Comments on: How to Break Out of the Games Industry You know, that's always been my personal experience, too. Full-time was vastly preferable to my last employer over contractors. But then how do you explain the influx of temp positions being advertised in recent days? Is it a shift in corporate policy? You know, that’s always been my personal experience, too. Full-time was vastly preferable to my last employer over contractors. But then how do you explain the influx of temp positions being advertised in recent days? Is it a shift in corporate policy?

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By: Tim Trzepacz/2011/06/06/how-to-break-out-of-the-games-industry/#comment-5512 Tim Trzepacz Sat, 11 Jun 2011 09:13:23 +0000 I absolutely agree about the horrors of overloading a project on the front end. At one of the places I've worked, I watched a AAA team start a project from scratch with about 40 people on it. They created the most expensive 20 minutes of gameplay in history before the project was canceled. The thinking, I'm sure, was that it was better to keep all of those people employed than tell 30 of them to start looking for jobs. It was the humane thing to do, but not a great business decision. The model you describe, Rob, sounds like an improvement (90% are project-to-project contractors) but its success is dependent upon ready access to all of those contractors -- something not everybody has. I absolutely agree about the horrors of overloading a project on the front end. At one of the places I’ve worked, I watched a AAA team start a project from scratch with about 40 people on it. They created the most expensive 20 minutes of gameplay in history before the project was canceled.
The thinking, I’m sure, was that it was better to keep all of those people employed than tell 30 of them to start looking for jobs. It was the humane thing to do, but not a great business decision.
The model you describe, Rob, sounds like an improvement (90% are project-to-project contractors) but its success is dependent upon ready access to all of those contractors — something not everybody has.

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By: Rob Povey/2011/06/06/how-to-break-out-of-the-games-industry/#comment-5188 Rob Povey Mon, 06 Jun 2011 17:12:51 +0000