When Cyberpunk 2077 developer CD Projekt laid off 100 staff in the summertime, some employees mentioned sufficient was sufficient. Sick of the stress and nervousness brought on by the spectre of job cuts, the employees got down to kind a union. It was a giant concept with small beginnings that has the potential to develop past the confines of CD Projekt’s Warsaw headquarters to grow to be Poland’s sport developer union, providing a house to all with a sound contract within the nation.
For this small group of CD Projekt builders, the sky’s the restrict, and they’re galvanised by comparable efforts the world over. Związek Pracowników Branży Gier, or Polish Gamedev Staff Union, is part of a rising labor motion inside the unstable online game trade that goals to mitigate a few of its worst options: crunch, poor pay, and the fear that comes from the thought that you would be out of a job any time, any day.
I’ve been within the trenches in 2019 and 2020. I’ve seen the fires in Jupiter burning.
Paula Mackiewicz-Armstrong has labored at CD Projekt for 5 years on just about all the things as a linguistic QA (high quality assurance) coordinator. “I’ve been within the trenches in 2019 and 2020,” Mackiewicz-Armstrong tells IGN in a video name. “I’ve seen the fires in Jupiter burning.”
CD Projekt was closely criticized for the human value of Cyberpunk 2077, with obligatory crunch within the run as much as the sci-fi sport’s disastrous 2020 launch. This got here after CD Projekt had promised its staff they wouldn’t be pressured to crunch on the sport. For the not too long ago launched enlargement Phantom Liberty, nonetheless, enhancements had been made. Workers say the stability between work and life has realigned. “The circumstances and the tradition have been bettering,” Mackiewicz-Armstrong says. “And sure, I’m completely satisfied that CDPR is dedicated to these enhancements, but it surely’s nonetheless not good.”
Extra time is voluntary, however the employees say it’s arduous to keep away from sure pressures to take it on. There’s, after all, monetary stress to earn extra cash which means generally it’s simply unattainable to go up additional time, particularly amid a price of residing disaster. Different pressures are extra refined. Some employees really feel the stress of accountability to part of a sport they’re engaged on, to one another, and to their crew. “There’s no form of direct peer stress or something like that, however there may be this vibe of, time is brief, we have to ship, proper?” Mackiewicz-Armstrong says.
Tolly Kulczycki is developing on two years at CD Projekt, and is at the moment a technical QA analyst engaged on Polaris, aka the subsequent sport in The Witcher collection. “You are feeling stress, accountability in your a part of your sport and also you need to be there for it,” Kulczycki says. “The trade, fueled by ardour, finally burns out its individuals. And that is an unlucky reality that we now have to face and battle, and no higher strategy to battle it than collectively.”
“It is not like there wasn’t any additional time on Phantom Liberty,” Mackiewicz-Armstrong explains. “There have been some groups, for instance QA, which have been extra taxed by way of additional time. However general it has been more healthy. There weren’t circumstances like, ‘okay guys, no holidays for the subsequent six months,’ and that form of stuff. So I feel issues have improved and the corporate has seen the profit within the workforce and within the product.”
The Phantom Liberty enlargement is seen as a giant success, because the triumphant ultimate footnote on essentially the most dramatic turnaround in online game historical past. CD Projekt’s fame was within the gutter following Cyberpunk 2077’s launch almost three years in the past now. The sci-fi journey starring Keanu Reeves as insurgent rocker Johnny Silverhand was so dangerous that Sony delisted it from the PlayStation Retailer. Refunds had been provided, lawsuits had been filed, and CD Projekt, which may do no incorrect after The Witcher 3’s launch, grew to become public enemy primary in a single day.
Slowly however certainly, CD Projekt improved the sport. Then an outstanding Netflix anime rekindled curiosity in all issues Cyberpunk. And this 12 months, the two.0 replace sealed the deal. The Phantom Liberty enlargement that adopted bought three million copies in per week. It’s loved vital and industrial success, and, crucially, was in-built a more healthy method than Cyberpunk 2077 was.
CD Projekt employees are actually pointing to the reception to Phantom Liberty as proof {that a} more healthy, happier workforce makes higher, extra worthwhile merchandise. “We firmly consider that the success of Phantom Liberty, that could be very a lot seen to individuals, is partially because of the anti-crunch insurance policies which have been enacted in CDPR,” Kulczycki says. “We wish video games to be higher, and which means we wish staff to be handled higher.”
CD Projekt’s deep cuts
With working circumstances bettering, why unionise? The spark got here in the summertime with CD Projekt’s deep cuts, or, as administration put it on the time, the “alignment of the dimensions and measurement of the crew with the necessities of ongoing tasks and the CD Projekt Group technique”. The layoffs affected these in growth, publishing, and back-office groups, and are anticipated to conclude within the first quarter of 2024. However they weren’t remoted.
In Might CD Projekt introduced it might lay off round 30 staff by the tip of 2023 as growth on Gwent: The Witcher Card Recreation got here to an finish. And that announcement got here after two different waves of layoffs. The Molasses Flood, which is owned by CD Projekt and at the moment growing the troubled Venture Sirius Witcher sport, noticed 29 crew members laid off earlier in Might. CD Projekt additionally introduced the closure of The Witcher: Monster Slayer in December final 12 months, with layoffs at developer Spokko because of this.
Whereas 2023 has seen the discharge of some spectacularly profitable video games (Hogwarts Legacy, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Baldur’s Gate 3, Phantom Liberty and many others), it’s additionally seen equally dramatic layoffs end in hundreds of sport builders dropping their jobs. In line with technical artist Farhan Noor, who has tracked layoff numbers because the starting of 2023 on videogameslayoffs.com, an eye-watering 6,400 gaming jobs have been misplaced up to now this 12 months. Over 100 had been from CD Projekt.
The layoffs have lastly reached Poland, proper?
“The layoffs have lastly reached Poland, proper?” Mackiewicz-Armstrong says. “We have had three waves of layoffs in CD Projekt, and we determined that that is the time to ascertain an organisation that will probably be legally protected and that can be capable of be a constructive affect by way of job stability and supply extra strong protections for staff.”
Kulczycki factors to the uncertainty that has come to dominate the ideas of CD Projekt’s staff, in addition to communication points when it got here to who was chosen to lose their job. The nervousness that comes from not realizing should you’re subsequent, or why an in depth colleague was axed, is exhausting. “When you could have an individual near you who you’ve got labored with for a very long time, otherwise you mentored, or any form of case like that the place you realize their potential and know their significance to the corporate and to the video games you are making, and also you see them laid off and you’ll’t discover these solutions as to why, the cracks start to indicate actually shortly,” Kulczycki says.
Gameplay QA analyst and union co-founder Paweł Myszka has labored at CD Projekt for over two years now, and tells IGN that communication, or an absence of it, was one of many largest elements within the want to unionize. Polish legislation offers union representatives entry to data on an organization’s employment construction in addition to plans for that construction. Simply realizing what’s occurring, even when what’s occurring could be very dangerous certainly, might help alleviate stress.
“I’ve a mortgage and lots of people in gaming are middle-aged,” Mackiewicz-Armstrong says. “They’ve households, they want stability of their lives to simply exist. So having the spectre of layoffs over you is sort of worrying. Or if you’re youthful and also you’re simply beginning within the trade, you then need to have an opportunity to ascertain your self, show that you are a good employee. And lots of people which have been laid off had been employed pretty not too long ago, months or a 12 months, they usually simply utterly misplaced that probability.”
![The Phantom Liberty expansion sold over three million copies in a week.](https://sm.ign.com/ign_in/photo/s/stressed-o/stressed-out-by-mass-layoffs-cd-projekt-staff-have-finally-s_ezhr.jpg)
However what, finally, can unionising do to forestall you from dropping your job within the online game trade? Mackiewicz-Armstrong and co know they can not cease CD Projekt or every other firm from making layoffs in the event that they actually need to, however, as a part of a union, they are often extra concerned within the course of and in negotiations, and profit from professional recommendation and a assist community. The Polish Gamedev Staff Union is definitely part of a bigger commerce union known as OZZ Inicjatywa Pracownicza, or Polish Commerce Union Staff Initiative, which presents essential authorized assist. There’s a hope that subsequent time, if there’s a subsequent time, CD Projekt will assume twice as a result of it must cope with a union and all that comes with it.
‘We’re in uncharted waters’
So what’s subsequent? A contract, however this has proved a stumbling block amid a lot of the online game trade’s unionisation effort throughout the globe. It’s all very properly being part of a union, however a legally binding contract between employer and union that units out working circumstances, pay construction, and severance pointers for members is the holy grail.
The Polish Gamedev Staff Union has but to get that far — it’s simply a few months outdated — however a contract could be very a lot on the minds of its members. The union is rising quick, its members say, with staff from different Polish studios set to hitch the fold within the coming months. Within the shorter time period, the Polish Gamedev Staff Union needs recognition from CD Projekt. In line with Myszka, a dialogue has began, though the corporate has but to formally recognise the union. “We’re working to get ourselves established and acknowledged by firm management,” Myszka mentioned. “We hope for coordination and a partnership on this regard.”
In an announcement to IGN, CD Projekt mentioned it’s going to “act in accordance with legislation and adjust to authorized obligations that may come up from that state of affairs”, and pointed to what are known as RED Workforce Representatives (RTRs), a democratically elected physique representing all staff and unbiased of the administration board. “Now we have been working with them for over two years now and we are going to proceed to take action to maintain our work surroundings clear, protected and wholesome,” CD Projekt mentioned.
With RTRs already in place, is a union wanted at CD Projekt? Completely, the employees say. These RTRs are “restricted of their scope”, Mackiewicz-Armstrong explains. “They’re an advisory physique to the board that has been established by the employer in an effort to give voice and so forth, however none of their selections or suggestions are legally binding in any method. It is all advisory, it is all on the discretion of the board or the administration.
“We do not really feel that is sufficient. It is a fantastic initiative, it truly is. However a union is an out of doors physique that’s not depending on the board, doesn’t reply to them, and offers protections and help that’s enshrined in legislation and never simply inner firm procedures.”
We’re in uncharted waters, something can occur.
Regardless of the deep cuts at CD Projekt during the last 12 months, the corporate is engaged on a protracted record of tasks, a lot of that are anticipated to be big-budget, triple-A affairs. CD Projekt is engaged on a remake of the primary Witcher sport, its first authentic IP (Venture Hadar), a Cyberpunk sequel (Venture Orion), the primary sport in a brand new trilogy set in The Witcher universe (the aforementioned Venture Polaris), and a multiplayer Witcher sport (Venture Sirius). That’s an enormous quantity of growth work that’ll take years to finish, assuming all these tasks do attain completion.
So that you’d assume CD Projekt would wish all the assistance it may possibly get, with layoffs hopefully a distant reminiscence. “I’ve a sense that they will not occur once more, that that is the tip in CDPR at the least, however I additionally wasn’t excited about them in January,” Kulczycki admits. “I’ve that behind my thoughts, that I did not anticipate this wave of layoffs earlier than it occurred, and that you just actually cannot anticipate them earlier than they occur. And there is a sense of this being a wave all through the trade.”
“We’re in uncharted waters,” Mackiewicz-Armstrong says, “something can occur.”
Wesley is the UK Information Editor for IGN. Discover him on Twitter at @wyp100. You possibly can attain Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.