Waching daily Nov 29 2017

Greetings earthlings! welcome to the MadQueen Show!

I am your host the MadQueen

On today's menu, our Industry Invaders episode is going to dive into the controversy of

CD Projekt Red developers and their working conditions

It all started with a video about Glassdoor reviews,

talking about the hard working conditions at CD Projekt Red

This video, that for some was very hard to believe due to the little credibility of the

sources and for others was proof enough to question the practices at the studio

This video, gave way to a second, more documented video with first-hand experiences of two developers

working there, that revealed what it was like for them to work in such a high-pressure environment

And to be completely honest, I thought the first video was bullshit the moment I saw

it, poorly documented and also a poor excuse to suck some views out of an easy controversy,

and as such I did express so in a video and for this reason, I'd like to extend an apology

to YongYea, author of these two videos, as you proved me wrong with the second one, I

still disagree with a good part of it for the reasons that I will explain in this video,

although disagreeing is healthy, but when a fellow YouTuber does a great documentation

work like you did, the only feeling I have for it is respect

The problem with all this controversy, at least the way I see it, is that we're talking

about the experiences of two developers, which under my point of view is too small of a sample

to get a broad and realistic vision of what's going on, so to learn the truth about what

we saw there, I looked for, and interviewed 43 former and current developers at CDPR,

from different nationalities, different departments and different levels of expertise, working

on either The Witcher 3, Cyberpunk 2077 or both

For obvious reasons the identity or position of these employees will remain anonymous,

and for those who don't know what these obvious reasons are: they have a Non Disclosure

Agreement that includes a clause that prevents them from speaking about what's going on

in the studio, not only about the features or details about current projects, so to avoid

any possible consequences for them, as some are still working there and they could lose

the job they adore, all measures will be taken to avoid any possible identification when

talking about their experience

The gaming industry is a tough one

No great results are achieved without hard work and crunches, and most developers are

more than happy to work as hard as possible, overtime, long crunches, weekends, everything

is great as long as they have the opportunity to create a great game

In the words of a senior developer working at The Witcher 3, and I quote,

And he was not the only one with that thought, as a fellow senior developer at Witcher 3 said:

No one disagrees that gaming is a hard industry: in the words of a senior developer working

on Cyberpunk 2077

All this said before he explained to me how CD Projekt pays the overtime or made a generous

bonus to developers after The Witcher 3 was completed, that, in his case, was more than

a year worth of salary

But not everybody at CD Projekt shares this enthusiastic and positive view of the working

conditions, the 47% of employees interviewed believe that CD might have gone a little too

far with pressure and crunches

In the words of a Senior Developer at The Witcher 3:

This experience is shared by other developers during this game

At the end of The Witcher 3, the morale at the studio wasn't great, as described by a Senior Developer

Another Senior Developer at the Witcher 3 adds

The last years of The Witcher 3 seemed to be a tough moment for developers.

A senior developer at The Witcher 3 said:

What could be the reason for these deadlines impossible to meet?

How is it that the great experience that a percentage of the employees transmit it's

so different to the ones that were burnt out, and while some developers enjoyed the experience

some others found it so frustrating?

Because in here we're talking about experienced developers, who worked in majors before and

know how this industry works, in both cases

Well, one of the patterns that emerged is that the way employees perceive their work

environment depends a lot on what department the employee is in and

the management of such department

In the words of a Senior Developer at The Witcher 3

The difference of departments is something that a Senior Developer at Cyberpunk 2077

explained to me very clearly

This way of escalating positions on the company based on relations more than merit was something

that caught the eyes of some developers, that even gave it a funny name

But they didn't find that funny when these battles amongst leads to escalate were put

before the project and lower level employees had to suffer the consequences

As a senior developer at the Witcher 3 said:

An experienced Senior developer on The Witcher 3 who was also a team leader, explained it this way:

A fellow Senior Developer explained it this way

Another Developer adds

Another Developer at The Witcher 3 added

The Witcher 3 was released and some developers left the company and others stayed to continue

working on Cyberpunk 2077

A good portion of them were happy with their experience at The Witcher 3, feeling proud

of being part of what it's been called "one of the best games of all time", but left

the company for different motivations, from personal and familiar, to wanting to continue

their career in other exciting projects.

In the words of a Senior Developer working for The Witcher 3:

others were tired and emotionally exhausted, they felt mistreated and some even fell into depression

As I said before, the portion of employees interviewed that left the company in bad terms

at the end of The Witcher 3 is a minority, but this doesn't mean that they don't

exist or their experiences should be hidden below the carpet of The Witcher 3 success

With The Witcher 3 shipped, developers received a generous bonus from the company and those

who stayed for Cyberpunk 2077 saw a significant increase in their pay

Once developers started working on Cyberpunk, those who had bad experiences during The Witcher

3 hoped that things were going to be better, since the first year of development of Cyberpunk

2077 seemed to be so encouraging and motivating for developers who participated in it, but

unfortunately, the "Game of Thrones" between managers that made the life impossible to

some departments of CD Projekt Red entered into a new season: the clash between the management

of The Witcher 3 and the management of Cyberpunk 2077

In the words of a senior developer at Cyberpunk

Another developer adds

And here, I believe it comes the part you wanted to hear

And no, it's not the release date

After this harsh beginning, at this point right now, most of the employees interviewed

that are currently working on Cyberpunk 2077 stated that the morale at the studio was,

in general terms, way better

It seems that, at least for the departments of the employees interviewed, the crunch stopped

at the reach of a very important milestone that was announced earlier this month.

Not only that, in the words of a Senior Developer working on Cyberpunk:

Another developer adds

Even though they seem to be doing OK, it's true that some didn't take very well the

response of CD Projekt Red to the criticism of former developers

In the words of a developer:

Other developer adds

And another added

But it's also important to note that a good portion of the employees interviewed believe

that this controversy is blown out of proportion, and, in words of a developer on Cyberpunk

Employees at CD Projekt Red that are currently working on Cyberpunk 2077 seem to acknowledge

that there's an issue in the company, but they still believe in what they are doing.

In the words of a developer:

The general image you have when you mix the experience of all these employees is the picture

of a company with a good heart that way too many times succumbed to pressure.

We don't want to see again something similar to The Witcher 3, where, in the words of a

Senior Developer

No wonder why they don't want to reveal the release date

They have the pressure of the budget, the pressure of the quality and the pressure of

the gaming community, and we have a lot to do here.

We're constantly told that we're a very toxic community, are we?

I mean, it's true that is has toxic elements, and usually, they are the ones that make more

noise, so their number seems way bigger but, remember what we just did, a couple of weeks ago?

When we united together for a good cause?

We stood together against abusive practices and to protect kids from gambling

And remember what happened?

We made one of the biggest companies in the industry to step back on their business strategy

Disney itself had to bow down

Several governments of the world are now investigating if loot crates should fall into gambling legislation

or if they require another type of control or even if they may be forbidden.

We did that.

Would you call that toxic?

I would call it fucking amazing

We're powerful together

And we can do good

That's why I'd love that you unite with me and help me spread this message that we

have for CD Project Red:

Dear CD Projekt,

We trust you

Your commitment to delivering the best quality games is beyond question

We believe that you won't mess with us with pay-to-win bullshit

We trust you because you don't treat us like brainless kids, and because we can see

how much care you put into the products you deliver to us

We're so excited to see Cyberpunk 2077, but we don't want to pressure you into hurrying

and making rushed decisions because you feel like you don't have time to stop and think

We can wait

We are hyped for this game—hyped as fuck!—but

we can wait

We care about your developers, the people who put so much time and effort into creating

the games we love

They don't get enough praise for all the hard work they do

Sometimes, they may feel forgotten by the community, but it's not true.

We do think about them and care about them.

We want every single one of them to feel respected for their talent, their expertise, their passion

and the sacrifices they make for us

We can wait

Please take good care of your developers, and stay being amazing!