How is possible that games like ES6 and GTA VI are being developed with hundreds or thousands of people but they can still keep it a secret?
In: Technology
Hi there. Former information security expert here.
Sorry if someone already said it but I didnt read all the posts. Another strategy big organizations use is compartmentalizing information. So the team working on a part of the game will only have information relevant to their jobs. Not the big picture. The actual story elements or different parts of the game are only known by whoever is working on it. Then the leadership gets a regular briefing during meetings that consolidates all the data and him and his team of staffers provide direction then and intermittently as issues arise.
Lots of misinformation in here.. particularly about people working on parts of the game and only seeing that part. This is flat out false, most major studios have processes that output playable builds of the game several times a day for all developers on the project to playtest (at least during production which is almost the entire time). Everyone can see the progress on the game no matter what department they work in. It would be impossible to work efficiently with those limitations with all the interdependencies of the entire process.
I’ve only been in the industry a handful of years but it’s been my experience that lots of things do get out, just not to the general public. And nobody ever shares crazy high risk things like release dates or major plot reveals or anything. It’s more like if you have a large network of colleagues across a bunch of studios you might end up hearing some vague info about a work in progress or maybe the setting of a future release or something.
It’s just a privilege of being inside the industry, you tend to know more and learn about things before the average person and somehow most people are reasonable and don’t immediately spoil it because most of us are mature adults who respect others hard work.
You either leak info and suffer a ridiculously priced fine and lawsuit or shut up and keep your job. Its their NDA contract.
They go by the honor system and create personalized handshakes with one another so that if anything like that goes awry, that personalized handshake becomes legally dead and can no longer be used, resulting in a blemish on one’s soul.
Technically, things leak, but let’s say I work on a game and tell some stuff to my best friend, do you think he’s an idiot enough to put me in danger by bragging on some forum about what I told him ?
People also leak some info between developpers at the pre-TGS/pre-E3 party but these are people of the same world, so they know how to keep their mouths shut.
Another factor, is that PRECISELY because so many people work on those games, each person only knows a fragment of the game. I have friends in the industry and some of them work on 1- ONE – level of a game, or even a small part of it. I mean, if you’re a background designer, what are you going to leak ? “There are trees in the game” ? If you’re in charge of the particles effects, what are you going to leak ? That’s how fragmented work is, so not everyone of those hundreds of people has something interesting to tell.
Is there any chance GTA VI will be more like IV or San Andrea’s that it will be like GTA V?
I’m sure people will be mad at me, but I didn’t really like GTA V…
Secret? We’re talking about it here so how secret is it really?
There is not enough incentive to leak. Somebody might pay you half a months salary, but not really more than that. Or you’re just going to feel cool?
These are not good enough reasons to justify losing your job over.
I worked on lots of games. We kept secrets because, more than anything we wanted to, it’s the strong most secretive culture I’ve ever worked in. Sure there were NDA’s, worries of getting caught and not being able to get a gig when your publisher pulled your funding, fear that whomever was making the “other” FPS would “steal” your secrets and all of that, but in my opinion, it’s just a part of the culture and people want to be in the know.
I spent a while working at a company where I had access to a list of games and prospective release dates for the next two years. I knew and still know of dozens of unannounced games, and could have leaked the list for some profit.
I didn’t and still won’t leak it for two reasons:
1. I was under massive NDAs, would have been sued, and blackballed.
2. I like games and want them to be the best they are. Leaking it would have made those games much worse.
Latest Answers