Rockstar Asks Employees To Return To Office Full-Time In Preparation For GTA 6

It makes sense to ask your team to come and work in the office in preparation for the big release next year, but at the same time I could see why employees aren’t “thrilled” with the idea. They’ve been used to working from home. Sometimes that means child care, dog walkers, extra gas money for commuting… It will also mean after the release, it probably won’t go back to how it was before with the amount of days working from home. It could always be worse though. We’ve seems TONS of layoffs in the industry lately. They still have a job so that’s at least something.

Hopefully this stops the leaks too

@EvilSilentFrame
I think Rockstar would get heavily investigated if they tried to lay off staff. We know they are absolutely swimming in money and have made record profits for over a decade

@ZuneTattooGuy yeah a company swimming in cash doesnt mean anything. Playstation is profitable and laid off people, microsoft is the richest company in the world and laid massive amounts of people off.

What a bunch of BS. The leaks rockstar recently experienced would not have been prevented by being in the office. They just found an excuse to pressure people back into the office so they can micromanage and exploit their staff leading up to launch.

Must be a generational thing to kick up a fuss about going back to the office.

I have been lucky enough to have been working from home for a while now, but I wouldn't moan and groan if I was expected to work in an office again - it does have its benefits.

This is coming from a person who has had to commute an hour to an office for the better part of 12 years.

Would I prefer to be at home working? Absolutely - it's prevented our family from having to find after school care for my daughter.

Would I cry "foul" because I would have to go to an office every day? No, it's just the nature of work.

I work in software development and collaboration happens much more often when everyone is in the same office together to either ask for help or bounce ideas off each other.

Sure, there are messengers and online meetings, but it's not the same. I have people on my team I don't even really "know" at all because I only ever hear their voices during daily standup or the occasional call.

@DoctorJohnDisco LOL what scam? It’s been proven that remote workers accomplish MORE than people working in an office setting. Whatever benefits there are from being in the office are more than offset by the increased difficulty to focus. Then when you factor in the cost renting office space it just becomes an insane decision to have staff in the office.

Company I work for has been full remote since 2020, has sold multiple office buildings, has had growth year-over-year, and makes significantly more money than Rockstar but I guess they don't own their office space and are paying for it so why not force the people in when there's layoffs industry-wide and they have no bargaining power.

And like I’ve been saying why games are taking longer to make the developers and teams want to work from home and not in the office, which is more efficient and more collaborative coming into the office and work.
That’s why the games are taking longer.
It happens in my business as well, so not just game development.

Considering what happened with RDR2, I don't blame these devs for not trusting Rockstar's motives for wanting them back in the office. Wonder how long before the overtime waivers come back

I'm not a fan of forcing people to work in office. Those companies seem stuck in the past. It's disappointing to see an innovative company like Rockstar take such a backwards stance on this.

@Rmg0731
Sony's only profitable division is the Playstation one, but their layoffs help offset they struggling divisions. Microsoft is worth a bundle but their Xbox division is struggling so again streamlining their gaming offices makes sense.

How come the gaming industry is the only industry consistently under a watchful eye when it comes to working any sort of overtime? Plenty of other, lower paid, less talented people in other industries have to work more hours just to get by and no one bats an eyelid, but my god, if a dev has to work overtime near a games release that’s the worst thing imaginable. Now, my word, they’ve been asked to go back to an office, ludicrous!!

I’d swap with them, I could walk past the John Marston life size statue, sipping on my matcha latte before settling into a hard days work in my hammock under my desk. Awful.

I'm very much a firm believer it's waaay past time for employees get their butts back in the office again. Play time is over. Time get back to reality people.

@RBRTMNZ .....or maybe they are simply asking what is reasonably expected for staff to do?

If people want to keep working from home, there are plenty of telemarketing and customer service jobs they can do.

@GuyinPA75 Why is it time for employees go back to the office when remote work is better for both the employees and empirically proven to be more productive? I swear some people just want other people to be miserable for no reason at all.

@RBRTMNZ @OldGamer999 Exactly. Amen, Old Gamer999.

RBRTMNZ, People can spout off all the statistics they wish about productivity for this, and that, working from home. But the absolute bottomline is it stagnants the group, organization, and/or company as a whole. Individual accomplishments, as nice as they are, mean absolutely nothing if the larger picture/group is not producing at maximum efficiency. It's just lost time and money.

If want to cite studies that's cool, I get it, and appreciate it. But there also numerous studies that reveal many spontaneous discoveries, ideas, etc, are no longer occurring since Jill is not walking across the office or the building and stopping to talk to Jim producing the above benefit.

As shared in other post, if want to work from home, that's fine. Customer service and telemarketing jobs are available. No one is stopping anyone from working those jobs. And they can still....work from home. No one is taking away anyone's opportunity to work from home. Just very well have to switch jobs to do it.

@Fenbops Thank you. Wonder how much those complaing are getting paid with and without overtime.

I not know for sure, but willing bet those salaries are far, far, above poverty line.

Ever since COVID, I have primarily worked from home, working "in office" one to two days per week. I am FAR more productive with me having the choice to work from home. I'm a much better employee and, honestly, I have not used a sick day in probably four years. We will most likely never go back to working full-time in the office again, which I'm fine with.

@GuyinPA75
Of course all those people working from home will say they are far more productive, because they are far more better off financially and time wise.
No travel costs
Reduced or no child care costs
No time travelling.

GAME development has definitely suffered in both time taken and quality since all this hybrid working from home started more after covid.

Its the same in my business and no one is going to tell me or you any different.

@GuyinPA75 Also sales, marketing, and programming jobs are great for WFH. I work for one of the fastest-growing tech unicorns, and we couldn't have scaled efficiently without being spread out across the country. It also enabled us to hire the best of the best, instead of relying on everyone being in one city.

I think there's certainly an argument for a lack of spontaneous ideas in hallways, but I don't think you can support studies that back that up while also handwaving away studies that show just how efficient and productive remote work is too.

And I get it — remote work isn't for everyone. Some people just don't have the discipline, some want to socialize more. People should be able to choose the culture that works best for them and their needs, and not every company has the tools or is capable of bringing people together remotely. But "playtime is over" is a comically inaccurate and dismissive way of looking at it. We wouldn't be the success story we are without it. And good Lord, the number of offices where I worked and people just socialized all day and got nothing done; the boss may have demanded "butts in seats" like grade school, but people weren't producing. Lazy employees will find ways to skirt by, regardless of they're in the office or at home.

The world of technology and work is always evolving. Every company should be able to decide what kind of culture they want and talent they want to pull from. But there isn't a wrong way. Especially when employees have choice.

That said, I get why Rockstar is doing this to get a big project across the finish line. But I can't blame anyone for being disappointed either. And there might be a talent drain as people head out to find other companies that succeed remotely.

@Romans12
I go to work at work everyday and haven’t had a sick day in well over ten years.
Apart from one serious operation, which you can’t avoid recovery time for.
And guess what I worked from home then to benefit the business, but I’m fully back at work now.

Working from home shouldn’t be about the employee and that has what it has turned into.

It should be about the business requirements.
And a lot of people working from home it is not the business requirement. It’s just added luxury the people take advantage of as they know the business has trouble refusing in this day and age.

@OldGamer999 Conversely, working from home benefits businesses by giving them the widest pool of applicants and building a dream team. Not great for less talented applicants or people without a big track record of success though.

But agreed, it has to be something that still benefits the business too. High employee morale means a lot, but not if it comes at inefficiencies or the business is unable to navigate remote work.

The cynic in me think this will be followed by layoffs.

@Fenbops
I hope some on here aren’t meant to be working from home and are on here instead 😂😂😂

@OldGamer999 A business requires high productivity. Remote workers, freed from the distractions of an office, have been proven to be more productive. As for the security reason given, the two leaks GTA6 has already suffered, would not have been prevented by having staff in the office. There is nothing about an office environment that would prevent fishing or someone stealing your data off of youtube.

@OldGamer999 How has development suffered? I know games that have performed poorly have tried to blame remote work but what evidence is there that they were not simply making excuses for a ***** game? Insomniac has been the most productive studio, releasing three huge well made hits since the start of the pandemic, and they are fully remote.

With the thousands of game developers losing their jobs and some want to risk theirs by throwing tantrums....then they seriously need to know what their real priorities are.

Can't wait to see all the entitled people outraged that they actually have to go into work to....work

I work in a job that is hybrid partially in the office and at home. Used to to be an office only before Covid. It is true that some people thrive at home. But that is a small percentage. There also people who “produce” at home but when you actually look at the details of their work , it looks poor and hastily put together. They are probably too busy doing other things than actual work. But if they are asked to come back to the office, they tell you how “productive“ they are.