A SEASONED developer has revealed shocking information about the development of a major game.
His claims describe appalling working conditions on a triple-A shooter game at a major studio.
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Released in 2019, Anthem is a third-person shooter with role-playing elements developed by major studio BioWare, and published by EA.
BioWare is well-known for impressive story-driven games, such as Dragon’s Age and Mass Effect.
Anthem was extremely disappointing to fans of BioWare’s other games as it didn’t have a story like many were expecting.
It was also criticised for its heavy reliance on microtransactions despite being a full-price game.
Many features, such as flying, were removed post-launch as they could crash or further break the game.
Former developer at BioWare, Ian Saterdalen, revealed shocking details about the game’s development.
He claims that the team was given just 15 months to develop the game’s massive open world and complex physics system.
This short development time frame is given as one of the main reasons why Anthem didn’t live up to players’ expectations.
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However, there is an even more shocking claim given by Saterdalen.
On Twitter, one user asked Saterdalen how the team managed to develop such a large game in only 15 months.
He replied: “Too many work hours. I (and many others on the team) were working about 90 hours a week for 15 months.
“I’m sure others were doing those hours before I arrived.
“It wasn’t sustainable and not even a position we should have been in.”
In the UK, the average person works around 37 hours per week, with anything above 48 hours per week being illegal.
If Saterdalen’s story is true, this means that the team worked an average of 13 hours a day, every day, including weekends.
Burnout and crunch culture are serious problems in the gaming industry, and if Saterdalen’s claims are true, they would have resulted in a lower quality game.
Written by Georgina Young on behalf of GLHF.
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