UK Games Industry Forms Official Union

UK Games Industry Forms Union

For many, the prospect of being a video game developer sounds like a great job. I mean, you get to make games for a living! How awesome does that sound! The reality is, however, very far removed from the fact. Well, if you go to work for a major developer at least. Overlooking some of the more nastier factors (which we’ll get onto shortly) you’re often working on a game you have zero interest in and often full in the knowledge that it’ll be a hated release.

There are, however, much darker sides to the industry than this. They are factors which have, in a report via SkyNews, led to the very first UK Game Developer Union being formed!

Long Hours And Crunch Time

The ‘Games Workers’ Union’ officially formed last Friday. The Union has been created to challenge what they consider to be a “broken sector and [to] create an ethical industry”. The main crux of their argument is the term known as ‘crunch time’. I sadly daresay that there are many of you already familiar with this, but for those of you who are not, this is essentially a period of time marked by the company where a level of work simply must be completed. This leads to many video game workers putting in 100+ hour weeks simply to meet the deadline.

Sexism And Homophobia

Founding member of the Union, Dec Peach, has said: “For as long as I can remember it has been considered normal for games workers to endure zero-hours contracts, excessive unpaid overtime, and even sexism and homophobia as the necessary price to pay for the privilege of working in the industry.”

It will certainly be interesting to see how developers in the UK react to this news.

What do you think? – Let us know in the comments!