Ending crunch in the development of games has been a focus industry-wide. Crunch is when a company forces employees to work longer hours and extra days to get a game made by a particular date. This pressure on the employees causes mental health issues and a strain on their home life. So when a company states they will be implementing crunch, it grabs everyone’s attention.
Cyberpunk 2077 developer CD Projekt Red announced they will be mandating all employees to work on Saturdays to get the game done in time for the November 19th release. This is even more poignant due to the company stating in an interview with Jason Schreier of then Kotaku that they would “avoid mandatory crunch”.
“Starting today, the entire studio is in overdrive. I take it upon myself to receive the full backlash for the decision. I know this is in direct opposition to what we’ve said about crunch. It’s also in direct opposition to what I personally grew to believe a while back – that crunch should never be the answer. But we’ve extended all other possible means of navigating the situation.”
Adam Badowski, CD Projekt Studio Head
Crunch continues to be a hot topic in the game industry as many seek to unionize. Cyberpunk, much like Red Dead Redemption 2 will now be used as an example of companies miss using their employees.
Sources: Bloomberg, Den of Geeks, Polygon
Geek Freaks Network 
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