The Troubles of Game Development
The game development process is a long and tiring road, and many challenges are associated with video game development. Each of these issues is dealt with in different ways, leading to new and more pressing issues coming up and causing problems for various companies. One of the many issues that need to be addressed within the development process is how long it takes to develop a game and if a game should be kept in development to polish the final product, or if it should be released to the public and finished off.
There are many games that have never been released and their respective communities have been enraged by this. The gaming community is a very sensitive community. There are many people who are able to wait years for a game to come out, whereas there are those who cannot wait for games to come out and will resort to leaking game info. There have been many cases where a game is in a long development cycle and the fans are waiting patiently for any information they can get about the state of the game and where things stand on its release. Sadly some games never get released and people are often left annoyed by this, some are devastated by the announcement or lack thereof.
One of the other major problems that are associated with video game development is workplace harassment. There have been many companies that have and are currently facing lawsuits over harassment and sexual assault. One of the most notable lawsuits is from a company called Blizzard. They have been sued many times for their lack of effectiveness in dealing with workplace harassment of their female employees. There have been a stacking number of lawsuits brought on by former and current employees over the years for many different video game development companies, not just Blizzard. This used to be an issue that was solely dealt with within the community but it has now captured the attention of the general public leading to more and more people taking a close look at these companies, and evaluating what they are actually doing.
The video gaming industry is a very big and very profitable industry which leads to many shady or underhanded practices, which are not technically illegal but ethically are wrong. One of the things companies will do is put gambling systems in their games. These gambling systems work just the same as if you went to a casino. They prey on people who lack self-control or have a tendency to impulse purchases. These practices have been investigated by many different government bodies one of the most notable investigations came from the UK. The UK government has been passing legislation to ban the practice of “loot boxes” in their country.
Many games use loot boxes to prey on people who should not have access to a credit card. Many of these people are children. There are a number of games that market themselves to children such as “Fortnight” and “Fifa”. These games both contain loot boxes, the loot boxes give the player a small chance at obtaining a cosmetic skin. These cosmetic changes to their characters or to the guns that exist in the game typically do not affect the gameplay and are solely there to rake in more and more money for the company.
One of the biggest companies in video gaming Electronic Arts is often accused of putting systems in their games to attract kids to spend their parents’ money without their knowledge. Many developers do not want to put those systems in place and often will protest doing so under the threat of losing their jobs. Sadly there is a culture within video game development where the developers are pushed to their absolute limit both mentally and physically. They are often burnt out and overworked especially when the game is close to being released.
Due to this “crunch” culture in the community, there are a lot of turnovers when it comes to each company and this leads to many games and ambitious projects being abandoned mid-way through development. The changing of staff and personnel often leads to games being super hyped up and fans being excited about them. Those fans are often disappointed when they learn that game that they have been waiting for, sometimes for over a decade, has been shelved and scrapped by the company.
Overall the gaming community likes to work hard to produce a game that they can be proud of and when it comes to developing that game, the developers face many challenges. The general public often overlook these challenges, in favor of getting the game sooner and with less hassle. More people need to be aware of what goes on behind closed doors at development companies, there are often many more skeletons in the closet than people care to admit.
