Bioware really not taking this well. They seriously need a complete turnover of the management for Bioware to bring back any sort of good faith.
The press is not your enemy, BioWare
The press is not your enemy, BioWare
The article doesn't go hard enough on unionization, tbh. Schreier unfortunately comes across here as painting a picture of "life ruining crunch isn't benefiting the games" when the angle should instead be "life ruining crunch isn't benefiting the employees."
I was about to write up a post about how Schreier and his dedicated fans are all-in on unionization (Schreier is very political) but I see Syz made that point in far quicker fashion!
I spent a lot of time last night reading reactions to this article and they almost all completely laughable. The article itself is fine of course, Schreier is very good at his job, my comments were aimed at the reactions rather than the article itself.
Bioware really not taking this well. They seriously need a complete turnover of the management for Bioware to bring back any sort of good faith.
The press is not your enemy, BioWare
Here you go Opinion | Making Video Games Is Not a Dream JobThe article doesn't go hard enough on unionization, tbh. Schreier unfortunately comes across here as painting a picture of "life ruining crunch isn't benefiting the games" when the angle should instead be "life ruining crunch isn't benefiting the employees."
Pretty sure Division 2 launching killed that game where it stood anyways.
And by the sounds of it, Bioware had the same issues plague this game like it did Mass Effect Andromeda. Poor leadership, unclear vision on what the game should be, leading to a rush to get it out the door.
Should just close that studio at this point.
I'm no fan of what BioWare has spewed out lately, but they have built such good worlds in the past, it seems a shame to let them rot at the bottom of EA's barrel of dead franchises.
....not that that's the first time it'd have happened to franchises I love.
I mean, it's the people that make the game, and all the talented people who built those worlds have left Bioware. If Bioware folds, another studio (independent of EA and poor management) will pop up with the talented designers.
Insanely crushing crunch, poor management and vision and dev sites that should be working together being hostile. I honestly, don't see this **** ending either. This is what, the third game in a row with Frostbite for them and they still don't exactly know how to work it? Honestly, if Bioware fell on its own blade, it may keep some dignity.
Apparently they never get much internal support for it, priority for help from the Frostbite team always goes to FIFA or Battlefield with Bioware a few rungs down the ladder.
Jesus Christ what a **** show Anthem turned out to be. I’ve hardly played it and I’m going to try to get a refund.
Dragon Age 4 becomes BioWare's next big focus, as Anthem loses its lead creators? | GamesRadar+
In this era of live services and microtransactions if your favorite studio is bought by EA, you know that eventually they will become something else entirely and most probably close down.Man, what a disappointing mess Bioware has become. The days of KOTOR feel so far removed.
In this era of live services and microtransactions
I think the idea is that the working conditions are currently unacceptable, and that forcing restrictions on them might actually force management to plan rather than rely exclusively on crunch time to "finish" games as they have in the past. In reality, it's likely not that easy, but it's obvious something must change - both for the workers, and for the quality of games. What isn't as obvious, is what needs to change IMO.
Crunch time will always be a thing (experienced it myself in the software development world), but relying on it almost exclusively is obviously not a sustainable model.
True, but it's not a good condition for either the workers or the productivity and, hence, the company itself. There are steps that can be taken to mitigate this, as a project being mismanaged like this should not be "how it is". I realize the real world isn't an ideal scenario, but that doesn't mean it can't and shouldn't be improved - particularly from our perspective, where the product obviously suffers.
I personally think that Bioware is also a victim of open world syndrome. This idea of making games bigger and non-linear has really destroyed story based games, which is what Bioware was built upon. Instead of Devs making small worlds filled with detail, the idea has become to make huge worlds with very little detail. You end up with a repetitive mess. Very few devs can pull it off well. Really the only open world games that I've ever seen pull it off well are Bethesda games (even then I get bored with it), The Witcher 3 (which I personally think could have been stronger story-wise if more linear), and Kingdom Come Deliverance (the open world was on the smaller side which made it less daunting to play without fast travel and also made most of the locations more memorable).
Creating a union will not fix this, it will actually bring on new set of problems to the table. The solution to this problem is sadly not a happy one, BioWare shot themselves in the foot the day they signed with EA, and it's only a matter of time until the studio is shut down. This should be a lesson to any successful studio wanting to have a good future in the industry.
Sorry, to clarify....what is the unhappy solution you are proposing?
The solution is shutdown and let it be a lesson learned for other promising studios that are thinking about signing with companies like EA.
BioWare is done, they had a good run while it lasted and it's time to move on.