EA: The Human Story

I used to work at EA and started there when it was a different company, we got bonus for a job well done and comp time. I was there when they crossed over to a billion in sales. It was a glorious time but then things changes. The place became very management heavy, and the OT started to crank.
I was 40 years old and sleeping under my desk to final a game. Shortly after I quit I have never looked back, some call the org, the evil empire...at times thats not to far from the truth.
I am glad for the op and the credits, but I'm very glad to have my life back.

Many senior artists and programmers are leaving as we speak....

I am a senior artist looking to leave.


All true all true

Bungie is owned by Microsoft. Don't give up the dream!

Curent EA employees,
have you heard anything official from your company? I can't imagine they don't know about these blogs and can't beleive they haven't tried to send an email or meetings explaining their position. I would be extremely upset if I worked there and after 2-3 weeks there hadn't been any explenation or viewpoint offered up by the senior staff/CEO's on how they want to correct some of these issues and truly make it "the number one people company". Do they want art unions, and programming unions?

spz

Wow, I've never heard anything like this before - what the heck happened to the american spirit, creative thinking and inginuity? In reading through the comments to this article, I keep running across the same term 'White Collar Slavery', but this term is an oxymoron, an impossibility. You cannot be a slave unless you are being forced to work. An average salary for a programmer (according to salary.com for a level III programmer (videogame programmers aren't crappy)) in playa del rey (right next to ea) is 77k/year. You can get a car for $5000 instead of the new lexus, and probably get your total expenses down to 30k/year - a lot of families live on that, which leaves you w/ 40k/year. Take that, throw it in the bank, and you have at least six months to start your own company. If your entire team is doing this, they're all probably unhappy - odds are if they were a good team for EA, they'll be a good core for a small software dev company. The whole idea that 20 people can't start a game company is bull. Scaled composites put a _GUY_ _IN_ _SPACE_ with 25 people.

Have some pluck, have some balls, and quit, start your own company, change jobs, change fields, get your self fired so you get unemployment, do something. A friend of mine put it best: 'You can't rape the willing.' - if it's too much to bear: quit. If it's not, shut up and deal with it, you make a boatload of money, and there are plenty of other options. No one is MAKING you work at EA. No one is MAKING you work for ANYONE. This is america, dammit. If you can't find an employer to suit you, become your own damn employer.

Lollygaggers.

IIRC, a lot of these companies operate in CA, where the price of living is SKY HIGH. That $77K doesn't go far at all here in sunny SoCal. If you want a house instead of a dinky apartment (and believe me, I'm paying $1,400 a month for a plain little two-bedroom in a dead-ordinary rundown suburb, I'm NOT talking Hollywood) you're completely fucked unless you make six digits. Which is why we're moving out of state soon. But if you're in the local game industry, there's nowhere to go. :/

Wow! I am a an artist who is starting to lose my chops because for years I've applied for jobs with these games and they refuse to even talk to me. So for me this seems like poetic justice. They will eventually get theirs, but you guys are going to have to create some kind of solidarity. You need a union.

Why is that this board is so infested with socialist, marxist and other left-wing extremists hell bent on "unions" and "sticking it to the man." These repeated calls to arms by liberal extremists have really turned me away from what was initially a very noble cause. It simply confirms what I've suspected, that Unions are a hallmark of socialist theorists, neo-Marxist "economists" and other left wing extremists. I'm just waiting for the post from the "Dean Nation" calling all their left leaning brothers together. Unions have a very checkered past and it sickens that individuals are exploiting workers concerns to promote a political agenda.

Unions won't work in the video game business, and if it does, all be damned if it's carried under the banner of the left leaning hucksters that keep posting. Keep the political agendas at home, shut the fuck up, you're ruining the cause.

How typical to exploit real concerns to promote political agendas. Keep it the fuck away, concentrate on the issues and stop beating us over the head with "unionize" bullshit. It's not the 1940's. I don't want fucking "Red" teamsters slapping each other other the back. We're developers not Richard Gere sympathizers you pathetic fuck.

Someones been listening to too much Rush Limbaugh.

Sounds like a CEO and a gagle of managers need an invitation to an Iraqi beheading party.....I'll grab the bucket....
Maybe on a highway somewhere, a shot could go off. If it hits one, who's gonna give a sh*t????

Hey, the military is hiring..... they'll be needing some fresh fodder for the new year..
They don't pay what the "game industry" does, but hey, you get to shoot people, right? Just think of them as former managers.... hell, why go to Iraq to do it... Do it NOW, while they don't expect it. I mean it. We've got to start assasinating these assholes. They don't deserve to be on our planet. Don't be a pussy, kill a manager for mom......

The cops and firemen have unions.... airline pilots. Even doctors have 'em... Are they a bunch of commies... Well, ok, but they've still got unions, and make more than your average putz. Especially the quacks..

if you think his experience was bad, try life as a tester.. EA calls it "Quality Assurance". i was a member of QA for over a year, and we suffered just as much, if not more. at least he was on salary and got benefits. we got squat, and had to work way longer hours than anybody in production. our crunch time never stopped. if you were in production, you usually worked on a particular title, like say NASCAR Thunder or Madden. when that gamed shipped, your job slowed down for a month or two, then production slowly ramped back up to crunch times again. if you worked in QA, you had a crunch time every other week, as tester work on multiple titles throughout the year, as it is common for EA to have one studio test, and one studio build. the studio i worked for, Tiburon, only had 3-4 official titles per season, but we tested for several other studios. so basically you could come off of the crunch of one title, only to be tossed directly into crunch time on another. you can argue that hourly paid employees get overtime, but that doesn't mean squat after taxes. we worked for $8 an hour, with time and a half for overtime. i remember a few 17 hour or more days,with plenty of days exceeding 10hours and when i got my check, the taxes ate most of it away... that and $20 games were all we got, oh and that great credit on a title if you managed to meet the requirements for being on that, which meant you had to work on the title for at least a month to even be listed... no benefits or company vacations for us.
QA is the real EA sweatshop.
the make you sign away your rights when you start working there, and give you the false idea that maybe if you kiss enough butt, you might be considered for some lowly production job, even though everyone i worked with had graduated from colleges with related degrees that should have put them in production, but the real truth is that if you work as a tester, you'll almost never make it to production, because if you're any good they just want to keep you there.
and god forbid you speak out against your superiors. that's a sure fire way to get canned. if you're not prepared to be a yesman that kisses your supervisors butt 24hrs a day, don't apply at EA.
they made us sign a paper that basically gave them the right to fire us whenever they want for whatever reason. this came after several of my friends slaved away for years as testers (which are all temporary employees except for the supervisors "leads"), to get that full time status, only to have that goal shattered by a piece of paper.
the turnover rate for testers is far higher than that of production. EA will say that that's because it's cheap labor and they have to, b/c testers are usually college students and are "seasonal". this is only true for about 10-15 percent of the QA staff, as everyone who manages to get past their 3 stage interview process wants to keep their job, especially after working 80 hour weeks.

Hmmm...on the games I have worked on for EA, dev has always been around long after test went home...and I have worked FAR more hours as a programmer than I ever did as a tester.

Since when does merely having any kind of degree mean you deserve to be "put" anywhere?

I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but EVERYONE pays taxes.

Seasonal or not...that's not the point. It's nearly completely unskilled labor. It doesn't require anything more than a high school diploma, no matter how many of your fellow testers had degrees.

The overtime sucks, but at least you got overtime for it. You found the workload and conditions sucked, you didn't like it, and you quit. I would recommend the same to anyone that feels that way.

If you really are a "struggling digital media artist" and you're any good, why bother getting a job as a tester at all? Why not just apply on your artistic merit?

if you think his experience was bad, try life as a tester.. EA calls it "Quality Assurance". i was a member of QA for over a year, and we suffered just as much, if not more. at least he was on salary and got benefits. we got squat, and had to work way longer hours than anybody in production. our crunch time never stopped. if you were in production, you usually worked on a particular title, like say NASCAR Thunder or Madden. when that gamed shipped, your job slowed down for a month or two, then production slowly ramped back up to crunch times again. if you worked in QA, you had a crunch time every other week, as tester work on multiple titles throughout the year, as it is common for EA to have one studio test, and one studio build. the studio i worked for, Tiburon, only had 3-4 official titles per season, but we tested for several other studios. so basically you could come off of the crunch of one title, only to be tossed directly into crunch time on another. you can argue that hourly paid employees get overtime, but that doesn't mean squat after taxes. we worked for $8 an hour, with time and a half for overtime. i remember a few 17 hour or more days,with plenty of days exceeding 10hours and when i got my check, the taxes ate most of it away... that and $20 games were all we got, oh and that great credit on a title if you managed to meet the requirements for being on that, which meant you had to work on the title for at least a month to even be listed... no benefits or company vacations for us.
QA is the real EA sweatshop.
the make you sign away your rights when you start working there, and give you the false idea that maybe if you kiss enough butt, you might be considered for some lowly production job, even though everyone i worked with had graduated from colleges with related degrees that should have put them in production, but the real truth is that if you work as a tester, you'll almost never make it to production, because if you're any good they just want to keep you there.
and god forbid you speak out against your superiors. that's a sure fire way to get canned. if you're not prepared to be a yesman that kisses your supervisors butt 24hrs a day, don't apply at EA.
they made us sign a paper that basically gave them the right to fire us whenever they want for whatever reason. this came after several of my friends slaved away for years as testers (which are all temporary employees except for the supervisors "leads"), to get that full time status, only to have that goal shattered by a piece of paper.
the turnover rate for testers is far higher than that of production. EA will say that that's because it's cheap labor and they have to, b/c testers are usually college students and are "seasonal". this is only true for about 10-15 percent of the QA staff, as everyone who manages to get past their 3 stage interview process wants to keep their job, especially after working 80 hour weeks.

BUG: Post is posted twice. Posts should be posted only once.

-Tester

I totally understand what you are going through, I dated someone in the gaming business and he had to take on those same kinds of issues, Even me, who is in a differnt business completely have to deal with simmilar problems, except I get paid overtime, but thats only because the company went through lay-offs to prepare for more "money-wise" situations. So instead of having a decent amount of people getting no overtime, we have too little people who get to be overworked and with a minimal amount of overtime, yay! And because the corporation I work with is so large they send out newsletters from the high up CEOs and such, and the main company controller actually said that since we should expect to never see a decent raise ever again, and no company perks or bonuses or 'thank you's for the hard work employees put it (direct quote) "We should just be happy that we aren't unemployed"..... Yeah, what kind of person with five differnt houses go and tell people who actually have to go into the office seven days a week ten to twelve hour shifts that hey.... you could just not have a job. Now thats respect for making someone millions.

Well, it's no use going to a place like 60 minutes or, especially cnbc... They get a bundle of advertising dollars from this place, and that lap dog surely won't bite a big hand that feeds it.
Time to understand that the u.s. gov isn't going to help either. Uncle Sam has changed, almost like one of the games they create, into our big brother. It's time for U S citizens to arm up and prepare for the coming police state. It won't be a long wait, I promise....
Good luck suckers, I'm shootin' my way out of here when I have to, until they get me.

Why do you losers stay there? I just don't get it. For the "prestige"? There is none, face it! You're losers, and should quit being pussies. Bitch slap your supervisors, and tell them all to go fuck themselves. It'll feel great when you look at yourself in the mirror the next time.

That's constructive. Have you had to pay a mortgage? Have you been unemployed for 6 months or longer? Have you watched your kids go hungry or struggle to pay the utilities while you slave away at some pissant job just to try and keep from going homeless?

Try living in reality.

ELECTRONIC ARTS

1450 FASHION ISLAND BLVD.
SAN MATEO, CA 94404
TEL 415 571 7171


[LOGO]


September 9, 1998


Rusty Rueff
181-12 Turn of River Road
Stamford, CT 06905


Dear Rusty:

I am pleased to offer you a regular full-time position as Senior Vice President
Human Resources reporting to me. Your annual base salary will be $240,000 with a
50% target bonus. The bonus will be guaranteed at 100% of target in the fiscal
year ending March 31, 1999, and 75% of target in the fiscal year ending March
31, 2000.

I will recommend to the Board of Directors that you be granted a Non-qualified
Option to purchase 70,000 shares of Electronic Arts common stock in accordance
with our Stock Option Plan. This grant will vest at a rate of 2% per month over
a 50 month period commencing with your hire date. Your unvested equity position
will be reviewed on an annual basis in conjunction with the EA executive stock
option program.

Electronic Arts will provide you with a $2,500 per month (net of taxes) housing
allowance for a three-year period. We agree to pay the difference between your
acquisition cost and the sale price on your property at 181-12 Turn of River
Road if the selling price is less than the initial purchase price of $612,500.
In addition, Electonic Arts will be responsible for all normal and reasonable
relocation costs associated with moving to Northern California.

Your employment with Electronic Arts is for an indefinite term. In other words,
the employment relationship is "at will" and you have the right to terminate
that employment relationship at any time. Also, although I hope that you will
remain with us and be successful here, Electronic Arts must, and does retain the
right to terminate the employment relationship at any time. Should you be
terminated without cause prior to March 31, 2000, you will receive one year's
salary plus bonus as severence.

This offer assumes that you have the legal right to work in the United States
and can submit appropriate proof. If you accept the offer, please so indicate by
signing this letter where indicated and returning it to my attention.

Electronic Arts' mission is to make fun software for consumers and to help
interactive entertainment become a part of everyday life. To play a leading role
in this new industry, EA needs a dedicated team of pioneers with vision, a
passion for quality, a willingness to innovate and a desire to achieve great
things while vigilantly maintaining our integrity. I would be delighted to have
you join us.

Sincerely,

/s/ Larry Probst

Larry Probst
Chaiman & CEO
Electronic Arts


Accepted: /s/ Rusty Rueff
--------------------

Date: 9/18/98
-------------------------





September 17, 1998


Rusty Rueff
181-12 Turn of River Road
Stamford, CT 06905


Dear Rusty:

This will confirm our discussion on Tuesday, September 15. EA will provide you
with a one-time $50,000 (gross) signing bonus to help offset the expected loss
on improvements made to your current residence, and the temporary loss of income
you will experience in conjunction with Patti's resignation from Pepsi.

We also agree to extend vesting on your stock option grant for a period of six
months if you are terminated without cause prior to March 31, 2000.

EA agrees to provide a relocation program similar to the Frito-Lay plan with the
exception that we will not be responsible for any loan points nor will we
provide one month's salary in conjunction with your move to Northern California.

I am thrilled that you have decided to join Electronic Arts, and very much look
forward to working with you. Would you please acknowledge acceptance of the
offer by signing in the space below and returning to my attention at your
earliest convenience. Thank you.


Sincerely,

/s/ Larry Probst
Larry Probst
Chairman & CEO


Accepted: ___________________________________________

Date: _______________________________________________

(http://contracts.onecle.com/ea/rueff.emp.1998.09.09.shtml)

Bear in mind that this is a little over six years old... so that means he's making alot more than he was at this point, and has accumulated a great deal of wealth because of all of the benefits outlined in the contract.

So here is a question: What does someone making that much money, with those exorbitant benefits need a $2,500 per month housing allowance for???

I mean really.