How Long do you work at your job?

Greg DAlessandro

I'm curious what it really is like working in the industry at a small/large company. I'm sure it varies, but is it generally 40hours a week? Is there a standard? Does it drastically vary company to company? Thank you.

I'm considering not pursing a career in the game industry if every week is 60+ hours. Even though it's something I love, I also want to have free time outside of work each week.

Burpee

40-50h for me, mid sized compagny, in advertisement 
I think it's a standard ? 

Vincent3d

40 for me in a big video game company BUT probably more during full prod,around 50

Kbrom12

Company size is about 40ish right now and I do 40-50 hours a week.

Have yet to have a 60 hour week that I did not voluntarily do.

kolayamit

45-50 hours for me, i am in a VFX Studio. Sometimes 60 hours when i am in a project that is close to delivery.

Swaggletooth

Generally I have pretty easy going hours, 9-5:30 each day with an hour of lunchbreak. Occasionally I have to do overtime (but that's rare).

I'm probably in a very lucky situation right now, everywhere else reputedely seems to operate on crazy hours.

Geezus

Man, that really depends. For the most part, I can swing a 40 hour week. There are times that I'm working on a side project for the title, or where we're crunching, that I obviously spend more time at the studio. Times like that can easily creep into the 60 hours mark. My only "set-in-stone" rule, to myself, is that I don't work weekends. It takes me, personally, screwing up an important deadline to come in on a weekend. I was burned far too much at another place, to ever give up my weekends again.

slipsius

Mostly 40 hours for me. If near a deadline, it's usually 48ish. tuesday and thursdays we stay an extra 3 hours (at least) each day. Large AAA. Managers have families too. They want to go home just as much as the rest of us. 

0xffff

slipsius said:

Large AAA. Managers have families too. They want to go home just as much as the rest of us. 

I find they want to go home, but typically would prefer if you didn't go home. 

Typically 35-50 for me. Big deadline close? 60-70+. Mid-size AAA.

SnowInChina

usually 40 hours a week
nearing deadlines up to 50
all overtime goes into a time account

advertisement/vr automotive in germany

Snowfly

• 9:30am - 6:30pm
• Crunch is scheduled but typically doesn't happen
• Additional leaves are given instead of overtime pay

Mobile game developer in Singapore (800 employees globally / roughly 50 devs in our studio / 20 on my team)

Pretty sane, I'd say.

Kwramm

40 - 44 hours. Sometimes more, but that's voluntarily. As team lead I am responsible for my team and if they need help I can't just go home. On the othe hand, I am also responsible for giving them the work where they may need help with. If everyone strugges, then I have to stay, because it's me who caused the mess in the first place by doing a bad job assigning work, or by doing a bad job helpiung my team to prepare.

And yes, I think it varies with company, but also with position and sometimes seniority. I know people who's careers seem to be full of working for "crunch time" companies. I've been lucky (or good at getting things done?) - I never did much mandatory overtime.

Working as tech artist in outsourcing in China, managing 3 teams of TAs. 1000+ people in 4 studios.

0xffff said:

slipsius said:

Large AAA. Managers have families too. They want to go home just as much as the rest of us. 

I find they want to go home, but typically would prefer if you didn't go home.

I'm the opposite. I feel bad if I "bug out early". If you're not an example then you don't deserve to be on top. On the other hand, I'm often tired when I head home, and I bet so are the artists. At least a technical person or programmer will deterioriate quickly if they don't have enough time to regenerate. As artist you last a bit longer, at least I could sometimes zone out in Zbrush (back when I did art). In any case the speed suffered too. I just think relaxed and well rested makes for fewer errors, better quality, happier employees and consistent output. Overtime guarantees the exact opposite, at least in what my team does. I just have to look at myself for proof. Whoever thinks that putting in more hours at the last moment (aka crunch) can save a late tech product is an idiot (or failed to read up on some project management classics). It just rarely works and if the product is on time it may still be a mess (which then pisses off your customers, who'd rather have a late bug free product than an early mess). Your time may be better invested in renegotiating than burning out and alienating your most important asset: your employees.

slosh

We work 40 standard.  Very rarely some OT if a deadline is looming.   It's basically a "get your work done" mentality.  That being said, the schedules are very reasonable so as not to end up doing OT as much as possible.  In my 10 years of gamedev, I've only done maybe 6-9 months of OT total which I feel is extremely lucky.

doolally66

Seems my hours are less than the average. I only have to do 35 a week with flexi-time, but during crunch periods this has gone up to 55+ hours. I'm the only artist in a company of about 50 so often there's a lot of different projects on the go. This means I often have to work extra hours to keep up with the various projects going on.

Ged

Ive been at a small to mid size mobile games company for the last 5 years, usually work 40 hours a week, 9am - 6pm with an hour lunch each day (lunch not included in your 8 hour day). Crunch would probably be about 45-50 hrs a week at least. We hardly ever need to crunch and if we do I think its often a sign that something has probably gone wrong somewhere in the development process.

Sk0LLiE

40 -45. Small team of devs. Excessive overtime destroys teams and often leads to work being roughly constructed, its usually a sign of wrong task estimation or workflow. So we try to avoid.

Spoon

40-45

Joost

At my old job (UK) it was 37.5 hours a week. Very little overtime if you didn't want to do it, but you were judged by how many extra hours you put in. Doing freelance now and my bare minimum is 40 hours, not accounting for any personal projects. But it's a lot easier to achieve that working from home. I do half days on weekends as well so I can spread out my time more.  My time is also much more productive because I don't get interrupted as often.

slipsius

Kwramm said:

40 - 44 hours. 
...
I'm the opposite. I feel bad if I "bug out early"


Is it really bugging out early if you`re only working 44 hours? I agree that leads should usually put in the most time, but they need to have lives too. If you lead by example, aka leaving at a decent time, doing your 8 hours of solid work and not dicking around on the net for half the day, then that is a better example than working lots of OT and draining your team, no? I know a lot of people are afraid to leave before their leads do, so if the lead takes off at a normal time, it lets those people feel ok about doing it as well. 

Kwramm

slipsius said:

Kwramm said:

40 - 44 hours. 
...
I'm the opposite. I feel bad if I "bug out early"


Is it really bugging out early if you`re only working 44 hours? I agree that leads should usually put in the most time, but they need to have lives too. If you lead by example, aka leaving at a decent time, doing your 8 hours of solid work and not dicking around on the net for half the day, then that is a better example than working lots of OT and draining your team, no? I know a lot of people are afraid to leave before their leads do, so if the lead takes off at a normal time, it lets those people feel ok about doing it as well. 

For me it's okay if I stay longest - I'm home in 5 minutes. The guys I work with have 1 hour commutes. But no worries, 40 hours are the regular work time where I work. In some weeks I clock 40, in some a bit more. I stay if I'm needed. Which means there's a problem with delivering assets or when we work with clients in another timezone and I need to pull my weight. Otherwise I remind people to go home - aka "if you stay, you do so voluntarily and I can't be blamed for you being at work longer than necessary". That's very clear in my team and there's no unhealthy "who stays longest" competition. I encourage people to report back if their workload is too high. The sooner I know, the better. It helps me to revise my planning and to anticipate problems before they happen. As side effect, it also ensures nobody has crazy work hours.

dystopianghost

9 AM - 6:30 PM normally for me at a mid size/large sim company so about 45 hours a week or so, crunch time maybe 55 hours a week.

Amsterdam Hilton Hotel

Maybe 30 hours. All of them high quality. Not dead tired, not chatting with coworkers about sports or kids. Just total focus. I've been in a 60-hour environment, less got done and mistakes happened more.

Quack!

40-50 Hours closer to 40, my family is more important than my job.
I try to make sure my time while working is hyper-focused and efficient and limit the chattiness, but in a team environment, proper amounts of downtime is good for morale.
I will do personal crunch from time to time, mostly just when it is needed or I really want to implement something new.  I am also active at working at home when family time ends, so that can be considered work time.

Mandatory crunch is a failure of the company you work at.
Personal crunch can show dedication and passion.

Stinger88

37.5 hrs generally. I'm on flexi time so some weeks more, some weeks less. Crunch time goes up to about 45-50 but its really very rare for me to do that. Large studio in UK.

Brygelsmack

9-9:30 to 6-6:30. Normal hours I would say, ~80 or so people at Starbreeze currently. 

TheMadArtist

Work at an oil and gas company here doing simulation models and animation, as well as animations for the company. Typically 40 hours a week, unless it's crunch time and then 50 plus. 

Kwramm

TheMadArtist said:

Work at an oil and gas company here doing simulation models and animation, as well as animations for the company. Typically 40 hours a week, unless it's crunch time and then 50 plus. 

Interesting. How do you get into crunch mode? I would have hoped that at least non-gaming companies don't have this as much. You guys have internal release dates? I guess pre E3 crunch and crunch for the Xmas sale won't be the reasons?

Bartalon

I also work a flat 40 hours.  Studio size is around 120.

My last studio had 7 people.  We worked a minimum of 66 hour weeks during an 8 month long crunch.  Prior to crunch we worked standard 10 hour days (50h weeks).

Needless to say the smaller studio lacked a dedicated producer so maintaining and adapting work projections was pretty much non-existent. 

dzibarik

Amsterdam Hilton Hotel said:

Maybe 30 hours. All of them high quality. Not dead tired, not chatting with coworkers about sports or kids. Just total focus. I've been in a 60-hour environment, less got done and mistakes happened more.

This is what I want to do myself but being 100% focused requires more discipline. Working on that. Right now it's 40-45 hours.

Joost

Amsterdam Hilton Hotel said:

Maybe 30 hours. All of them high quality. Not dead tired, not chatting with coworkers about sports or kids. Just total focus. I've been in a 60-hour environment, less got done and mistakes happened more.

Sounds like a healthy attitude and you'll probably get way more done than people working 50 hour weeks, spending half(at least) of their productive time doing other things (like me currently, posting this!) Most of the people I've worked with have a weird sense of pride in the amount of hours they work. Even though I know through observation that they barely get anything done. I'm guilty of this myself obviously but I'm trying to improve.

When I do short focused bursts of work I definitely get more done. But as Dzibarik said, it takes more discipline to commit to that.
And if you try to do that at a studio they'll just give you more work!