Update: Shortly after publishing the original article, The Guardian published an interesting interview with Rockstar North's Rob Nelson, who admitted that the studio had work to do when it comes to working conditions, but who also defended the company.
When asked about how they manage their staff, Nelson replied: "As best we can, and it's something that we're always striving to get better at. We're growing as fast as we can, and we're structuring our departments based on need, because we don't want people working too hard.
"Do people work hard and is there overtime and extra effort put in? Yes, there is. Is it something we want happening regularly for long periods of time or as an accepted part of our process or as a 'badge of honour' thing? No, it is not. We are always trying to improve how we are working and balance what we are making with how we make it and we will not stop working to improve in this area."
Apparently, The Guardian was shown documents showing the number of hours logged by staff at the studio, and none were anywhere near the 100-hour-weeks that kicked off this whole debate. Indeed, the average working week this year has been between 42.4 and 45.8 hours.
Original: Rockstar has come under fire these past few days following statements made by Dan Houser, who said that there were periods when his team worked 100-hour weeks on Red Dead Redemption 2. His thoughts provoked a negative reaction both from the community and from fellow developers. Houser then clarified his comments, but we've also heard from former employees, including Job J Stauffer (who worked on Grand Theft Auto IV), describing unsustainable working conditions.
In defence of the company, however, comes people like Rockstar San Diego's Vivianne Langdon, who has published a post on Twitter offering her experience at the company, during which she describes more reasonable amounts of (paid) overtime, and a supportive work environment. The tools programmer certainly tells a different side to the story, and Langdon makes a point of saying:
"R* has granted permission for us to speak frankly about this issue on social media. I want to stress that this is is my uncurated personal opinion, I am not being compensated for this post in any way and am making it voluntarily. I'm only going to speak to my personal experience."
There are other positive reports doing the rounds, such as this one by Phil Beveridge on Twitter, and they paint a picture contrary to the one that Houser inadvertently offered during his interview. Having said all that, we also can't imagine many current employees coming out against the company in such a public manner, so it'll be interesting to see if we hear any more off the record reports from current staff.
Thanks, Segmentnext.