Naughty Dog, one of Sony's most highly valued development studios, is pretty notorious for its crunch culture, with extended working hours the norm during certain periods of a game's production.
Crunch is a problem throughout the medium, but Naughty Dog is arguably one of the worst culprits, and that's because it's given up trying to avoid it.
That's according to Benson Russell, a former employee who worked on the Uncharted series and the original The Last of Us.
Speaking in an interview on KiwiTalkz, Russell discusses Naughty Dog's approach to crunch.
According to him, the studio's crunch culture snowballed after Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, and despite efforts to clamp down on it, leadership ultimately gave in and accepted it was just part of the company's process.
"After The Last of Us [...] it was just an admission in a meeting, it was like, 'Well, we've just come to realise this is what it takes to make games at our level. If you don't want to do that, we understand, we'll write you a great letter of recommendation,'" Russell recalls.
"The company runs the way it wants to run. You either want to be a part of it or you don't. They're not technically breaking any laws," he continues.
Russell also adds that crunch isn't a strict requirement at Naughty Dog, but employees are incentivised to do it because the amount of work they put in is reflected in bonuses.
It's been previously reported that the studio has been in crunch mode on Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet after failing to meet a series of internal deadlines.
Earlier in this interview, Russell talks more about Naughty Dog's approach. "They'll set internal deadlines, and treat them like actual, external deadlines," he says.
"It's at that point you realise, you've wandered too much," he continues, "and it could be Sony tapping them on the shoulder, being like, 'Hey guys, it's been three years, not seeing much from you, we've spent I don't know how much money already, what's going on?'"
It sounds as though the studio isn't shying away from crunch, and is in fact leaning into it to make its games. We sort of already knew that, but this fresh perspective shines a new light on it.