Ever since the two mass shooting in the United States, politicians, concerned mothers with too much time on their hands, and fathers who let the TV play babysitter while they drink and post stupid online comments have once again begun to attack the video game industry instead of addressing the real issues at hand.
Well, it seems Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick has had all about he can take telling Mad Money’s, and oversized boglin with legs Jim Cramer, that it’s disrespectful to criticize entertainment when mass shootings happen. Zelnick noted that:
“The truth is it’s disrespectful to the victims and the families to point the finger at entertainment,” he said. “Entertainment is part of people’s daily joy. It’s consumed worldwide, and it’s the same worldwide. Gun violence is uniquely American. That has to change and that will only change if we address the real issues.”
This is all well and good, and Zelnick makes fine points, but don’t think this is anything but him protecting his bottom line. This is the same man who said that “hard to imagine” why his developers would want to unionize to better protect themselves from their own company higher-ups.
Remember that this is a company that boasted to games media about how hard they worked to get Red Dead Redemption 2 out the door, seeing employees put in 100-hour work weeks to get the game finished. I don’t know about you, but that’s a pretty monstrous thing. Imagine if your boss “asked” you to put in 100-hour work weeks to get a project finished by their imposed deadline.
A lot was thrown around about the art and pushing to create something great, but that’s all bullshit that company heads push on those beneath them. You don’t have to work all those extra hours, but someone else will and you better believe your job will be on the line later. Twitter user @floofyscorp said it best:
“Unpopular opinion time: if you are the kind of person who will voluntarily work 100+ hour weeks, you are causing harm to your colleagues and peers by normalising it and making it acceptable. You’re hurting the rest of us. Go home.”
And this sort of thing goes back years and years with a former Rockstar employee saying, “It’s been nearly a decade since I parted from Rockstar, but I can assure you that during the GTA IV era, it was like working with a gun to your head 7 days a week. “Be here Saturday & Sunday too, just in case Sam or Dan come in, they want to see everyone working as hard as them.”
Don’t get me wrong, Zelnick is correct in his defense of the industry from outside forces, but don’t for a second think he is doing it because he truly cares about the people who work under him. Easy points are easy points, and even a broken clock is right twice a day.
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