fired essentially. The game shipped (barely) but in the process I went through a bad breakup with my fiance and was laid off with a majority of our staff right after launch. It's been several months and I'm still feeling the backlash from those events from getting into a deeper financial hole and still looking for employment not to mention the world changing events inflicted on someone you spent years with.

Ultimately I think there is a balance to be found. With the passion and enjoyment that comes from working in games it's hard to draw a line and say my day ends here. It's going to spill over in some areas. I knew the risks involved and would take them again. But it's unfortunate to see the damage that can be taken.

I know the EA employees went thru a 12 hour a day 7 days a week crunch as of Sept 20th till release of Lord of the Rings.....which people don't talk about...Soul?

I had inside info at a GNomon class I attended.

"EA's bright and shiny new corporate trademark is "Challenge Everything." Where this applies is not exactly clear. Churning out one licensed football game after another doesn't sound like challenging much of anything to me; it sounds like a money farm."

That has to be the most truthfull statement about EA I've ever heard. I've hated that company for years. Not because of this, I had no idea the working conditions were like that. I hated them because they just come out with the un-inspired festering piles of shit every year.

During these crunch times, those employees seem to fall of the face of the earth. That's not a career I'm looking for. No one should go through that much trouble just to make a game. It's just a game!

This is getting just stupid now. If they give you a piece of the profit fine. But no profit sharing, work yourself sick, only to be booted out after release? No wonder they don't want anyone over 30. Anyone that old would say..."Ok, so this game grossed 20 million?(Halo2 did 200M just yesterday) and I get 27k AND you shitcan me?" "Where is that baseball bat?" Has the gaming industry become an exploiter of youth?
In any business the largest cost is salary. Why hire double the artists when you can just make the ones you have work twice as hard? As businesses get larger the tend to get less human. When the corporation cares more for the stockholders than their employees that when the exploitation starts.

HellMark- "...if you're not here you're fired essentially"
Did you get overtime? 12*7-40= 44h!
Couldn't you sue them for false dismissal?

Here's a thought- Unionize

I did hours like this at the start of my career on Driver PSX/PC. It's never worth it, there's no reward big enough to cover me for the lose of my life and generally there is no reward anyway, unless you count watching the boss drive to the office in a new porsche or ferrari a reward.

Post deleted by Daz

Basically, these are the same tactics the Animation Industry use to use in Hollywood. Since alot of the EA studios are in California, I'd imagine the same a'hole executives that use to manage artists that did cartoons probably are managing 3D Artists too.

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eepberries: careful what you say there buddy. Whatever your dislike of the corporate monster that is EA, at least 4 or 5 or more folks on these boards worked on those 'festering piles of shit' that you speak of.


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Well I'm not criticizing the artists and programmers of the game. They're most likely the pawns of the operation (that's just my guess though, of course). The overall execution of the game will be good. The graphics will look good, and the presentation will be good. The problem is that the actual game itself will probably suck and be nothing more than the same thing the company sold last year with one or two added "OMG FEATURES!!1"

Im proud of some of the EA games Ive worked on as a gameplay experience ( Everything Or Nothing recieved critical acclaim for the most part. And no, it wasnt a re-hash of anything else we'd done the year before ).

This thread was about EAs working hours practises, not the quality of their games.

Isn’t there a union or something for artist over there? If not, there should be one. It should be illegal to force your employees to work that much.

This is a really unhealthy culture for the whole industry and It always pisses me off to hear about stuff like this.

I’m not going to buy anymore EA games from now on.
Except Sims 2, just so I can get some time alone at the couth with a beer. :P

/Palm

Personally the trend worries me, especially as i have 3 kids to look after and have seen or been involved in too many casualties allready. I Can only wish us all the best of luck, especially those at the sharp end. Something must change for the better soon, if there is anything that i personally can so i will. I hope that the same is true of all involved...

tpe

mmmm, don't need nearly as many antacids now that I'm back in academia!

Well, as an interesting hypothetical to think about;

I've noticed that some people in the industry are a bit prone to depression and emotional disorders. (as are some people on this board) What happens when a few of their own employees start whacking themselves, or one gets really pissed off and takes a gun to work? Or perhaps a few die from stress-related disease? I'll tell you what.

Multi-Million dollar lawsuits. Bilion-Dollar Class-Action lawsuits. Stock value goes down the toilet.

You can only push people so hard before they can't take it anymore. In these situations, most people will just quit. But some people will die from it. And employers that helped to cause this type of situation will pay for it dearly. It'll be a terrible lesson to learn, but I think that this is inevitable if some companies don't change their ways.

"Multi-Million dollar lawsuits. Bilion-Dollar Class-Action lawsuits."

"And employers that helped to cause this type of situation will pay for it dearly"

You'd think that might be the case, but thanks to Bush and his cronies and the passing of prop 64, class action lawsuits will probably become a thing of the past. I dont think the big corporations have anything to worry about. They have the govmnt. on their side, unlike the workers.

Sett we never got overtime. It was a start up studio so things were tight enough. As I said we crunched for a year straight and pulled 7 days/week for the most part of that with a few weeks of 6 days/week peppered in there. We had about a 90% staff reduction from layoffs after launch.

As for suing I heard some people were considering it but most of us just wanted to move on and find something better for ourselves and learn from the experience. Besides the studio had no money to give and filed Chapter 11 recently.

I'm hoping a good change can come from all this. I don't have much stake right now since I'm not working but I'd definitely be willing to do what I can to help make it better. Word of mouth I think can help but isn't the end all for an answer. Everyone here has been pretty discreet and honest (one of the things I like about coming here)about some of the bad experiences at certain studios. What they said has made me gun shy of some studios for sure. I wonder if that type of information affects the type of talent a studio can get and/or keep the talent they have long term.

They know you are working this type of job because it is what you enjoy doing and it is what you want to do.

They are taking advantage of that. They also know that lots of never-had-this-kinda-job are waiting for yours to open up so if you don't like it you can be replaced.

You don't need a union. You need to change the mindset of the people on this message board who have yet to get a job.

I've worked less hours at my job when helicopters are grounded in Iraq and are needing parts we are supplying!

Sheesh!

It's like any other type buisness . If EA starts losing top talent because of the way they run there buisness they will change . It seems odd to me though that if it is so bad there why so many film people have started to flock there . I guess doing 70-80 hr weeks for a steady,good paying,somewhat reliable employer is better then working 70-80 hr weeks in film only to get laid off and have to move ever few months . I guess as the old saying goes " could be worse "

Though I agree that if they spend so much time on there games they should be on par with what Blizzard is doing or another top studio . I think only Madden Football has that kind of respect ?

Duke is absolutely right, except I will argue the whole "you don't need a union" part. Unions have been demonized in the latter part of the 20th century. A few of us together united will not make a change. There are too many people so willing and anxious to get into the industry that they will work for nothing and tolerate the abuse. A few of us united together will not make a change. There are less than 1% of us that are too "elite" to be replaced. For the rest of us, there are plenty of young, anxious kids ready to replace us. We need to unite and unionize to make change. Together we can make a stand, divided we will all fall.

Look for the union label when you are buying that coat, dress or blouse.
Remember somewhere our union's sewing, our wages going to feed the kids, and run the house.
We work hard, but who's complaining? Thanks to the I.L.G. we're paying our way!
So always look for the union label, it says we're able to make it in the U.S.A.!

heh heh

I think Unions can be good. They were good for the auto industry in the early part of the 20th century now they are useless as far as the auto industry goes. In the auto industry, now the Unions are the bad guys. UPS workers went on strike to allow the Teamsters (mafia) to run their Union. (What a bunch of idiots UPS employees are! Sincerely they deserve all they get now) Unions are good in my opinion when there is some diservice being done. After a while they outlive their usefullness and just become a drain.

I'm not for Unions at all, but you game employees need to get something together wether it be a Union or just a bit of unity. 12 hour days 7 days a weeks is bullshit. I can see maybe one or two weeks of it, but you guys do put up with way to much crap!

It’s sad to see that the unions work so poorly in the states. You US peoples seems to hate unions, so something must have gone terrible wrong down the road somewhere. In the end, you end up paying for it when you are forced to work every weekend while your boss are playing golf or picking up chicks in his new Dodge Viper.

Or get a heart attack by the age of 35, not knowing where you kids go to school, etc etc etc..:P

[img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]
/Palm

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You need to change the mindset of the people on this message board who have yet to get a job.

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I'm convinced. There are just too many responsibilities in my real life that would prevent me from taking that sort of abuse. From my past experiences with part-time jobs, I try to do the best I can, to the point that the company realizes I'm a valuable worker. I'm needed. Then, they'll work along with my needs, or they'll lose me.

It seems in order to succeed in the game industry, you need to be along that level. Having the talent and respect that allows you to stand up for yourself, so the company respects your needs for fear of losing you.

Many of the "kids" looking for their dream job in games, have just enough ability to be hired. Expendable youth. Too bad the quality shows in the product. Similar to how the ability to count will get you a job flipping burgers, while knowledge and skill will land a stable job as gourmet chef.

I'll wait a few more years.

I think the problem isn't truly the love what we do attitude making us do the long hours, I think it's the fact that when we get our first jobs everyone else is working those hours and we figure if we don't then we will get fired.

Most of us refuse after a few years to do too much crunch but the flipside of that is because companies like EA already control most of those companies where people are perhaps standing up for their rights, not putting in those hours causes the companies game to bomb or get canned and then the company gets canned.

It's all well and good saying we should stand together, but in this day and age you can't get 6 people to agree on the color of shite let alone a few thousand to agree on certain equitable and humanitarian work attitudes that suit all!!

As Daz mentioned, the idealist attitude that when serious crackups occur they will lead to government stepping in is just pure fantasy. It's not like the games industry is the only one being utterly screwed by the degree to which capitalism is being twisted.

Some good input on unions.

Dukester - for someone who is not for unions your shure know that song very well. ya commie [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Suing can be a problem too, if the word gets out that you sued your last employer. It could be tough to get new job.

If the co. that work for is young and hurting try this approch -"I will work 12 hours a day in exchange for stock." If they say bugger you then you know what kind of people you are dealing with. and where you stand in their eyes. If the are true entertainment purists they should let nothing stand in the way of the completion of their project.

I think the key is profit sharing. A worker who gets a piece of it will work harder. Use unions as a threat.

If these don't work, when upper management leaves at 5 -loot the fucken' place! Not even a doorknob.

Was it relic? Good comment they gave to the entry level people willing to work for free or very little.

"We Hire people based on how much they are worth financially. So your saying you are worth very little then?"

Nice gleam of hope in a sea of assholes.