The last time I mentioned David Jaffe, it was about his claim that 'video game journalists aren't part of the industry', to which I called BS on. At the recent DICE conference in Las Vegas, Jaffe had these words to close:
"So much of ourselves were put into this property, it's fair for Sony to own this, but as I get older, and now that I achieve this success personally and with my team, I kind of wonder if we're going to work this hard there's a sense of kind of being exploited. And not by Sony. I've got no qualms with Sony, I think it's an industry problem."
"I do wonder about the three or four creative and key people who really give that game its life and vitality, how can they be expected to sort of continue down that road time after time after time without emerging from it with significant financial payoff. When you're younger it's okay, you just want to make the game, but once you've done that, what's the motivator? I don't know what the solution is. To be perfectly honest, I'd rather work for Sony who believes in the medium and never having a payday, versus forming a company and making games for kids to buy for fifty dollars. It's just something I've been thinking about."
"I don't want to run a company. I like the creative work, I like worrying about gameplay and mechanics and character and story. I'm passionate and grateful. If I start a company, I'm dealing with milestones, money, meetings, HR, insurance and all that stuff. Why would I want to do that? I'm stubborn, I feel this industry should eventually grow to this point -" I should be able to make a good living bringing what I have to offer, whatever that may be in their eyes, and make a real living out of that. I think it's a realistic expectation, and I'm hoping the industry will go that way."
The way I'm reading this is, he wants to get a payoff from Sony (or he wants to unionize the industry), but doesn't want to get fired as noted by his attempts to kiss butt with Sony, and this is his thinly veiled attempt at saying if he doesn't get his payoff, he'll start his own company. That's the vibe I'm getting out of this.
Now, having a strong corporate structure does insulate the creatives from having to worry about the day to day activities of HR, insurance, money and meetings, but there are ways around that if you're a creative individual who wants to start your own company -- namely hire other people to take care of that stuff. If being creative is what you do, then carry on. However, at this point, I get the feeling that ... well, Jaffe might not have the motivation left in him to do another game -- he seems to indicate that he is going for safety and security so he can be creative, but I think his spirit has been crushed by Sony -- the payoff for God of War doesn't seem to be signifigant enough to keep him happy.
It's really tough, especially when you make a blockbuster game that sells, and you do the calculations with the unit cost and realize that your portion of the royalty is likely in the fractions of a penny per copy sold. That's when you start to ask yourself -- was it worth it? Was the sleep-deprived days or the 14 hour workdays worth it? Was it worth giving up all those weekends?
Jaffe wants the industry to change, but it won't, not without a union. Until then, creatives are completely exploitable by the companies that own them, and the only way off the corporate treadmill is to start a company.
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