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While many jobs are demanding, the conditions in the gaming industry are uniquely unforgiving. Most developers in the United States do not receive extra compensation for extra hours. Their income pales in comparison to what’s offered in other fields with reputations for brutal hours, like banking and law. The average American game developer earned $83,060 in 2013, according to a Gamasutra survey, or less than half the pay of a first-year associate at a New York law firm.
Crunch makes the industry roll — but it’s taking a serious toll on its workers. In late 2011, as he was finishing up production on the role-playing game The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, programmer Jean Simonet started feeling severe stomach pains. At first, doctors were perplexed. But on his third emergency room visit, he revealed that he’d been regularly staying at the office late and coming in on weekends to fix bugs and add features that he thought would take Skyrim from good to great, no matter how much sleep he lost along the way.
Crunch makes the industry roll — but it’s taking a serious toll on its workers. In late 2011, as he was finishing up production on the role-playing game The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, programmer Jean Simonet started feeling severe stomach pains. At first, doctors were perplexed. But on his third emergency room visit, he revealed that he’d been regularly staying at the office late and coming in on weekends to fix bugs and add features that he thought would take Skyrim from good to great, no matter how much sleep he lost along the way.