Please tell me it isn’t this bad, @AndyB.
This is why game companies won’t let game developers interact with the community, you know.
I came away from that with a different opinion. Dude was fine till the hyper critical boss showed up, that was the pressure that broke him.
When I watched the first one of the series my first thought was, “funcom”?
Yes, I have to agree. Classic case of an executive acting like “Mr. Bigshot” feeling the need to throw his weight around and control thing while not actually giving any clear instructions, only threats and intimidation. Then when things, unsurprisingly, go wrong he will be the first one to point fingers and place blame (never at himself of course).
In quantum, its call the observer effect.
Like light?
I sometimes struggle to distinguish when someone is being serious and when they’re making a very subtle joke. This is one of those times.
Please tell me it was a joke.
Dude wasn’t going to be fine even without the boss, but not because “Ha-ha, all devs are neurodivergent, isn’t that hilarious?”
If you’re going to be fielding questions and you know them beforehand, like in the premise of this video, then what you do is let the person responsible for answering those questions review them and prepare to answer them.
Alternately, you answer them in a pre-recorded video that you can do as many takes and as much editing as you need.
What you definitely don’t do is spring those question on them while doing a live stream.
It is pretty much a setup for failure when you pre-screen the questions, bring in an employee to represent your company and then do not bother to inform them of any of the aforementioned questions are or what they entail. Then to add on top of that the etreamly high pressures of a live stream where hundreds if not thousands of people will nit-pick every word you say, or deliberately misinterpreted it to further their own agenda. But the mega agro “dude-bro” boss making threats before it even started sealed the deal crushing any slim hope of salvaging something from what was ultimately a doomed situation to begin with.
Mmm, a lot depends on the person being interviewed I think. Some can handle such questioning really well even if it’s not something they do all the time. Others, not so much.
What is universally true though is having the boss standing there watching you like a hawk and giving weird, unclear prompts all but guarantees the interview will not go well regardless of who is sitting in the chair. You’re right about that. It adds a lot of undue pressure to give the correct response rather than the honest or right response, if that makes sense.
My cousin ,who is a senior programmer at google for some years now is one one the people with best socials skills I know. This is a caricature of the idea people have about developers, not an actual thing!
It kinda was, and kinda wasn’t. I sort of wanted people to think about what I could’ve meant with an intentionally short and vague statement.
Obviously, the part that was a joke was the implication that developers are human wrecks who aren’t capable of lucid communication. I actually dislike the depiction of the developer in this video because it plays with what I consider a harmful stereotype.
But what was not a joke was the idea that companies don’t want developers to interact because the corporate management wants to control the information shared with the community. Sending a developer into a livestream environment (or a live event such as conventions) without thorough preparation and grooming may result in awkward situations. That’s why the faces of game companies we tend to see (in addition to community managers, of course) are studio managers, CCOs and similar people.
I loved it when Privateer Press sent one of their digital sculptors as their representative in various game events and conventions. It showed the trust the company had towards their staff, and the guy was also an excellent ambassador for the company and their games. Sure, they had most likely briefed him beforehand what sort of teasers for the future he was allowed to tell, but at least he didn’t need a boss breathing down his neck while he was abroad.
Of course, the boss character in the video was a caricature too, but I’m afraid it’s somewhat closer to reality than the developer character was.
I wonder what we didn’t see when Andy had Nicole appear on camera to say hello to everyone during a livestream?
On the other hand, as a guy who did Live Local News, I’ve seen professional photojournalists, and even anchors, completely freeze up. It’s a lot of pressure. I remember my cameraman Ahmed after what I thought was a particularly good Live: “Hey man on the positive, not a lot of people were watching.”
It can be terrifying. Luckily, I’m not susceptible, but then again I’ve got a black heart. People who aren’t trained and experienced in this way should be nervous and should be completely freaked out. Therefore I personally saw it less of “Dev” and more of “Everyman.”
ETA:
When the Director yelled “Cut!” at the end of the cringeworthy piece to camera, it made me think the Dirt League gave themselves an escape hatch. This has all the feel of what we in the business call a “Look-Live,” where many, many takes are made. The Talent believes the first take was indeed Live, and any successive ones are for Editing. The piece is then cut and presented as Live. Local News does it a ton.
Just a little story. New independent station back in the antenna days
I was setting there watching 6PM news having supper. First time the lunch news anchor did the evening news. He didn’t look to good to start and when the camera zoomed in on him Vanished for a month then turned up on a Saturday morning kids poppet show hosting cartoons.
That guy had the same look just before he faded out.
It’s definitely “Σάτιρα”.
Between lies and truth, a boss or a manager, can be very devastating to an employee and make him-her feel fear. This is not a healthy cooperation however and it never leads to better productivity. If you have to press the employees, the least is to rise their moral and be there when they need you. Of course some extra money for their efforts is always welcome, it gives them a good boost and a way to stop the whine of their pair since they went home late.
Over the years, no matter the success, we have seen Sunday updates or holiday updates. We are not sure that these people actually got payed enough for their efforts, so the least is to give them gratitude for their effort.
But even if there are some devs with social issues or whatever else, i don’t believe that they are incompetent or disable to do the job, in the contrary they may be amazing to what they do, extremely charismatic.
So “Σάτιρα” is for people to laugh, by exaggerating situations and make them comical, nothing true, but with deep messages always!
True. I remember my first time on camera - I wish I didn’t, but this discussion brought the memories back to surface.
Several years later I had the pleasure of personally erasing those tapes.