Animator at Electronic Arts (EA) | Computer Animation BS - Entertainment Business MS
One phrase that keeps coming up from big game publishers when trying to justify their layoffs and cuts is this, "the market is oversaturated." They're intelligent enough to identify that fact and blame it on enhancements to technology and accessibility, but they don't appear to have been intelligent enough to acknowledge that their habitual hiring/firing practices have contributed directly to the market's oversaturation that is now harming their growth. I can almost guarantee that every one of you reading this knows multiple people who have started their own indie studios, joined an indie studio, or become solo developers following the disillusionment they experienced due to the current widespread job insecurity in AAA games. These companies have identified the problem while simultaneously contributing to the problem, because the ability to think in terms of short-term financial gains does not equate to the ability to think in terms of human behavior. Unless employment in AAA becomes truly equitable - and I'm talking about what will take years of shows good faith, of creating and maintaining steady full time employment for everyone across the board (that means doing away with a lot of temporary contract work), that means no more leaving the creators out to dry - the future of games will belong to Indie developers. There will at some point be a decisive shift in power if there is not active, intentional, and equitable change made by the people in positions of power. I'm not saying this with hope that the indie devs will win out above AAA. Not at all. I want both to thrive, and to everything there must be a balance. I've been far more enmeshed within and therefore very hopeful about the future of AAA games throughout my career, and I still dream of a world in which AAA game devs on every rung of the ladder have steady and unshakable lifelong employment within that world. It IS possible, and it HAS been possible. But as long as greed is at the wheel, that dream will not become a reality outside of independent studios. And that's just the truth of it. What can you do? In whatever capacity you are able, do what you can to create a more honest, decent, and equitable world. You can do this in your company, you can do this in your personal life with the people you meet. Take every little opportunity to do something good, because every good act plants a seed. We simply haven't had enough little good acts, and that shows up in in society in big, big ways. Peace to you. -B
