When confronted with the idea of extended crunch time, such as the conditions alleged at L.A. Noire developer Team Bondi by former employees, some become confused and possibly outraged by the idea. Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter is not one of those people. In the most recent episode of his Pach Attack show on GameTrailers, Pachter dove headfirst into the topic in response to a viewer question.
“The LA Noire project was disrupted, and there were several false promises of finishing the game, and poor Brendan McNamara – who is probably going to be ‘rich Brendan McNamara' – was put in the position to get his team to crunch and get it done more than once,” he began.
“I don’t know anybody in game development who calls it a 9-5 job,” Pachter said. “I’ve never heard a developer say ‘I don’t work overtime and I don’t work weekends’. If you’re getting into the industry – if you’re going to be a developer - you know you’re going to work plenty of hours.”
Pachter does believe that the idea of unending crunchtime is a legitimate complaint.
“I think there’s a legitimate complaint if crunch time is never-ending,” he said. “Crunch should be the last three to six months of game development.”
When it came to overtime for crunch work however, Pachter had what’s probably going to be a controversial viewpoint on the matter.
“If you are a salaried employee – if you’re not told what to do – then you are master of your own domain and you don’t get overtime,” he added. “I do get that it is a bad and unfair business practice to work 18 months non-stop overtime, [but] I don’t think anybody was entitled to overtime pay.”
Pachter noted that developers are well compensated in the form of bonuses, and as such, overtime is not a factor. He cites the fact that Infinity Ward had a profit pool of $84 million to be paid to around 100 employees.
“I think [the point] that everyone is missing is that, if a game is good – and L.A. Noire was good – there will be a profit pool, and there will be bonuses,” he said. “My guess is that Mr. McNamara is going to be able to compensate his employees and they’re going to make a lot more than just their hourly pay. And I think they’re going to get compensated for overtime.”
“I think that all the complaints about Team Bondi are premature. If your complaint is you worked overtime and didn’t get paid for it, find another profession, cause I don’t think you’re getting overtime pay anywhere. And if your complaint is that you’re just underpaid in general, then why don’t we wait and see what bonuses are paid out.”
“The cool thing about this industry is, if you’re good, you’ll make a ton of money,” he closed. “I just don’t have a whole lot of sympathy for people who say ‘I worked for such-and-such, and I didn’t get paid, and that’s not fair’. If you want to be an hourly employee, go build automobiles, and what will happen is they’ll close down your autoplant some day and you’ll be out of work.”
“I think unions are in business to protect workers from, I think, dangerous working conditions and unfair labor practices. Sweatshops should have unions but games studios, which tend to pay people a lot of money, shouldn’t,” he said. “I just don’t think people who make over $100,000 a year need a whole lot of protection cause they might have to work overtime.”
Do you agree or disagree with Patcher? Is crunch unavoidable? Do employees in the game industry get paid enough that they don’t need protection from employers?
