alanschu

The big one I remember was EA spouse. But like, Rockstar will pretty much troll in response to complaints about working conditions. But do fans really care if the working conditions are harsh if they're getting a game that they really like?

I could see it. Stuff like this can happen at a lot of places. I hear stories about a lot of other studios, and even stories about how BioWare used to be and so forth. I think the industry can definitely use some maturation here across the whole front. Although I think it's also reflective that EA isn't as collective as some people think. How BioWare does QA, for example, is a lot different than pretty much any other studio does it, let alone other EA studios.

I'm not saying that there's anything special about the benefits. From what I can tell compared to a lot of my friends that work other places, things seem "pretty equivalent." For a lot of positions compensation may not be quite as high as equivalent programming/producing/QA jobs in other fields, but frankly a lot of that is simply a degree of supply and demand. We have had people apply for contract QA positions with experience from other fields and they'll be "whoa this isn't paid as much as I thought" and it's mostly just "well, we have 3 openings and 80 applicants." (even just in Edmonton). The circumstances around contract people are the most challenging and areas I hope can get better though.

BioWare offers a "gaming rebate" for game related purchases. Normally it's just me dumping dozens of printed Steam receipts (I get $100 per year).

This is fairly common throughout the games industry that hours can be pretty extreme. I know a lot of places are trying to get better at it, but like there was the #RyzeFacts thing that happened earlier where people were getting on the dev for coming across as being proud of supplying over 10,000 crunch meals (and I agree that that isn't something to be proud of). All of the crunch (maybe 10-20 days in the last 2 years) I have worked on DAI so far, though, has been voluntary (i.e. I really wanted to get some stuff done because my plan for how long it'd take for me to get some tasking done wasn't accurate). I don't mind doing it because I don't do it much, and it's because I want to help make the game be really good. I could make more money elsewhere (especially in Oil rich Alberta), but I am still very comfortably compensated and frankly the work culture (I got randomly high fived by people in the hallway because they actually know who Ryu is) and so forth is just more enjoyable for me. My point was just that if anyone wants to hold EA to the fire for its sweatshop, I think people are being a bit discriminating in how they apply their concern for the poor workers.

Had to wait for me to wake up first As this sweatshop worker starts his day at 10 PM (I choose to work 10-7 since work offers me that flexibility. Some choose to work 7-4 instead). Running a bit late today though as I had to remember how to tie my black belt for the Ryu costume I'm wearing today.

I know it's awful. Like, I am sick or go on vacation and I still get paid just the same like the rest of my friends that make salaries in other jobs. Also, when my boss says "Allan, I noticed you were working late a couple of days last month. Do you need some help with your tasks? I don't want you getting burnt out." That and the other annoying things like RRSP contribution matching, reimbursements for buying gaming software and hardware (EA gave me money for contributing to Project Eternity). Never mind that they still feed me when I do work late. Or that time that I sustained a serious concussion playing ball hockey and was bed ridden for 2 weeks with post concussion symptoms and they said "don't worry about work or money. Just worry about getting better" and accommodating the 2 weeks of half days after that as I slowly got better. Or when my personal life went into shambles in early 2012 with huge fractures in my social structure and I was given free access to a professional to help me through that. I'm sure many people in sweatshops look over at me and go "dude, we're totally the same." But I'm sure pre-EA BioWare was a beacon of proper working hours and non-"sweatshop" conditions, right? Fans don't care about employee working conditions in the slightest, all they care about is whether or not they like the game. Plenty of people here that enjoy games that are oblivious to the fact that they were made on an 80 hour work week for over a year with epic employee attrition after the fact when they realize it's not sustainable long term.

You're presenting a false dichotomy because of the following statement: "Why would they do the sensible thing and, knowing their ruleset and mechanics, outfit enemies manually when they can make complicated algorithms that take into account class, talents, attributes, group composition, target level for the area and then bake a fabulous and balanced combat encounter. Aesthetically pleasing too." We have two choices: 1) outfit enemies manually 2) make complicated algorithms that take into account a multitude of aspects (i.e. you made it as complicated as possible) It should be noted that the post of yours that I responded to came before you saying "I'm okay with it in random encounters" as well as "I'm okay with non-equipped loot." Baldur's Gate did have random loot, though it wasn't equipped items. I mentioned it more for Baldur's Gate 2 creating scaled encounters though, since you were focusing on the amount of work required for "random" loot, and it's an example of similar work with similar "complicated algorithms." I think there's also a misunderstanding because in my practical use of the term "random" in game design, it more typically means "some sort of probability based selection." That is, it'd be "random" in that it's not always the same every playthrough, but would still have significant designer control. And would not at all require "complicated algorithms."

You're presenting a false dichotomy and displaying a misunderstanding on the level of influence randomization must have. It's 100% or 0% for you. It's not like randomization elements didn't exist in Baldur's Gate games as well, so I think your perspective is a bit narrow.

During the Town Hall (which I just watched) there was a brief breakdown from the CFO in terms of how GAAP and non-GAAP works. Non-GAAP is pretty much "the actual cashflow for the quarter." But they are accounted for differently (via GAAP), which means that the revenue/losses for particular products end up getting split across the lifetime of the product (for a game like FIFA, roughly 12 months). In terms of non-GAAP Net Income, EA was in the black by $105 million. You can feel that they just put on a show for the employees, but the executive team has been pretty enthusiastic with the Q2 performance. This is probably why (as linked in the article) Andrew Wilson "was nevertheless positive about the results."

I enjoyed the video. Thanks

I also work for a dev studio, and can understand that all features represent an opportunity cost and that things like scope creep are very real things that are very real project killers, especially if you aren't exactly operating with a near limitless budget. If you think that this is a decision made simply to appease Mouse and Keyboard elitists, only to mansplain what one of the apparent advantages of the PC are to a bunch of PC game developers that have been developing PC games (and console games) for over a decade, then I think you're being a bit naive in your assessment. I'd bet my entire savings that it has much less to do with Obsidian thinking "it doesn't work." On the plus side, however, if you're available to make a mod then you can do that and make all those people happy. You can utilize it as leverage to help bring exposure to the Indie Development Studio you work for too.

Pars 20-22.

There's nothing mandating that what you just said is true.

As you say, it requires additional work. And it's not like Obsidian has never done work on console titles with controller support, either. Just as a note, this is a rather confrontational tone and shifts the discussion from being a collaborative one to an adversarial one. I for one, would dispute that the KB&M crowd is either dying or diminishing. But since it evidently isn't up for debate, I guess the conversation just ends here?

Part 18 and 19 are up. ALso, sneakiest jensen ever http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=189828622

Parts 11-17 are up (last two are shorter. Part 17 shows the first boss fight) Full playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLv1uX4i1Tm5JPFKsFIqE6JOQ2SWadNqQl

How is it happening? The only "slowdowns" (not unplayable) I have noticed are when I enter larger areas and after a bit it fixes itself.

What stuttering issues? :S

Yeah, after the fact I learned quite a bit about capacitor dramas

Catchy ad! http://youtu.be/_1mfIg1I3zE

I do not craft badges and have a decent chunk of these.

It will support Mantle, however, which may be of interest.

I had similar symptoms back in 2010. In the end my motherboard capacitors had bulged and my continued use of the computer ended up causing some damage to my video card as well. I had had the computer since about 2006 or 2007. Unfortunately, I don't know if the capacitors were the cause or the consequence, but given that 2007ish timeframe was a less than amazing time for capacitors they may have been of lesser quality.

While reading through the comments, I saw another point that I see come up a lot which simply isn't true: "Sure the money comes from the fans, but when it comes down to the "classical method" the money comes from investors. These investors want to see revenue and thus have a say in whats being made. Even if they themselves aren't well versed in the gaming world. So while a decent portion of the revenue will be "profit" instead of repayment to the investor. There are also other things to consider." For a publicly traded company, the investors typically do not affect the cash flow of the company. In fact, the money usually just trades hands among investors. The only time a company's cash flow will directly interact with the investors is when it issues new stock, buys back existing stock, or issues a dividend (which most game companies that I am aware of do not do).