Red Dead Redemption 2 devs say you should speak out on crunch, but don’t boycott the game

Red Dead Redemption 2 releases for consoles later this week. It’s the biggest game of the year, made by a company with a reputation for regularly raising the bar when it comes to open world action games. But concerns over Rockstar’s lengthy overtime hours and unhealthy crunch have dominated the conversation around the game leading up to release, and a new report has collected dozens of anonymous accounts from current and former employees. If you’re hoping for either a damning indictment or absolution of Rockstar’s work practices, you won’t find it here. The worldwide studios working under the company’s banner are all different, and the thousands of developers who’ve touched Red Dead Redemption 2 all have different experiences to share. Some of those experiences include mandatory overtime, diminished relationships, and deteriorating mental health. The full feature from Kotaku is well worth your time. One current employee says that “the overall tone at Rockstar is that what the company values most is not the bugs you fix but the hours you put in.” Those sentiments are echoed throughout - even among those who are generally positive about their time at the company. Everyone values putting out the best game they can, but it seems the expectation is for developers to show that value by staying late and coming in on weekends.

from PCGamesN https://ift.tt/2q5Y24v