Video Games: A Labour of Love or an Abuse of Labour?

I’ll preface this by saying I have no idea about the state of labour practices at Playground Games. It just so happens that I’m playing Forza Horizon 4 at the minute and so it is this game that frames the piece.

Forza Horizon 4 is an absolutely beautiful game, the Forza series always have been. For a long time, racing games with their puddles on tarmac, brake lights in the night and the sun bouncing of exotic chassis have been an excellent show piece to illustrate just how powerful new hardware has become but also to show a studios mastery of the software they use to create these games. In Forza Horizon 4, I often find myself thinking just how photorealistic those puddles are, how good those brake lights look in the dark and marvel at how shiny those cars look.

The sun, the tarmac, it looks so crisp

As I drove through the games depiction of the North East, I had a moment where I noticed just how perfect the light and shadows bounced of my Ford Focus RS as I glided past a ridiculously accurate model of Bamborough Castle. That’s when it hit me. In a sudden epiphanic moment I realised that people had created all of this.

Now obviously I didn't think video games are plucked from trees, I’m fully aware games are created by people. However this was the first time whilst playing a game I thought ‘what about the devs, this is a striking amount of detail for people to create, it can’t have been easy’. I’m also not naive of the awful labour conditions within the industry, however this was the first time I had a ‘what if?’ type of suspicion whilst playing. Maybe this is because of the current climate I found myself in, Uber were taking part in a national strike, I had recently read pieces by Seva and Heather Alexandria about Assassin's Creed Odyssey and worker conditions and I have been wrestling with myself over the upcoming release of Red Dead Redemption 2, a game from a studio with a history of alleged terrible labour conditions.

Forza Horizon 4 is a painstakingly detailed world, one with an eye for ridiculous accuracy, be that in the form of perfectly modelled cars, with dashboards and engine sounds identical to the real life versions or accurate in a mechanical sense, with cars handling differently depending on their specifications or the environment they are driving in (Hitting big stagnant pools of water in the spring feels so good in this game, I don't know how they have managed it but there's a huge momentum shift and a drag that is portrayed through the controllers triggers and onscreen speed reduction, it feels amazing).

The lighting is really good

But it doesn’t stop there, not only is the world ridiculously detailed, there's an almost overwhelming amount of events for players to take part in, and that’s even before the game fully opens up and introduces you to the persistent seasonal world which adds weekly and daily challenges and also Forzathons, big cooperative group activities that happen each hour. All this detail, and all these things for us to do is directly the result of developers labour, their time, talent and creativity.

Oooo shiny

The realisation of how these games are created combined with the scope of them is what led me to become apprehensive. After spending the majority of my adult life so far working in hospitality and currently working somewhere where HR openly laughed at the suggestion of a union, I’m fully aware companies will happily take advantage and wring everything they possibly can out of their employees. Exploiting the need to provide for yourself, your family and your passion.

This has been a common occurrence and can be seen consistently throughout the game industry. There seems to be stories each month breaking about the abhorrent labour conditions in the form of unpaid overtime, 12+ hour working days and studios justifying crunch as the status quo. Add to that the rise of the gig economy with workers having temporary contracts until games are made and are then let go.  On top of these awful conditions there is then the saddening studio closures that have plagued 2018. Capcom Vancouver, Visceral and arguably the most egregious Telltale (Whilst studio closures are awful news in any circumstance, the shocking treatment of Telltale staff being kept in the dark and having no severance is absolutely repulsive).

So to be clear, I’m not accusing Playground Games of participating in these exploitations of labour, but it’s hard to play a game as big and detailed as Forza Horizon 4 and not think about the conditions the game was made in. The hours of labour that go into making a game with such scope and the fact that crunch is such an ingrained part of the culture makes it almost impossible to imagine the game hasn’t been crunched on given the opportunity that these companies have to exploit an already vulnerable workforce.

Take Red Dead Redemption 2 for example, Rockstar already has an alleged history of poor labour conditions. Pair this with the massively detailed world they are advertising for Red Dead Redemption 2 and it seems to be a logical conclusion to imagine 12+ hour days as developers face mounting pressure to ensure everything is ready for release at the end of the month.

Horse Balls.

So if companies are exploiting their workers and adopting poor working conditions, what is our personal responsibility as the people who buy and play these games? I have some ideas but I’m genuinely conflicted as most suggestions seem to ask more questions than give any answers.

For argument's sake, let's say Playground Games, Rockstar and Ubisoft all have terrible labour conditions and take advantage of their workers passion by forcing mandatory overtime on them because ‘they’re so lucky they get paid to make games’. Knowing this, it makes sense to conclude that buying games from these studios not only directly endorses the practices that creates these poor labour conditions but encourages them to continue to do so. Thus continuing the practice of poor working conditions, arguably this is why crunch and these conditions are seen as ‘just how it is’ in the industry.

So, should we boycott these games? If these companies are treating workers poorly, should we all ‘vote with our wallets’ and hit developers and publishers where it hurts and demand they make a change? After all, this is one of the few redeeming features of capitalism, the market can be dictated by the consumer (sometimes at least). We witnessed this with Star Wars Battlefront 2, fans were upset with the games pay to win marketplace and planned to boycott the game, because of this EA launched the game with no micro transactions (even if it was just to save face and they were later reinstated to a lesser extent). So can we do this to studios to ensure they improve their standard of labour conditions?

My fear is that by boycotting games from these studios, we could be punishing the already exploited devs. Does not buying these games mean that the devs who create them miss out on sales based bonuses? (if they are implemented) Taken to the nth degree, could it mean studios decreasing in size or even dissolving altogether? Thats certainly not the intended outcome. Granted this is the extreme, but it is not outside the realm of the possible. By demanding better of these companies and the industry as a whole, if things get significantly worse before they get better is it worth it?

Is being aware of the poor conditions and the context which games are made enough? or are we kidding ourselves? hoping that one day it will get better. What can I do? what can we do as people outside of the industry but with direct influence? Is tweeting about these awful conditions enough? By sharing articles and being labour conscious is this enough? What about showing solidarity with those who are trying to unionise?

Take the recent strikes by workers at Uber, TGI, McDonalds and Weatherspoons for example. I fully support those workers and hope they reach the deals that provide them with the best working conditions possible. To do so I can choose not to cross the picket line, to show solidarity. My worry is that until the games industry unionises, then boycotts and industrial action would have a detrimental effect on the very people we wish to help. At a complete loss, I contacted Game Workers Unite UK to find out if there is anything we can do at all.

Game Workers Unite is currently an ‘organisation that seeks to connect pro union activists, exploited workers and allies… in the name of building a unionised games industry.” In the UK, they seem to have found some success, as they are to become a legal trade union this winter as a branch of IWGB (Independent Workers Union of Great Britain).

After reaching out to GWU they suggested that players support would be crucial when they are legally formed into trade union. The idea of boycotts, though not rejected, would be taken as a complete last resort only if workers had voted and agreed on such a decision. What GWU did advocate for those who want to get involved was the organisation of socials and benefit events, for allies to attend demos and rallies and of course for us to share their material.

Another idea suggested was for people to continue creating content about the cause, be that writing articles about labour conditions, making videos and podcasts, or even going as far to create games exploring the problem. GWU’s big target was to be able to challenge some of the unfair work practices in court so it goes without saying that fundraising for legal teams will play a big part of what we can do as allies.

The conclusion I came to was that until the industry pulls together and unionises it is vital for us players to ensure we continue the conversation about the conditions the games we enjoy are created in. By continuing the discussion and raising awareness we help games workers get closer to the goal of unionising, thus ensuring fairer working conditions for all. The GWU UK has achieved some success in preparing to become a legal trade union, but that's just one drop in the ocean, there's still a long way to go.

Watch_Dogs 2 Photo Diary

So when Watch_dogs 2 was released I gave it a shot. I played about 4 hours before I decided I hated the game. Every bit of it grated against me, from the meme aesthetic to the stereotypical crew of hackers. Fast forward a year and a half and I decided to pick Watch_dogs 2 up again.

 This was for numerous reasons. Firstly, I never finished it and I’ve recently been wanting to clean up a backlog before I buy any more games. Secondly, I played and loved Assassins Creed Origins and I wanted to see if Watch_dogs 2 could create some of the same feelings that Origins did. Thirdly, I recently went to see an exhibition, States of Play: Roleplay Reality at FACT Liverpool. Whilst there I stumbled upon the work of Alan Butler and his Down and Out in Los Santos series of photographs that documents poverty in GTA V. Butlers work inspired me to go an explore an open world and take in the people that exist in it, not just see them as set dressing.

With those three reasons, I finally booted up Watch_dogs 2. Before I hit ‘new game’ I made a pact with myself, I would play ‘realistically’. That entailed me playing as a pacifist, and also with all of the HUD elements off. The reason I chose to play with no HUD was because Watch_dogs 2 was constantly bombarding the player with different things on screen, which took away from the amazing San Francisco sandbox they had designed.

March 30th 2018: I was walking around trying to catch my bearings when I noticed the three people sitting down smoking (probably vaping) and it felt like one of the first real human moments I had seen so far, three people just having a smoke break together. In the far right of that picture I noticed somebody wearing armour, so naturally I went to have a look. 
As I turned down the alley, I seen a man land a punch on somebody who was trying to walk through what was obviously gang territory, the victims friend quickly rang 911 and within seconds police had arrived. 

I quickly pulled my camera out and took the picture of the officer arresting the Tezca Gang member who had just committed assault. The officers partner was on the other side of the fence waiting by the car (You can barely see him on the far left of the third pic). Then in a flash the man behind the officer pulled out a pistol and fired at the arresting officer killing him. In the final picture you can see the moment the gang turned and shot the second officer and the sudden panic setting in as they realise whats occured.

Later in that session I stumbled accross another violent confrontation between the police and the Tezcas, this one ending in even more bloodshed. It began with the police chasing a suspect who happened to be a Tezca member. After shots are fired the police gave up the chase and as seen in the second image, begin to fire back. In the shade of that image you can see a downed officer and the perp they chased emerging from cover. Backup arrived too late as you can see in the third image, both of the officers that arrived first on scene were killed. As can be seen, the back up officers managed to deal with the threat, as they killed the last gang member as he fled. Then theres the aftermath.

UPDATE April 1st 2018 
When I loaded into the world on this session I found myself accross the road from an inner city camp filled with the homeless which was a stark contrast to the gentrified areas of San Francisco you spend most of the game.

Later on, when walking through a park I noticed the flash of police sirens so decided to investigate.Thats when I stumbled on the police arresting a gang member. This was the first time i'd seen an arrest go succesfully and not end up in a shoot out.

UPDATE 6th April 2018  

The officer clearly hasn't looked very far. I stumbled on this scene when I was looking for a way to grab the cash bag hidden in the vent. Police were all over the back of these buildings with what I imagine is a suspect dead on the roof after hiding the bag. 

The next few images are some that I took to show how the game portrays sex, the game places working girls on dark corners at night in impoverished areas. Soon after, I was transported to a Burning Man esq festival for one of the games main story beats. Where most people where pretty progressive with their sexuality, even the old lady at the enterance. When I returned to San Francisco I went on a little walk and realised there are restaurants and bars you can enter, when a man stumbled out of a door on the side street. It just so happened to be a strippers.

 Just a few more pictures from Burning Man

Sea of Thieves: The Pirate Game I Didn't Want

Since AC: Black Flag, I have searched for the perfect pirate game. Some have popped up in the last few years, there’s Blackwake, Blood and Gold: Caribbean an also Ubisoft have announced Skull and Bones, a game that uses Black Flags pirate ship combat. However none of these really scratch that pirate itch. Blackwake focuses on PvP multiplayer and working as a team to be successful almost like a pirate Chivalry. Blood and Gold: Caribbean is at its core a re-skin for Mount & Blade, but the developers seem to have stopped touching the game anyway. Whilst not much is known about Skull and Bones, it seems to just be ship combat with a focus on PvP. So when Sea of Thieves was announced at E3, I was excited. When it was shown it had interesting ship combat, it had melee and firearms, there was treasure hunts and though it encouraged teamwork it was also accessible as a solo player. I thought this was it, the pirate game I’d been waiting for. 

As it turns out, Sea of Thieves is a game that gives me nothing but mixed emotions. It is really exciting, but at the same time equally flawed. I have played a couple of hours so far in solo and as a duo (with my brother). I do plan on putting a bit more time into it and jumping into a bigger group and seeing if that changes much gameplay wise, but I highly doubt it will have much of an effect. 

The first thing you notice when you start up Sea of Thieves is the lack of character customisation. The game randomly generates a group of pirates that you get to pick from, which is infuriating because the characters look really fucking cool, however because you don’t create them, the character you pick doesn’t really feel like it’s yours. I wish I got to design what MY pirate looked like, especially in a game were the only real progression is to get gold in order to customise your outfit, to me it doesn’t make sense to start from a base that you haven’t created. This leads me onto my next point, progression. 

The progression in Sea of Thieves is barely existent, there are three factions, and you do quests for each to be rewarded with gold and faction rep. As far as I’m aware Faction rep just unlocks more ‘difficult’ quests, whilst gold is used in order to buy new clothes and equipment. The clothes and equipment you can buy seem to have no effect whatsoever on gameplay, no numbers get bigger, no abilities unlock, they are purely cosmetic. 

The fact all the progression is horizontal is no surprise, Rare said it would be numerous times in their press releases since its announcement. As an idea it’s a choice that makes perfect sense, it allows for new comers to jump right in and not have to worry about getting blasted by a Super Mega Canon that fires flaming heat seeking shot. It makes the game a level playing field (assuming you aren’t playing alone). However, in practice the horizontal progression feels massively flawed. 

Maybe it is because my tiny reptile brain is so used to numbers getting bigger, that I need that little endorphin rush to fully enjoy a game. Why is it that I don’t care for buying any of the cosmetics? It’s not that they don’t look good, some of them are really interesting (even though there isn’t many items to buy at launch), is it because they don’t offer me anything new? What I plan on doing is saving up all my gold and wearing nothing but the rags I started in, becoming the secret millionaire of Sea of Thieves. 

But have we become so goal orientated that having a sandbox to play in with friends and have fun simply isn’t enough? Even the quest loop in the game is awful because there’s no real reasons to do quests unless you want different cosmetics, also this isn’t helped by the absolute lack of variety in the quests given from the three different factions (however it’s possible at higher levels quests get different and change but I haven’t seen that reported anywhere yet).

However, even in the face of all these negatives, I’ve had boat loads of fun with Sea of Thieves (I hate myself for that). As said earlier, all my time has been spent either in solo or as a duo with my brother so I am yet to experience the large ship. However the act of sailing in this game is absolutely amazing, the teamwork needed to sail a ship efficiently is so well designed, I often find myself heading towards a storm to test our abilities as sailors. Sailing the boat is so well designed, that it never really feels like you are just waiting to go from A to B, you are constantly moving around the ship, angling the sails, checking the map, acting as lookout, preparing the cannons or god forbid… repairing the hull from damage or relaying buckets of water from your rapidly sinking ship.

Sea of Thieves is a game that relies on emergent gameplay and the unplanned experiences you have -arguably more than any other game I can think of - and in my experience so far it has succeeded, however how long can Sea of Thieves lean on emergent gameplay before everyone has the same stories to tell each other and experiences get repetitive? Nevertheless the time I’ve spent so far sailing the seas and finding treasure have been incredible. 

Adam (my brother) proposed a quest for the merchant’s guild, we were tasked to track and capture two different type of pig and deliver them to an outpost, how hard could that be? As we lifted up the anchor and drifted away from the dock we met at the map to discuss where we were best headed to find these pigs. We agreed on Snake Island, a group of three small grass covered isles that were sure to be home to the pigs we sought. We sailed north, leisurely, we were in no rush and besides it was sunrise so we relaxed and took it in because Sea of Thieves is absolutely breath-taking. *DING DING* “That’s the Island” Adam hollered as he ran to raise the sail in order to slow down our approach. We got within 200m of the isles and I took a cage, jumped into the sea and swam toward the centre landmass as Adam docked the ship.

As I made my way out of the surf and trudged up onto the beach I heard Adam sheepishly mutter “Uh oh…. This is bad”. Without thinking I dropped the cage and headed towards where he was making dock, “You don’t wanna see this” he exclaimed. As I followed the beach around in search of our ship, it’s then I noticed it. A ships bowsprit, our ships bowsprit, poking through the trees. “I told you, you didn’t wanna see it”.

We both jumped aboard and began repairing the ship in an attempt to keep it from sinking. With all the damage patched, I left Adam on bucket duty whilst I tried to manoeuvre back into open waters. After a couple of minutes of messing with sails and raising the anchor, we found ourselves in a decent position to dock. And to our surprise, we heard the sound of pigs. Adam grabbed a cage and headed toward the island with me in pursuit. And as we got up onto the beach we seen it, the spotted pig, our buried treasure. We pounced, within seconds the swine was ours.

I directed Adam to the other cage whilst I took the pig on board and readied the ship. Soon after, my brother jumped aboard with another pig, however, it wasn’t the right type. No problem “Just release it an go find the right pig” I said.

“It won’t let me” said Adam. “I don’t think you can.”

Shit. I knew what this meant. I knew what we had to do. Adam had made far too many mistakes so far, it was up to me to rectify this one. The image of George standing above an oblivious Lennie sprung to mind. I drew my gun and with one squeeze we were back on mission. “You absolute dickhead” my girlfriend shouted, she had been watching me play all along and had enjoyed it up to this point.

 

Almost deflated, I remained on deck as Adam went looking for another pig. When he returned we didn’t even mention what had just took place, we just quietly sailed toward Ancient Spire Outpost to deliver the livestock. As the outpost came into sight after what seemed to be 20 minutes of sailing in silence, I seen what I dreaded. *DING DING, DING DING* “That’s a Galleon!” I shouted “We have no chance! Get out of here!” Adam took a sharp right as I kept my eyes on the Galleon to make sure they weren’t giving chase.

We seemed to be in the clear, the Galleon was docked, and we were far away enough and out of sight of the ship. That’s when Adam suggested I should sneak onto the island, hide on it and then signal when it’s all clear. After positioning the cannon just right, I loaded myself in and soon found myself hurtling through the air. Thankfully I didn’t have much of a swim to make dry land.

I positioned myself in a bush, and looked through my spyglass. After a couple of tense minutes trying not to be spotted I noticed the captain of the Galleon turning the ship, his team angling and lowering the sails. “Thank God” I thought. They were leaving. I notified Adam who had took the ship and hid it at another island (the south side of Devils Ridge) that it was all clear then I used the merman teleport to get back to our ship.

Worried that we may encounter the Galleon I checked all the cannons were loaded, that’s when I noticed the silence. No longer could I hear annoying oinks of our cargo. “Adam, what the fuck have you done?” I yelled as I ran below deck to check the cages. Empty. The cages were empty. “That’s what you get for murdering that pig!” my girlfriend muttered under her breath. Adam swore he hadn’t done anything. Even now we are both unsure what happened, though we think they starved as I recently seen you could feed caged animals with bananas.

With our cages empty, and time running out we decided to rummage through Devils Ridge and pray we would find the pigs we needed. As I breached through a tree line I stumbled upon a barrel of gunpowder, I figured that was some profit at least. “Bring the cages” Adam exclaimed. I made my way to him and as if by an act of God, there they were, the two pigs we needed. Quickly we got them aboard and headed north to our final destination.

We finally arrived and delivered the goods, was it all worth it for 1500 gold coins? I don’t know but I can tell you now it was a lot of fun. To celebrate me an Adam went the pub, got drunk, puked and decided to call it a night. Yes, Sea of Thieves has its problems, but it also has its moments. Almost everyone who has played the game has stories similar to mine and maybe that is what’s more important than making numbers get bigger. In my opinion the game is exactly what was advertised, an open world pirate sandbox where you get to hang out with friends and go on adventures. However I do hope the game is supported with content updates as Sea of Thieves really is a fantastic base with so much potential.

I plan on playing more Sea of Thieves with Adam, and I can’t wait to get my other brother online with us too, then we’ll get to try out the Galleon. The game is worth trying with Game Pass especially if you have a bunch of friends who you can play with, even the dullest of quests become interesting when you are hanging out with the people you know, and I think that’s where Sea of Thieves really shines, being a fantastic space to hang with friends and create your own stories.