This might be my most stupid question yet, but what the hell:

I’m reading about the GTA VI leaks on Wikipedia, and it talks about the various impacts the leaks had, one of which was low morale amongst the developers. Why is that? The response from the internet to the GTA VI leaks in particular seemed to be positive and caused renewed excitement in the game. Everyone [seemingly] understood that it was early, non-final work, but were nevertheless impressed/excited, as far as I could tell anyway 🤷‍ Besides, it’s GTA, it’s not like they’re gonna break much new ground in terms of gameplay mechanics that need to be kept secret. Things were more or less set in stone in that regard in GTA III.

Why so sad?

  • slazer2au@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    Because people on the internet are assholes. Imagine working 60 hours a week on a game that you can’t talk about because of your employment NDA and some chucklefuck leaks your work in progress and complains that it looks shit and doesn’t work despite it is still in progress.

    Then those dickheads start harassing employees saying their work is shit, and in some cases should die of embarrassment.

  • scarabic@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago
    1. If people liked what they saw, this steals thunder from the actual release. All it will do it set expectations higher, and some people will inevitably say “a leak showed the game was working 8 months ago - why is it taking so long to release?”

    2. If people don’t like what they see it is an unfair judgment of the work and that’s disheartening

    3. These people live under confidentiality agreements and don’t tell their friends or sometime even family anything about their work. Seeing some jackass leak everything invalidates all that effort and sacrifice. I would not be surprised if the company cracks down on everybody, making their lives even harder, because they don’t know where the leak came from therefore everyone is suspect

  • Romkslrqusz@lemmy.zip
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    3 days ago

    Ever had someone looking over your shoulder providing feedback to something that you’re in the middle of writing the first draft of?

    • Aeao@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      I engraved leather stuff we made with a laser.

      Whenever a customer was commenting on white I was typing WHILE I was typing it… I’d swivel the screen away from them so they couldn’t see it until I was done writing.

      It’s like “yes I know I misspelled that word… you just verbally told me a paragraph of text I’m writing quickly before I forget it. I’ll fix the spelling and formatting after… just wait. Before I engrave I’ll show you for approval”

    • ruekk@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      Your point? Management already does this constantly. What’s wrong with your actual customer and user base doing it too?

      • BussyCat@lemmy.world
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        3 days ago

        It’s not done and it’s annoying. Logically speaking management knows what you are working on so if you are working on a 25% complete deliverable they have a reasonable expectation what that should look like. When management doesn’t do that it’s also annoying.

  • it_depends_man@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    Besides, it’s GTA, it’s not like they’re gonna break much new ground in terms of gameplay mechanics that need to be kept secret.

    Why Would You Say Something So Controversial Yet So Brave?


    Honestly, I think it’s relatively simple: eeeeveryone and their dog signs an NDA. The people working on it are excited and have to bite their tongue every. single. day. and they are waiting for the release where they can just talk about it.

    Then some douche with access leaks it and so all that effort goes to waste, and they still can’t talk about it, because that would make things worse. Also, if someone says something negative, they can’t show the positive and defend their work.

  • paultimate14@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    My assumption has always been that this is just the usual made-up corporate nonsense that comes from management and marketing departments, to try to turn public opinion against leakers.

    My guess is that most of the humans actually creating the game don’t have strong opinions. Marketing teams probably care because it disrupts their plans. Management of course cares because it could impact sales. And with big dev teams with dozens or hundreds of people working on a game there will never be a consensus opinion. Maybe some would be upset that people get to see placeholder work or rough drafts, but only a fool would look at a leaked game and judge the individuals who made it based on that. Heck, even when games are officially released in functionally unfinished states I think most fans these days know to blame management and ownership rather than the workers.

    I don’t remember ever seeing an actual dev talking about leaks much. Even content creators that are former devs. Absense of evidence is not evidence of a sense of course, but like… If I apply that to my own work I don’t think I would really care.

  • cuboc@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    I am not a game developer, but I imagine that getting loads of online flak on projects that are not quite finished yet can be very demoralizeng.

    I do develop other stuff and do not do sneak peeks anymore.