This might be my most stupid question yet, but what the hell:
I’m reading about the GTA VI leaks on Wikipedia, and it talks about the various impacts the leaks had, one of which was low morale amongst the developers. Why is that? The response from the internet to the GTA VI leaks in particular seemed to be positive and caused renewed excitement in the game. Everyone [seemingly] understood that it was early, non-final work, but were nevertheless impressed/excited, as far as I could tell anyway 🤷 Besides, it’s GTA, it’s not like they’re gonna break much new ground in terms of gameplay mechanics that need to be kept secret. Things were more or less set in stone in that regard in GTA III.
Why so sad?
Because people that work on things like to be the ones that get to unveil it when they’re ready.
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If people liked what they saw, this steals thunder from the actual release. All it will do it set expectations higher, and some people will inevitably say “a leak showed the game was working 8 months ago - why is it taking so long to release?”
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If people don’t like what they see it is an unfair judgment of the work and that’s disheartening
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These people live under confidentiality agreements and don’t tell their friends or sometime even family anything about their work. Seeing some jackass leak everything invalidates all that effort and sacrifice. I would not be surprised if the company cracks down on everybody, making their lives even harder, because they don’t know where the leak came from therefore everyone is suspect
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Because people on the internet are assholes. Imagine working 60 hours a week on a game that you can’t talk about because of your employment NDA and some chucklefuck leaks your work in progress and complains that it looks shit and doesn’t work despite it is still in progress.
Then those dickheads start harassing employees saying their work is shit, and in some cases should die of embarrassment.
I love that some asshat was triggered by you calling them an asshole and downvoted you.
Ever had someone looking over your shoulder providing feedback to something that you’re in the middle of writing the first draft of?
I engraved leather stuff we made with a laser.
Whenever a customer was commenting on white I was typing WHILE I was typing it… I’d swivel the screen away from them so they couldn’t see it until I was done writing.
It’s like “yes I know I misspelled that word… you just verbally told me a paragraph of text I’m writing quickly before I forget it. I’ll fix the spelling and formatting after… just wait. Before I engrave I’ll show you for approval”
Your point? Management already does this constantly. What’s wrong with your actual customer and user base doing it too?
It’s not okay for management to do that either. The devs don’t need asshole customers doing it too.
It’s not done and it’s annoying. Logically speaking management knows what you are working on so if you are working on a 25% complete deliverable they have a reasonable expectation what that should look like. When management doesn’t do that it’s also annoying.
… And?
I worked on big games that got leaked. Companies spend a shitton on marketing with the hope of making a big boom when it’s announced. We’re hoping to see our work revealed in the best way possible. When it leaks, that big announcement possibility is gone, that money is partly wasted, and what’s shown is out of our control.
Game companies are notorious for lying in their announcement trailers. So why should we care about what they want to show?
I mean, if the marketing is lying about the product, it will probably demoralize developers in a similar way and for the same reasons.
Besides, it’s GTA, it’s not like they’re gonna break much new ground in terms of gameplay mechanics that need to be kept secret.
Why Would You Say Something So Controversial Yet So Brave?
Honestly, I think it’s relatively simple: eeeeveryone and their dog signs an NDA. The people working on it are excited and have to bite their tongue every. single. day. and they are waiting for the release where they can just talk about it.
Then some douche with access leaks it and so all that effort goes to waste, and they still can’t talk about it, because that would make things worse. Also, if someone says something negative, they can’t show the positive and defend their work.
Because Devs will have the managers on their ass from now on.
Off the top: imagine buying an amazing present for a loved one and being so excited to give it to them. Now imagine that someone else intentionally buys the same thing and gives it to them right in front of you.
I feel like it’s kind of like that.
My assumption has always been that this is just the usual made-up corporate nonsense that comes from management and marketing departments, to try to turn public opinion against leakers.
My guess is that most of the humans actually creating the game don’t have strong opinions. Marketing teams probably care because it disrupts their plans. Management of course cares because it could impact sales. And with big dev teams with dozens or hundreds of people working on a game there will never be a consensus opinion. Maybe some would be upset that people get to see placeholder work or rough drafts, but only a fool would look at a leaked game and judge the individuals who made it based on that. Heck, even when games are officially released in functionally unfinished states I think most fans these days know to blame management and ownership rather than the workers.
I don’t remember ever seeing an actual dev talking about leaks much. Even content creators that are former devs. Absense of evidence is not evidence of a sense of course, but like… If I apply that to my own work I don’t think I would really care.
I guess, umm, probably sure in my opinion… maybe?
For real though, I appreciate that you’re trying to disclaim that it is much more of an educated guess than an objective truth, instead of just trying to paint it as if it were that truth…
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…but you still sound like you’re just a professional opinion haver. It’s nice that you’re trying to contribute, but you end up producing information noise due to the fact that your takes don’t seem to be based on any meritorical backgrounds.
So what are you looking for here? Some sort of objective and peer-reviewed academic research of the morals of videogame developers and the impact of leaks upon that? I think you’ll find that does not exist.
I’m just pointing out that the only people who seem to be complaining are managers and PR departments. And it’s not that dev’s don’t have voices- there are plenty of current and former developers who are now producing social media content and talking about the industry, and I cannot remember this ever even being addressed as an issue. I DID bring up my personal experience in the corporate world is that management and marketing craft these narratives for public consumption which are just lies, and I don’t have any reason to think the videogames industry is any different.
The very topic is one that is nebulous and subjective. That’s why it’s on c/nostupidquestions and not c/askanexpertwithameritoricalbackground.
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I am not a game developer, but I imagine that getting loads of online flak on projects that are not quite finished yet can be very demoralizeng.
I do develop other stuff and do not do sneak peeks anymore.
