Video game developer Naughty Dog is reportedly requiring employees to work mandatory overtime on its upcoming game, Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet, according to Bloomberg.
Naughty Dog is allegedly requiring developers working on its forthcoming title, Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet, to work mandatory overtime, according to a Bloomberg report.
According to the article, which cites studio employees, workers at the Santa Monica-based studio behind the massively popular Last of Us have been required to work at least eight additional hours but no more than 60 total hours per week. After completing their overtime, they are expected to log their extra hours in the company’s internal timesheet.
Bloomberg reports that the crunch is due to the company pushing staff to deliver a polished demo for review by its parent company, Sony.
This alleged overtime, which began in October, is also an attempt to get the production back on track after several missed deadlines.
The developers have also been asked to work from the office five days per week, whereas previously the requirement was a hybrid model with three days in the office and two at home. The surprise introduction of mandated overtime has left developers scrambling to arrange childcare and pet care.
As of now, Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet doesn’t have a public release date, but Bloomberg reports an internal target of mid-2027. Bloomberg’s report would also add that Naughty Dog’s mandated overtime would end this week and that it would return to regular working hours and its hybrid arrangement, with a more detailed schedule to follow.
While a brief period of crunch like this may not seem major in the grand scheme of things, it’s important to remember Naughty Dog’s history.
The developer has a notorious reputation for difficult crunch periods of development, as developers would note working on titles like Uncharted and The Last of Us. The studio would even go so far to hire developers willing to undergo crunch periods openly.
As the company entered its final months of development on The Last of Us II in 2020, it required staff to work through an intense crunch, with workers staying past 9pm to work on the game. As one Naughty Dog developer would go on to tell Kotaku, “This game is really good, but at a huge cost to the people.”
Controversy surrounding the company’s crunch periods became prominent enough that studio co-presidents Evan Wells and Neil Druckmann would address the issue with Game Informer in 2021.
After being asked by the interviewer about recent the companies controversies regarding crunch, Druckmann would go on to say, “Everybody has a different definition of what crunch means… for us, we think of it as, how do we look out for the well-being of our colleagues and everyone that works at Naughty Dog, which is some combination of how many hours you work and how much stress you’re feeling, whether that’s something that’s going on in the office or at home.”
That same year, Naughty Dog would hire a team of producers tasked explicitly with easing the company’s workload. However, it has since been reported by Bloomberg that many of those producers have left the company. It was also noted that some employees worked long hours to finish Intergalactic‘s first trailer, which would go on to debut at The Game Awards in 2024.
Given that Druckmann has gone on to call Intergalactic the company’s most “ambitious”, “expansive” “expensive” and game, it’s no surprise the company is yet again finding itself amidst yet another crunch period.
But as another developer told Kotaku in 2020, another crunch period will have a high cost for its staff.
“This can’t be something that’s continuing over and over for each game, because it is unsustainable,” shared one developer describing the working conditions on The Last of Us II. “At a certain point you realise, ‘I can’t keep doing this. I’m getting older. I can’t stay and work all night.’”
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