Anyone who believes in long-term job security is 'kidding themselves', says Tantalus CEO
The games industry is too volatile to assure developers they have a long-term job, the CEO of Tantalus has claimed.
Speaking to Gamasutra, Tom Crago said he was previously forced into laying off staff at the Mass Effect Wii U studio despite 12 prior years of profitability because of the financial crisis and the transition away from console to other platforms such as mobile.
He added that any developer or studio head that felt they could guarantee job security was kidding themselves, and said he would attempt to be more transparent about the challenges of the business to employees.
"I spent a lot of time thinking about how I could do things better, from a studio perspective, and I made a lot of changes," said Crago.
"Fundamentally, and I realise this is a little controversial, I came to the conclusion that in an industry as volatile as video games, it's impossible to put your hand on your heart and say to any of your developers that their job is going to be secure for the next five or ten years.
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"I feel like anyone who does that is kidding themselves, and so I determined to be much more transparent about our business, both in terms of its challenges and its successes."
Despite the layoffs, Crago said he was now back to hiring staff at Tantalus, and claimed employees were now paid more than they had been before.
He also said that Tantalus now shares 20 per cent of profits with its staff each year as well as other bonuses, with the idea to help developers gauge the health of the company based on performance results.
I appreciate honesty in life, but this is something we all know in the industry. Saying it like this just discourages from people trying to enter the industry, and encourages those of us in it to get out as soon as we can.
It has ever been so. Games is a good experience corner, but very little stability. Banks won't back us as we a big risk/profit model.
I agree totally, and it's good to hear of someone in a position of responsibilty to say this. In my 10 plus years experience of development I find myself unemployable due to age, experience, cost etc and the general lack of work around. I also have to point out that I've worked in many studios and not once have I seen much professionalism. This is as much to blame as the business model not working correctly due to new tech and lack of finances. Not sure what other business would promote people who have little to no management and business skills and suddenly are in charge of a large budget and a large team. It's no surprise that banks won't touch us and as the games development sector shrinks this will get worse as layoffs due to bad projects and wasted money spent on 'free' gaming comes to ahead. It seems that the industry is imploding and returning back to it's simple bedroom coding roots. Also interested to see how the debt laden graduates will shape the future without well paid jobs and stability to help get them on the bottom rung...we are in the middle of a perfect storm and I know of many senior/lead staff that want to leave and are stuck.
