Press Reset: Ruin and Recovery in the Video Game Industry

Fantastic reading. Felt like a documentary. It was so interesting learning about the horrors of the video game job industry, and how it impacts all the developers and workers. Fascinating stuff. One can only hope that the industry gets bette for the workers.

I didn’t enjoy this book as much as the author’s last one. It is definitely a good book that’s well written, thoroughly researched, and informative, but it’s somewhat depressing. It’s instructional, telling us about the pitfalls of video game development and its cost on human lives, which is important, but not fun. It’s not supposed to be fun, but I’ll be honest, while I am sympathetic to the plight of video game developers, I have been playing games for over 30 years and already know it.I don’t regret buying the book but hope that next time around the books focus more on making games, not destroying peoples lives.

I am working as an engineer in game industry for a decade. has been working in many companies with different cultures and high variety of projects from mobile games to consoles and VR.With that said, everything that I just finished reading in this book happened to my colleagues or friends whom are involving with the industry. I am the type of guy who can smell the disaster before that day comeswhen it's too late to jump out of the ship. but you can't be that guy when you have kinds and wife and those sort of responsibilities. You need to have job security and benefits and enough time to be with you family.As far as I know, having family and making video games are not that compatible.I hope someday our industry get better at treating their employees just like they care about their customers. developers don't have voice as much as gamers!This book was all on point for most parts but started to get radical on some subjects and totally missed some points to present the both side of stories at some points. but I understand why, first, those people didn't want to do interview and second reason, I think, it was to not get distracted from the message that this book carries.So it went little extreme and single dimensional in some of those reports. but at the end of the day, the point and the message is still valid.The book contains a lots of useful information for those who wants to open a game studio. It's more useful to learn about those failure stories rather than just following success stories. Few succeed in this industry just like any other art form like music or movies, most of the creators will fail and small "successful" percentage will attract the most number of customers. that's how human's brain work. no one to blame. We wired to pay attention to the best product in any type of list. producing an average product doesn't have any place in music, movie or game industry.

This is probably not a great book if you've worked in the gaming industry because you probably lived through similar horror stories. This is a great book if you're considering working in this industry. Not as a means to discourage you from doing so, but as an eye opener, a cautionary tale (many of them actually) to understand what is most likely to happen, how to prepare for it, and more importantly to force you to ask yourself if you're ready to tackle this. The book is well researched, well written, entertaining, and informative.This is also an excellent book to read if you're a gamer. I've read reviews where, unlike the previous book 'Blood, Sweat, and Pixels', some readers found it less interesting because it didn't cover juicy design details about their favorite games. This book isn't about the games. It's about the people, the sacrifices. Read it and appreciate all the hardships that occurred to bring your favorite titles to life. Only a few titles and studios are covered here, but these stories are pervasive across the industry.I loved the book, the audible narration was excellent, and I can't wait for the next one.

I found this to be an interesting, eye-opening read. Despite being an avid gamer growing up, I recently lost all my interest in games and don’t play them anymore. To me, it felt like many new games were homogenized and uninspired (so many forgettable post-apocalyptic/dystopian open-world shooters in recent years). AAA games, while polished and visually pleasing, often felt watered down for mass appeal and showed signs of being rushed, and were generally unsatisfying experiences for me. I wondered why it felt like billion dollar companies were taking shortcuts to churn out games that seemingly were intended as cash grabs.This book helps explain this to me, while also revealing some of the shady, yet common practices of the gaming industry and how it affects people’s lives. Each chapter on a different studio follows a similar formula which can get repetitive, but they occasionally intersect in neat ways.I enjoyed reading this, all in all. My actual rating is closer to a 4.5, but I’d still recommend it to anyone who’s willing to see that the video game industry isn’t what many people think it is.

Me llegó el libro con unas marcas de daño, no tiene cubierta de plastico que lo envuelva.La calidad del libro es regular, los materiales no me gustan del todo. Me recomendaron esta lectura, asi que lo estaré leyendo.

Well written. Entertaining despite me having no prior knowledge of the video game industry.

Quem leu o primeiro livro, sabe a veia investigativa que o Jason tem e o q ele traz à mesa sem medo de entrar em assuntos polêmicos ou expor grandes empresas de game (estou olhando pra vc, EA!!). Um livro de fácil leitura, em par com o primeiro em termos de qualidade e se você gosta de conhecer os bastidores de desenvolvimento de jogos, esse livro (e o primeiro!), precisa ler este livro.

It's not that it's a bad book per se, but it is uninterestingly written. Mr. Schreier's prior book, Blood, Swart and Pixels was a fascinating read, a page turner told with a proper nix of anecdotes, behind the scenes, interviews and the author's own discussions and thoughts.This book, in contrast, reads more like an article on Wikipedia, with a "he said, she said, then this happened"-formula running through it.It's not that the subject matter is mistreated, however the wit and personal discussions that so helped his last book is completely absent.A surprisingly poor read.

LETTURA CONSIGLIATA PER CHI VUOLE APPROFONDIRE LE DINAMICHE (E I CONFLITTI) DIETRO LO SVILUPPO DI UN VIDEOGIOCO:Jason Schreier è un giornalista di Bloomberg, da anni nota figura nel mondo videoludico, in particolare per le sue inchieste spesso rivelatrici.Dopo il suo libro Blood, Sweet and Pixels questa nuova pubblicazione porta nuovamente alla luce le difficoltà nello sviluppo dei videogiochi, ponendo l’attenzione sui conflitti tra sfera manageriale e ambiente di sviluppo (particolarmente interessanti i casi di EA e 2K).L’unica nota negativa riguarda i materiali usati, con una qualità della carta non buona e copertina non rigida.