Epic Games Boss Responds to Criticism
- Thread starter Michael Grimm
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Indeed. I honestly think this argument (the OP) is primarily because of Capp's poor wording.stinkychops said:
"Everyone must work more than 40 hours a week every week" is what it implies, whereas what he meant was
"Everyone must be willing at crunch time to put in extra time to make sure there are no cockups" which is fine so long as crunch time isn't all the time.
Bullshit. This is the same thing EA got smashed for. Just because people are willing to work ridiculous hours and be in crunch time at all times is no reason to do so. And most of the time, the only reason people are willing to do so is because if they don't someone else is more than happy to do so to get into the industry. It is the same thing that happens during workers strikes. The company realizes that they can get cheaper labor, the workers strike, and the company hires cheap labor and replaces them, or this happens over a slower amount of time.
Just because he can defend himself and sound intelligent and make comments that seem viable doesn't mean that they are viable or what he's doing is okay.
Just because he can defend himself and sound intelligent and make comments that seem viable doesn't mean that they are viable or what he's doing is okay.
Given the number of people who want to be in the industry, passion isn't really hard for a company like them to get. They have to choose employees somehow.level250geek said:
It really depends on what you do. If you do food service, your employer probably shouldn't expect passion, given it's known to be a big, boring, soul-sucking industry that almost nobody is passionate about.
If a lot of people consider a job in your industry to be a dream job, you're going to have substantially more competition if you're just there to be paid (in which case, you should probably leave because such things don't pay as much as other things you could be doing with your skill set). If there are enough applicants that you can get the majority of your workforce to really love their work, why not hire *them*?
It sounds like most of you don't realize that most of these software developers don't get paid hourly for their work. I'm not sure about Epic but a lot of these companies pay their employees via a salary + bonus structure. You work 60 hours a week and get paid for 40 hours a week with the potential of a bonus or extra time off etc.
40 hour weeks are just about right. Maybe it's because I'm accustomed to it, but I find that leaves enough time to work-out, spend time with my GF and my friends, and keep my gaming up to date.Jadak said:
Heck, I could use even a little less working time. Ahh... lazy boy
And yet they have voluntary turnover far below the industry average, when many of their staff could easily find work elsewhere with their experience (and talent). And they're constantly voted - by their own employees, in anonymous surveys - as one of the top companies to work in NC. So... again, they're probably doing something right.Phase_9 said:
Capps' point is perfectly valid. We here at Chez Escapist usually work 8/9 hour days, if not more. When I need to finish a review, I stay late. When we're out covering a show, we work late. It's our version of crunch time, and we do it because A.) we care about the quality of our work, and B.) we're passionate about what we do. When they're trying to put polish on an E3 demo or rushing to hit release, it makes sense for developers to put in long hours to make sure that the finished product is up to standards. They do that because they're passionate about what they do and care about the quality of their work.
Read the full Joystiq interview with Capps, because really, he answers your concerns.
It's like this everywhere. You can say you don't have to do the extra hours, but if you're the only one not doing them then it's going to look bad, you're not going to get a pay rise and you'll be the first head on the block when they start needing to downsize.
Where I worked (sorry, no names) it was 40 normal paid hours a week, plus whatever extra as and when. Extra hours were unpaid. Working at the weekend was usual at crunch times (milestone builds, every 4 or 6 weeks). But there would be an atmosphere of camaraderie in the office, we were putting in these extra unpaid hours because we were passionate about the project -- it was hard not to be; it was a killer project -- and even though it was mainly fairly tedious work, we did it because we had to keep the publisher happy and we knew the eventual end result would be a wicked awesome game. Staying at least an extra half-hour in the evenings was usual, as chances were someone would be struggling to get something finished on time and need some support.
Where I worked (sorry, no names) it was 40 normal paid hours a week, plus whatever extra as and when. Extra hours were unpaid. Working at the weekend was usual at crunch times (milestone builds, every 4 or 6 weeks). But there would be an atmosphere of camaraderie in the office, we were putting in these extra unpaid hours because we were passionate about the project -- it was hard not to be; it was a killer project -- and even though it was mainly fairly tedious work, we did it because we had to keep the publisher happy and we knew the eventual end result would be a wicked awesome game. Staying at least an extra half-hour in the evenings was usual, as chances were someone would be struggling to get something finished on time and need some support.
Many of us with jobs that don't have deadlines/special events/real consequences for not "getting the job done" will not understand this, but there are times where extending the work day, whether or not you expected to at the start of the day, is justified. I don't allow myself to get looped into staying late as a practice (I'm usually out 15 minutes early), but when we get slammed, I'll work a double if needed. My supervisors are flexible with me, and appreciate when I'm flexible in return. After a 20 hour snow day, I not only got my huge overtime pay, but also a Best Buy gift card in my in-box from my department director. I'll put in extra for these guys.CantFaketheFunk said:
That said, if the expectation is that you stayed late every day, screw that- there's not enough money in the world.
I guess my point is that different jobs have different expectations, and you sometimes can't fit what you need to do into a simple, 8 hour a day schedule.
Precisely. Which is what Capps was saying about how asking people to work overtime on Crunch is one thing, but if you asked them to do that regularly, they'd burn out. Which is why they have flexible hours, and actually kick people out of the office at 2 AM.Bofus Teefus said:
What about game developers who have families? A lover needs attention, children need two actively parenting parents and being a daddy, or in a few encouraging cases a mommy, is not just some little hobby you can leave in the basement for seven years while your career moves along to a point where you actually have time to spare again; we're looking at more troubled individuals growing up not giving a crap, finding their way to crime, vandalism, substance abuse or even becoming that really really annoying guy at your office who constantly does things solely to spite you, just when you really don't need any more grief...!
Being passionate about games, to me, is like being passionate about the sky or the moon if you're not also passionate about life: it's just staring off at something completely disconnected from you and eventually losing perspective on reality and all the things that make life worth living. Let your employees have lives, I say! Make them work professional hours, by all means, but leave them enough time to remember who they are and why they bother existing. Nobody produces amazing material while they're burnt out, anyway, and crunch periods strike me more as symptoms of a serious problem than an acceptable means to an end.
Being passionate about games, to me, is like being passionate about the sky or the moon if you're not also passionate about life: it's just staring off at something completely disconnected from you and eventually losing perspective on reality and all the things that make life worth living. Let your employees have lives, I say! Make them work professional hours, by all means, but leave them enough time to remember who they are and why they bother existing. Nobody produces amazing material while they're burnt out, anyway, and crunch periods strike me more as symptoms of a serious problem than an acceptable means to an end.
They just said on the interview, people on the Gears 2 team got paid more on extra hours than in normal wages.
Do want
Also to the above post, they get massive downtime after releases. They just work those 60 hour weeks when a game's about to be released (2-3 weeks prior).
Do want
Also to the above post, they get massive downtime after releases. They just work those 60 hour weeks when a game's about to be released (2-3 weeks prior).
If thats the case, then it seems Capps just used a very unfortunat choice of words.CantFaketheFunk said:
According to one of my professors, who works in the industry, things get pushed into crunch time 50% of the time no matter what you do. So trust me, they try their best to avoid development snafus. That leads to a REALLY bad crunch.Cousin_IT said:
Yeah. I think that he was meaning to say that when things go into crunch time, occasionally you'll have to work insane hours: it's part of the profession sadly.TsunamiWombat said:
What Capps says there is definitely true - but that wasn't the point of the whole blow-up in the first place... by the time this whole story made it to the websites, it had turned much more into Greg trashing on Capps, and about Epic being unfair.CantFaketheFunk said:
The actual start of this whole thing was when Capps was at the IGDA Leadership Forum, on a panel "Studio Heads on the Hotseat". You can find the video of it embedded in the original Joystiq piece, and here on google: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7344863953591545577&hl=en
I've put his quotes here - sorry where it's a little long, I got it as short as I could while doing my best to retain the context.
7:10 - The question Jen asks is, how do you keep people excited in tough times. Part of Mike's response was (my transcription here):
"Our hiring process is built around passion. Of course, experience and talent is part of that, but its finding people who just care so much about animations looking good - I don't care if he never plays games, if he's a perfectionist, or she loves animations that look so good it'll keep them up late at night and I don't have to do it - because there's nothing I can do to keep someone away from their family and kids or whatever else until two in the morning, but there's a lot they can do to make themselves get that invested. So it's really up to them. (audience laughter) Or, you know, honestly if they're having trouble at home, we look for people like that... (more laughter) You wanna stay in the office, sure..."
21:09 - Jen says that they had an interesting discussion on the panel's prep-call about work-life balance that turned the conventional wisdom a bit on its head, so to Mike, what does quality of life mean to him?
"What's quality of life? That's a good question, I guess. I mean - again, one of the personal leadership track sessions had some really good - I guess it was Don talking about how quality of life comes from doing what you want to do, and that's basically my job for the studio, is to set them up for a position where they can -love- making art every day or whatever it is. And it's not just that, but its putting it in a space where if you're a great character artist, not only do you get to make wicked, bad-ass characters at Epic, but millions of people will see it and your commercial will be in movie theaters and all that other stuff. That way there's a lot of pride that comes from that. But it's very different than the traditional, oh, a 40-hour work week kinda stuff - we're not about that. We split the profits internally with the people at our company. So, no, we purposefully don't hire people because we want to work 60 hours a week so that we don't have to split the pie up as much. And I think there's a lot of talk in the games, oh you can make great games in eight hours a day, five days a week, and never - the only - it's management's fault if you work more than that. Fuck, it's management's fault for hiring people who want to leave at 5pm every day, is the way I look at it. There you go! There's your complaint, right? My job is to hire people who are so passionate that I have to kick them out. And I do. 2am, we have a rule, you go home."
So. What Capps is doing now is either backpedaling from his earlier statements, or explaining them & putting them in context better.
That's all good, as far as I'm concerned. Epic does indeed keep its employees happy - it helps that they have self-selected to get people who like that environment, but sure - why wouldn't they? They made what both sides feel is an equitable arrangement.
The problem many people had - including myself - was that this is an IGDA event, and one of the IGDA directors, while being asked questions by the IGDA chair, is advocating this kind of stuff. Since the IGDA has made a point of saying it is leading the charge against excessive or exploitative overtime, this didn't sit well at all.
Of -course- people have to work overtime sometimes. And sure, in games right now, for a lot of reasons, it's part and parcel with the environment. But that's light-years away from working at a studio where it is stated policy to be there 60 hours a week most of the year, regardless of what the schedule looks like because that's just how it works. And I've worked at that place, so I know they're out there. That's the kind of crap that the IGDA needs to (and is trying) to help stop.
There are already some positive signs to come out of this whole thing, and I'm glad for it - people are engaged and talking about the issue. I do wish, however, that the press had picked up on the underlying issue here, as opposed to Costikyan's rant and Capp's backpedaling.
Wow, seeing the original quotes make me think that Capps and Epic are complete scum, the lowest form of life. However, I'm sure Epic aren't the only company that does this, and I'm sure he's only being honest and upfront about the types of business practices that go on in ALL development houses, that don't generally get talked about. Perhaps maybe I should stop buying computer games altogether, if this is what the industry is like across the board... I wouldn't be missing much, it's not like there is much decent new product coming from major game developers these days...
I believe in his statement, the undefined point is that he doesn't want people who just "clock on, clock off" at 40 hours, but people who will, as you said put in extra effort during crunch times, and make a commitment to the company (enjoy working there, enjoy their projects, are willing to put in a little extra effort).Doug said: