Wow, I can’t believe six months have already passed since I reviewed Blood Sweat and Pixels. I was fascinated to look behind the curtain of game development and hear some of the triumphs and horror stories behind famous games, some of which I had played, but many of which I knew only by reputation (or not at all).
Press Reset felt like a kind of sequel to Blood Sweat and Pixels, in which Schreier picks another problem with the gaming industry and then grinds away at it with unique insight and skill.
In BS&P, the issue at hand was “crunch”, or the systematic overwork (exploitation?) of employees so that development companies can meet rigid deadlines, and make large profits. In Press Reset, we’re focused more on the volatility of the sector and how its common for large companies to shutter studios — sometimes laying off hundreds of people at once — at the drop of a hat.
There were many unbelievable stories within this book, but the standout for me was about Curt Schilling, 38 Studios and the supposed “WoW Killer”, Project Copernicus. Press Reset is worth reading just for this story alone. I don’t want to go too in-depth here, the saga is detailed in much better fashion within the book, but essentially a baseball player (Curt Schilling) founded a video game company in order to build an MMORPG. Only Schilling had never run a video game company before. He bought all the best stuff to attract the best talent, took a $75 million loan from the state of Rhode Island to pay for it all, and then eventually had to file for bankruptcy when the company failed to produce the game.
There is a lot more drama surrounding this outlined in the book but I think the moment which hit hardest for me was when folks started realizing their paychecks weren’t getting deposited. Many had completely uprooted their life, moved to Rhode Island and bought new houses assuming they’d be able to pay for them, and were consequently left in the lurch. Many were screwed twice, as they weren’t able to sell their house in Boston (or wherever they were from), and were responsible for two mortgages and weren’t getting paid.
From experience, one mortgage is already too much. If I’d lost my job randomly (management pretended everything was fine until they couldn’t afford to keep the lights on) and had TWO mortgages . . . I’m having a stroke just thinking about it.
And even worse, the game actually looks pretty fun and probably would have done well!
There’s a lot in this story that is ultimately the fault of bad actors involved, but it also gives insight into larger problems within the video game industry. Foremost amongst those problems seems to be the disconnect between the people actually making the games, who consider their work a form of art, and the bosses running the show who see little more than numbers on a spreadsheet and are happy to throw away years of work on a whim to bump their stock price for a quarter, or in the case of 38 studios, a politician willing to burn an entire company so he looks slightly better against his opponent.
Eventually, Schreier examines some alternatives to the way things are now, with what I would call a mostly unbiased view. Obviously he has an agenda for the book (otherwise it’s just news), but I thought the author did a decent job presenting alternative arguments. Some organizations are attempting to unionize, and we see the reasoning why this might be good, but also are made to understand that it will not solve all the issues.
We’re introduced to some alternate workflows in which specialized companies provide specialized services, say combat mechanics, for many different games and how this might alleviate the need for ‘crunch’, as well as provide more stable income for employees.
In all, it seems the main thrust of the book is that the current model under which videogames are made cannot be sustained. Games may be expensive monetarily, but the true cost is on the people making them. The uncertainty in so many aspects of the job, even down to where an employee has to live (some folks in the book moved several times a year after getting hired on to a new studio which was closed sometimes only months after), wears on people, grinding them down. As more and more people realize this, it becomes a less and less attractive industry to work in, whether for people already there, or newbies coming in.
I don’t think Schreier wrote this book as a warning for people looking to try there hand in videogames however, I think the warning is more for people steering the ships. After finishing this second book (and seeing a third will come out this year), I don’t get the impression that Schreier hates games and the gaming industry, but rather the opposite, and that these books are an attempt to make people aware of the problems, not to shut gaming down, but to allow for course corrections, so that the sector may thrive in a better way for everyone.
Unfortunately, I’m not sure we’re quite there yet. This book came out in 2021, and now in 2023 and 2024 we’re seeing massive layoff numbers with upwards almost 20,000 jobs lost (8,000 lost in January & February alone). Games are getting cancelled and more studios are closing (Sony Interactive Studios being perhaps the biggest surprise)
Perhaps Schreier was more prescient than he knew. Perhaps the gaming industry is ‘pressing reset’, just not in the way anyone hoped.
Give This Book A Read?
Absolutely. As is becoming habbit, Schreier finds interesting stories happening behind the games we know and love, and uses them to craft a poignant message about the state of this beloved art. The chapters about 38 studios are such a surprising and wild ride, that they are worth the price of admission on their own. That there are many other fascinating and well researched chapters just shows the quality and care with which this book was written.
It seems there are some pretty far reaching systemic problems within the gaming industry, and ones which do not seem to have changed much in the three years since this book was written. I’m hopeful, as I believe Schreier is, that things can turn for the better. That we can hit the reset button on such exploitative and unsustainable practices, and build a better industry, so that we might all have better games.
That’s all I have for you this week. Has anyone read this one yet? Or Blood, Sweat, & Pixels? What were your thoughts? (also what are your fav games?). Leave your thoughts in the comments!
Until next time.
alligators and aneurysms! 