[ Asid Cast ] Alleged Ex-Ubisoft Employee Talks About His Experience

[KaRLiToS]

SOURCE

Many of us want to work in the game development industry to do what we love to do i.e. “gaming.” But a shocking revelation from an alleged ex-Ubisoft employee on /r/assassinscreed clearly shows that not it’s not as easy or rewarding to work in the highly competitive industry especially as a developer.

 

[ImpulsE69]

Nothing in there that we didn't already know. AAA titles are driven by shareholders and money grabs, nothing else and the usual misconception that everyone is a pirate.

 

[JeffMD]

This makes me sad, unfortunately we don't force the companies to pull this shit, it is the programmers that need to say enough is enough.

 

[tential]

I'm not one to take anything on reddit seriously, especially something that is as poorly written as that.

Real or not, it's probably what actually happens there anyway.

 

[BrunoPuntzJones]

Might as well have been written 25 years ago. Has been, always will be the same thing.

 

[SunnyD]

The "90% are pirates anyway" quote has been in circulation since the internet came into existence.

 

[Silverforce11]

Just for reference sake, mid-late 2000s was also when Ubi went full-retard on DRM to prevent "losing $ to all those PC pirates".. sadly it just prevented legit buyers from enjoying their games.

 

[Blanky]

Nothing in there that we didn't already know. AAA titles are driven by shareholders and money grabs, nothing else and the usual misconception that everyone is a pirate.

Have to agree. No idea if this guy is even a legit ubisoft ex employee, but nothing here shocking at all. I imagine there are many game developers who still love their jobs, but many are hugely overworked and could make as much or more money working less hours serving the corporate world--which is exactly what they are doing when they work for a publicly traded company anyway.

This game's failings were obvious from day one: I was positive that dev wanted more time on it but the suits said no you're out of time. I've seen it in my own work. The devs always win in the end; either delay something and annoy people, or release shit and truly piss them off. It's always better to delay, and if you can't deliver all the features by a deadline that truly can't move you just cut them out. Better to trim poorly-coded features entirely than put in things that don't work properly.

The tragedy is that given what the state of this game seems to be in I bet a few more months could have squared it all away; fixed the clipping, fixed performance, nightmare faces, etc. all the silly crap we've seen online. But instead of a three month delay now the game will be remembered as ubisoft releasing something unfinished and pissing many of its customers off. It's shortsighted and dumb.

 

[poohbear]

well good thing they lost 12% in shares, if it hurts their pocket books then they might reconsider for next time!

 

[TeknoBug]

I know two people that USED to work in EA Vancouver (and one went to Edmonton to playtest SWTOR). They both said the same thing, you're a big gamer and you learn software development and want to develop games because you're a gamer- however it's like grinding teeth because you're putting a lot of effort and have pressure and get little reward after. Think about it if you want a career in game development, you may just as well develop a good mobile app for iTunes and Android and make millions off it if you sell it for $4.99.

But that "90% are pirates anyways" is a jerkfaced comment, I know piracy is pretty high on PC but I honestly think there's more honest legit PC gamers than pirates. And releasing a subpar game for $60 is just going to encourage piracy even more anyways.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Sound a lot like my stint in the PC games Dev industry.

 

[BSim500]

Can't say I'm surprised. The overall attitude towards PC gamers from certain large studio's has been somewhere between "barely tolerated peasant" and "dog turd underneath my shoe" for quite a while now. Sounds like they're "pulling an EA" with crazy levels of +90% unpaid overtime for the developers / quietly tolerating a bullying culture of anyone who "dares" to work normal time they were contracted for instead of the "70hrs work for 37hrs pay" p*ss-take.

Then again, I've almost completely lost interest in their output anyway. Didn't buy Watch Dogs (though tested it on a friend's), not interested in any of the AC franchise or the Crew. The Tom Clancy franchise has been utterly "spam-sequelled" to death (over 30x titles across Ghost Recon + Rainbow Six + Splinter Cell). Far Cry 3 may have been good but the franchise will probably also end up "over-sequelled" over the next few years (FC5, FC6, FC7, etc, by 2020).

I know two people that USED to work in EA Vancouver (and one went to Edmonton to playtest SWTOR). They both said the same thing, you're a big gamer and you learn software development and want to develop games because you're a gamer- however it's like grinding teeth because you're putting a lot of effort and have pressure and get little reward after. Think about it if you want a career in game development, you may just as well develop a good mobile app for iTunes and Android and make millions off it if you sell it for $4.99.

^ This. You'd have to be insane to leave college with a pile of debt, and want to work on an AAA title for one of the big three publishers only to end up earning less in real terms (adjusted for unpaid hours) than a degree-less, debt-free electrician or network installer (moreso "adjusted for stress" or actually having a life after 5pm). If you have decent coding skills and can make something like Diner Dash or Bejeweled (50m copies sold across all platforms) and publish via Popcap, you'll make far more than you ever will slaving away for the big three in a non-managerial position trying and failing to finish off overly-complex games with constantly inadequate budget / time constraints for development & testing.

 

[Jodell88]

Those 'pirates' allowed me to play Prince of Persia: Two Thrones on Windows 7. Ubisoft's DRM will not allow it to run. Thanks pirates!

 

[you2]

That's why there has been such a boom in indie developers and more than a few of these indie teams are producing near AAA games that are doing pretty well. The following is a small list of recent success:
larian studio, cdprojek (ok you might call these guys a publisher but...), stoic studio, xile, obsidian, crate studio (no clue if they are doing ok $$)...

Then there are the 'good' guys like paradox and a few others. The problem is most of these develoeprs/small publisher produce similar types of games (rpg, strategy, arpg) and the art side is not quite AAA but they are still decent enough games.
-
Long run I keep hoping ubisoft and ea will reconsider their positions (though EA is not nearly as bad as ubisoft which I find to be awful) but only time wil tell. Mind you EA is sucky employer (from what I hear) but at the end of the day their games tend to be ok sometime and their support for stuff like origin is almost good - ubisoft has no problem shutting down uplay for a week and telling games stuff it or dropping all support for a game 6 months after release.

 

[davie jambo]

That's why there has been such a boom in indie developers and more than a few of these indie teams are producing near AAA games that are doing pretty well. The following is a small list of recent success:
larian studio, cdprojek (ok you might call these guys a publisher but...), stoic studio, xile, obsidian, crate studio (no clue if they are doing ok $$)...

Then there are the 'good' guys like paradox and a few others. The problem is most of these develoeprs/small publisher produce similar types of games (rpg, strategy, arpg) and the art side is not quite AAA but they are still decent enough games.
-
Long run I keep hoping ubisoft and ea will reconsider their positions (though EA is not nearly as bad as ubisoft which I find to be awful) but only time wil tell. Mind you EA is sucky employer (from what I hear) but at the end of the day their games tend to be ok sometime and their support for stuff like origin is almost good - ubisoft has no problem shutting down uplay for a week and telling games stuff it or dropping all support for a game 6 months after release.

I'd say there is far more chance of an indy game company dropping a game (Hello Doublefine) after release than a big one like Ubi or EA

 

[cbrunny]

If working for AAA devs is always the same, and has always been the same, why would anyone expect anything different? Do people not research their chosen career paths anymore? Find out what they're getting themselves into?

I have a hard time finding much sympathy for someone working at a AAA dev. There are other options. I think this internet thing has caught on enough that a computer programming job doesn't need to be at a AAA dev. As others have said, indie, crowdfunding, app dev, etc. Or not gaming. Software still exists too.

No one is forcing anyone to stay in a career they hate. Not good enough? Quit. It is nobody's life goal to work 60+ hours a week.

EDIT: also, I don't understand why he would complain about a company setting a revenue projection at the start of a project. How would any company set a budget for any product if they had no idea how it would sell? Do you think that Apple didn't have a revenue projection for the iPhone 6 at the conception of that project?

Ubi's model is at a breaking point it seems, but really it's not that unexpected. They do what other companies do - squeeze as much out of their teams as they can for as cheap as possible. Apple pays terrible wages & has working conditions for their employees that assemble the phones too. Ubi just does a crappier job actually managing the tipping point of where an exploitative business model results in a product that is sub-par.

 

[njdevilsfan87]

I've had the pleasure to experience these types of working conditions. And in these conditions, your productivity goes down the drain. It doesn't matter how many hours you are there, when most of those of hours are wasted because of the depressing situation you are in. Then you figure out that if you can half ass something just to get it done, you'll do just that because you won't be motivated to put out a quality product, or you'll be too afraid to try to put out a quality product because you'll fear not being able to get it done on time. Then what should be a quality 6-8 hours of work turns into 2, with the other 9 of pretend work (which ends up being more exhausting) just to make management happy. Because putting out something half asses requires far less time than something quality.

After my experience I will never let anyone take advantage of me like that again. So I guess that means I'll never work for a AAA game company.

 

[tential]

If working for AAA devs is always the same, and has always been the same, why would anyone expect anything different? Do people not research their chosen career paths anymore? Find out what they're getting themselves into?

I have a hard time finding much sympathy for someone working at a AAA dev. There are other options. I think this internet thing has caught on enough that a computer programming job doesn't need to be at a AAA dev. As others have said, indie, crowdfunding, app dev, etc. Or not gaming. Software still exists too.

No one is forcing anyone to stay in a career they hate. Not good enough? Quit. It is nobody's life goal to work 60+ hours a week.

EDIT: also, I don't understand why he would complain about a company setting a revenue projection at the start of a project. How would any company set a budget for any product if they had no idea how it would sell? Do you think that Apple didn't have a revenue projection for the iPhone 6 at the conception of that project?

Ubi's model is at a breaking point it seems, but really it's not that unexpected. They do what other companies do - squeeze as much out of their teams as they can for as cheap as possible. Apple pays terrible wages & has working conditions for their employees that assemble the phones too. Ubi just does a crappier job actually managing the tipping point of where an exploitative business model results in a product that is sub-par.

They may love the end product so much that they put up with it. That's what it seems like. It seems people actually working on games LOVE what they do, they just hate the environment.

 

[lozina]

Well yeah. I certainly put much more blame on piraters than I do on the knee-jerk reactions by profit seeking corporations.

It's funny with my evolution in gaming. Back in the day yeah I pirated a bunch of games when I was in high school and couldnt afford them. Then once I got a real job I was buying whatever I wanted to play because I had the money and didnt want to waste time dealing with downloading and cracking the games, plus I liked having the manual and maps and such. Nowadays, I am buying PC titles on Steam which I never even play lol.

 

[cbrunny]

Well yeah. I certainly put much more blame on piraters than I do on the knee-jerk reactions by profit seeking corporations.

It's funny with my evolution in gaming. Back in the day yeah I pirated a bunch of games when I was in high school and couldnt afford them. Then once I got a real job I was buying whatever I wanted to play because I had the money and didnt want to waste time dealing with downloading and cracking the games, plus I liked having the manual and maps and such. Nowadays, I am buying PC titles on Steam which I never even play lol.

I'm the same. I always said once I could afford to buy stuff I would buy it. Now I can and I do.

 

[tential]

Well yeah. I certainly put much more blame on piraters than I do on the knee-jerk reactions by profit seeking corporations.

It's funny with my evolution in gaming. Back in the day yeah I pirated a bunch of games when I was in high school and couldnt afford them. Then once I got a real job I was buying whatever I wanted to play because I had the money and didnt want to waste time dealing with downloading and cracking the games, plus I liked having the manual and maps and such. Nowadays, I am buying PC titles on Steam which I never even play lol.

So you're saying it's the pirater's fault that Ubisoft releases poor PC Ports?

So do the piraters infiltrate Ubisoft headquarters and force bugs into games? Then after they have bugged the game, they then go online and torrent it?

I blame piraters for pirating the game and I blame Ubisoft for releasing poor PC Ports before their developers are finished them.

 

[lozina]

So you're saying it's the pirater's fault that Ubisoft releases poor PC Ports?

So do the piraters infiltrate Ubisoft headquarters and force bugs into games? Then after they have bugged the game, they then go online and torrent it?

Yeah pretty much.

From the sounds of it, ubisoft perceived that pc games were a lost cause due to pirating so they no longer cared about how poor their pc ports turned out.

 

[ImpulsE69]

It's an excuse, nothing more. If they were worried about pirating, they wouldn't even release it on PC. Contrary to popular belief many people pirate consoles too. The real reason is simplicity. It is easier to make a game that has 1 definite line of technology (or 2) than it is to try to deal with all the different aspects of a PC build. They can one and done with a console (except they can't even get that right these days) and they don't have to support it for 15 years when an OS changes.

Piracy is and has been a scapegoat since the invention of the computer. The real reason is quick easy profits. There are plenty of PC games out there that make money, but PC gamers are a bit more fickle than the average attention deficit console only crowd.

Steam and competition has also lowered the overall cost of gaming across the board. This does seem to slowly be making its way into console gaming which is actually a good thing but for now, they still make faster profits on the $60 asking price that millions jump on day one.