Every Day is Monday!

[Ascius]

Death marches totally pwn my sense of time.

[WillieLee]

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/168/370430537_c5f1de557b.jpg

Trudging slowly over wet sand
Back to the bench where your clothes were stolen
This is the coastal town
That they forgot to close down
Armageddon - come armageddon!
Come, armageddon! come!

Everyday is like sunday
Everyday is silent and grey

Hide on the promenade
Etch a postcard :
How I dearly wish I was not here
In the seaside town
...that they forgot to bomb
Come, come, come - nuclear bomb

Everyday is like sunday
Everyday is silent and grey

Trudging back over pebbles and sand
And a strange dust lands on your hands
(and on your face...)
(on your face ...)
(on your face ...)
(on your face ...)

Everyday is like sunday
Win yourself a cheap tray
Share some greased tea with me
Everyday is silent and grey

[mewelke]

Death marches totally pwn my sense of time.

Sorry. I've been through too many of these myself. Hopefully the end is near?

[ramtower]

whoa. morrissey looks old.

[WillieLee]

whoa. morrissey looks old.

Dude is almost 48.

[Ascius]

Sorry. I've been through too many of these myself. Hopefully the end is near?

The end will come, one way or another.

We'll be done done in about a month... things should lighten up in a couple weeks.

[mewelke]

The end will come, one way or another.



I seem to remember in those situations that either end is welcome at that point.

[Brian Reed]

The end will come, one way or another.

We'll be done done in about a month... things should lighten up in a couple weeks.

<flashback>
*shudder*
</flashback>

[mewelke]

The end will come, one way or another.

We'll be done done in about a month... things should lighten up in a couple weeks.

At least you're not at Blizzard. The death march is all the more disheartening when you know it's potentially endless.

[Brian Reed]

At least you're not at Blizzard. The death march is all the more disheartening when you know it's potentially endless.

Potentially? My friend, their development group is now a perpetual motion machine.

[Ascius]

When I was young and new to the industry, I totally wanted to be at Blizzard.

Then I met Brian.

Now I'm glad that Blizzard wouldn't hire me.



Of course, I'm still at work today, because today is Monday.

[Brian Reed]

Don't get me wrong. I loved my time at Blizzard. Not just for the friends I made, but what I learned about the industry and what, to this day, saying I worked there does for my hireability on a game gig, even as a writer.

But I'm about 5 years past being willing to spend 20 hours a day at the office, 7 days a week. I'd rather see my wife and kids than I would see a milestone get met. It's why Busse and I either tag teamed late nights or completely bailed on them through USM.

I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. EA Spouse started the anti-game industry overtime wave, then didn't help finish it.

[mewelke]

THQ's new employee handbook includes a line that employees can be terminated for any refusal to work overtime, and declines to place any sort of limit on what is acceptable overtime. If I weren't already grumpy as hell these days, having to sign that pissed me off thoroughly.

[intercept789]

Nice. Are you guys at least freelance (or were) for the overtime and get paid for it? Or do just get hammered? Sounds like you at least get the weekends off?

[mewelke]

I'm on salary, so no, no pay for OT. The first project I was salaried for was Diablo2, which also is probably the worst crunch time I worked (a little over 8 months where a saturday or sunday off (never both) was a rare treat.) Our work week was always in excess of 80 hours, occasionally busting the 100 hour mark. I made the mistake of calculating what my salary translated to hourly...I'm never making that mistake again.

On the plus side, after all that they did send me to Dublin to work on the localization, and though I was working the whole time I was there, 8-10 hour days seemed like nothing, and we could actually go to the pub afterwards...plus the staff there was awesome and friendly.

[GelfXIII]

.... the silicon chip inside her head gets flipped to overload...

[tymothil]

I do not miss the Blizzard Death Marches, but I think the one I went through at Squaresoft was the worst.

[mewelke]

I do not miss the Blizzard Death Marches, but I think the one I went through at Squaresoft was the worst.

The project and project managemant can make something worse regardless of hours. The last project we had here was hardly a best seller, but it was fun to work on for the most part. Then seventy five percent of the staff on that project quit.

From back in Blizzard days I remember on War3 crunch my friend Justin saying that even though the hours were longer for awhile, it wasnt anywhere near as bad as Diablo2...not unless someone stabbed him in the eye everynight with a pen.

[ramtower]

I do not miss the Blizzard Death Marches, but I think the one I went through at Squaresoft was the worst.

FFV or FFVII PC? Because neither of those was especially pleasant, but at least we were together...in texas...alone...with Rob...and fucking top dog.

[tymothil]

FFV or FFVII PC? Because neither of those was especially pleasant, but at least we were together...in texas...alone...with Rob...and fucking top dog.

Fucking Top Dog!! Jeebus, I'd blanked that out...good god...so, yeah, either death march...but FFVII in particular, the one that killed me for working in the game industry, the final nail in the coffin, driven in by sausagebitch while we were in Atlanta.

[intercept789]

I'm on salary, so no, no pay for OT. The first project I was salaried for was Diablo2, which also is probably the worst crunch time I worked (a little over 8 months where a saturday or sunday off (never both) was a rare treat.) Our work week was always in excess of 80 hours, occasionally busting the 100 hour mark. I made the mistake of calculating what my salary translated to hourly...I'm never making that mistake again.

On the plus side, after all that they did send me to Dublin to work on the localization, and though I was working the whole time I was there, 8-10 hour days seemed like nothing, and we could actually go to the pub afterwards...plus the staff there was awesome and friendly.

Dude, that's krazy. That kind of overtime without being compensated...well, like Brian said, as long as there is some sort of recognition payoff that you can use in the future.

[mewelke]

The long term compensation was worth it in the end, but I'm pretty done with working those sort of hours...too old. I start to get grumpy now at a 60 hour week, to quote Swinging Utters:

"I've said and once too often, some things I'd never say again. in streams of thoughts unbroken I fish for a few good men
Sundays and holidays and twelve hours straight no pay for bloody hands and believe me they pay a petty wage
my poor self pity speaks with sobbing, mumbled words strewn with the awful taste of bad, cowardly prose
I'd take some time to get my posture set straight if I had the chance I'd break and subdue the scheming hands of fate.
Wrap up your limp red mass of knuckles and fingertips it's fighting time and time to battle with your wits, time to spit back when you're spit upon, when you're left for head. time to hit the road when the road you're on had run out of tricks
And I don't want your Sundays & holidays of twelve hours straight no pay for bloody hands, no I don't want your fucking petty wage!"

[Ascius]

Today's my 16th day in a row at work... I was here till 8am saturday supporting our push to Beta. I think I'll be getting part of my weekends back now.

I'm salaried. Some of the guys on the team were recently switched to hourly pay, so some are getting OT these days... it's rather perplexing who got the switch and who didn't. I'm pretty sure in a legal sense I still don't count as management, so I shouldn't be exempt... but the hourly guys won't be getting comp time after we're done either.

It's gone all bizarre. I think they still need a couple more years to work out the kinks in the industry's work vs. compensation field.

I'd be like a rockstar to kids though, if they knew who I was.

[tymothil]

I'd be like a rockstar to kids though, if they knew who I was.

Hell, people still ask me to do the goblin ballonists voice from time to time, usually at club. People I don't really know. It's odd.