GTA 6 Developers Unionize

Can anyone comment on why "big video game" dev pay has lagged "big tech" pay so badly? Ostensibly they are doing remarkable similar engineering problem solving, so why is there such a disparity?

Who would have thought we'll get programmer unions before GTA 6!

This is great news, unions not only improve working conditions, but also improve the final product by not having underpaid stressed staff with high turn-over. It's a good sign for the future product quality of any company to see workers unionise.

Solidarity forever! Game devs eat a a lot of crap, so I'm glad they are banding together to bargain collectively.

Isnt management at Rockstar the same poeple who:

A) Allowed a bug in the code make all GTA5 Load times on every single copy on every platform take exponential times longer to load, for YEARS, unchecked or investigated, until some random kid FIXED IT by reverse engineering compiled code?

B) The bug was a simple and unneeded look up for SHOP items

C) The never rewarded the kid, with say a job or something worthwhile for him like 100k ( when they earn billions ). I mean even this decision ALONE is such terrible optics clearly mgmt were AFK.

D) They then came onto HN to argue with me in the comments about how " its not nice to say mgmt responsible should have been fired over this"

I mean Ive had my share of almost blinding incompetence, but the one that really bothers my crumpet, is when they come on here and start denying things.

Im for the union, Rockstar North made one of the greatest games of all time. It will probably result in an inferior product but crunch is unethical and always due to poor management.

PS - I got a bit heated and have edited this comment so its readable apologies.

PS - All of this can be verified in previous posts on HN regarding both the bug and replies

PS - And to whoever is downvoting me, feel free to reply and tell me what I am wrong about

What is the career ladder like for game devs? In a union, the only way up is seniority or, in other words, the amount of money you've paid in dues over the years. A great developer isn't going to get rewarded with higher pay or a better role unless they've spent enough time/money as a union member.

They should call it a cartel

Hell yeah

I always see the same thing:

“employer seen as blocking union effort”

I’m wondering if that’s simply a rational thing available to do as opposed to an actual opinion about collective representation whether thats bargaining or something else

“hey, here’s this regulatory overhead you can completely avoid by merely being present, unless people interested in the regulatory overhead are more persistent. just don't fire them though”

On Thursday, the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB) and Rockstar staff members announced the Rockstar Game Workers Union. This union will be part of the IWGB. The reveal came in the form of an informative video which delves into their motives and what we should be looking out for in the future.

If companies do not like this, paying a percent of profit instead of salaries is always an option.

(ah s** here we go again by the way).

One of these days I'm going to see an article here about how the sex worker characters in GTA 6 have unionized.