Game developers must avoid the ‘wage-slave’ attitude
[翻译] 游戏开发者不该有领死薪水的心态
缩网址：http://wp.me/pBAPd-vd
Alex St. John April 16, 2016 12:00 PM
[译按：我（NDark）必须事先声明，本篇文章是翻译文章，并非代表我的个人立场，一直
以来我都很关心在游戏产业中管理的议题，我一直希望透过国内外的案例，正反方的论述
，让大家能聚焦在这个议题上，试图共同解决劳工，老板，及工头的三角议题。本篇文章
在IGDA生产力同好会的订阅信中也引发讨论，显然这并非东方文化单有的问题，值得我们
追踪。陆续还会有几篇翻译完成，敬请期待。一系列加班相关文章整理请见：
http://wp.me/PBAPd-uT ]
[备注：Wage-Slave直译是薪水奴隶，台湾比较适合的翻译是领死薪水的员工，这里讲的
是只被薪水所驱动，而非为了实现所驱动工作的员工。]
I read this article by Dean Takahashi the other day, and my jaw nearly hit
the floor.
有一天我看到了 Dean Takahashi 的文章，眼镜差点摔破。
Many modern game developers have embraced a culture of victimology and a bad
attitude toward their chosen vocations. They complain that the long hours and
personal sacrifices great games require are a consequence of poor management.
They want to pretend that they can turn an inherently entrepreneurial
endeavor like game development into a 9-to-5 job. Somehow, these people have
managed to adopt a wage-slave attitude toward one of the most remarkable and
privileged careers in the world.
很多现代的游戏开发者习惯认为自己生活在受害者情节下，同时对他们自选的职业抱持负
面态度。他们抱怨长时间工作及牺牲了自我，是导因于一连串的低能管理。他们把天生就
有创业精神的事业（游戏创作）当作朝九晚五的工作。不知何故，即使面对这世界上最具
挑战及恩典（与生俱来的创作能力）的职业，这些人竟认为自己应该是领死薪水的雇员。
I’ve been working at technology startups since I was in my early 20s and
later founding and running them. I’m fortunate for the career I’ve had, and
I’ve always been grateful for the incredible opportunities that the
technology industry has afforded me, especially when you consider that I grew
up in a log cabin in Alaska with no electricity, plumbing, heating, or cable
TV. I grew up largely home-schooled; I never did get that high school
diploma. None of those educational shortcomings seems to matter in the
high-tech world. Over the years, I’ve had the privilege of working with a
lot of truly amazing and hyperaccomplished people, many with backgrounds just
as unorthodox as my own. It was my job at Microsoft and later at WildTangent
to develop relationships with every leading game developer on Earth.
我自从二十岁就在科技创业，然后投资并营运。我很幸运有这样的职业，我也总是感谢这
些科技产业赋予给我的机会。特别是你若知道我是从没有水电，暖气及电视的阿拉斯加树
屋长大。我都是在家自学，从未取得高中的学历。在高科技的世界，这些教育的劣势其实
一点也不重要。这些年我拥有与这些惊人且高成就的人一起工作的恩典。他们很多都是跟
我一样不是正统出身。这是我先前在微软，WildTangent 游戏的工作内容，它让我能与世
界上其他知名游戏开发者建立关系。
I know I’m going to offend a lot of people by saying this, but I do so with
the hope that a few will wake up and shake off their mental shackles. I’ll
grant that it’s been 23 years since I used an outhouse or had to hunt for
dinner, but I’m still thrilled by the incredibly decadent luxury of
porcelain toilets and fast food. I can’t begin to imagine how sheltered the
lives of modern technology employees must be to think that any amount of
hours they spend pushing a mouse around for a paycheck is really demanding
strenuous work. I’ve hired thousands of people over the years and can’t
help but notice the increasing frequency with which I encounter people with a
wage-slave attitude toward making video games.
我知道我接下来说的东西将冒犯很多人，但我这样做是希望他们之中的一些人会清醒过来
，摆脱思路的纠结。我承认虽然我在野外自力更生二十三年，我对奢持品，陶瓷马桶及速
食仍感到兴奋。我无法想像这些受到现代科技庇护的员工认为动动鼠标就能营生是艰难的
工作。我曾长期雇用过数千名员工，无法不注意到这些把游戏制作当作是领死薪水雇员的
趋势。
A wage-slave attitude exhibits itself in several tragic ways. I’ve known a
lot of stupid self-made millionaires — really, hundreds of them — and they’
re usually young as well. I’m talking about kids who made some of the worst
games you can imagine and got rich accidentally, working in their parent’s
basement in the Florida Everglades. They make their first game, get rich, and
they’re gone, never having attended a single networking event at the Game
Developers Conference, done. Contrast the dozens and dozens of these kids
with the many game industry veterans I know that have long storied resumes
listing dozens of triple-A console titles they have “labored” on, who decry
the long working hours they are expected to invest in the games they are
employed to work on. These people are smarter, more experienced, more
talented, better trained to produce amazing games and they’re still working
for paychecks and whining about avoiding long crunch hours to finish big
titles or about not being paid fairly by some big employer. Listening to them
complain about it, you would they think that they are trapped in some
disenfranchised third-world country forced to dig for blood diamonds to feed
their families.
领死薪水的雇员的态度显露几个悲惨的方向。我认识很多个白手起家的百万富翁，真的，
数以百计，他们通常也都很年轻。我也跟几个做了粪游戏却突然变有钱的小伙子谈过，他
们住在佛罗里达的地下室。他们都是作了一个游戏，赚大钱，然后就离开，从未参加过
GDC。相反地很多我认识的游戏产业老手们，他们的履历中写着做了多少三Ａ级的游戏，
却抱怨那些被雇用的长时间工时。这些人很聪明，有经验，才能，可以做出惊人的游戏。
但他们仍为了薪水，而对加班发牢骚，或是抱怨工资不平等。听他们抱怨，你会感觉你听
到的是没人权第三世界国家挖血钻石试图养活家人的工人在说话。
I’ve never been able to mentally reconcile these conflicting experiences.
Any time I hear this stuff, I tell these people; quit, go make great games on
your own, pursue your passion, you’re better equipped to succeed than any of
the dozens and dozens of amateur kids I’ve seen retire early while you were
still “trapped” in a job you hated and trying to rationalize mailing in a
40-hour work week making video games. To my great shock and disappointment,
they never respond to this feedback with any sort of enlightenment or
gratitude for my generous attempt at setting them free — usually, I just get
rage. Being a victim of their employers has somehow managed to become a
deeply cherished part of their core identities and any suggestion that they
are far better equipped to rekindle their sheer passion for making games, do
a Kickstarter startup with their other talented friends and crank out an
original hit game, than a bunch of amateur kids working in Flash, is greeted
with a lot of anger. They rant about the value of “work-life-balance”, how
hit games can be delivered on a schedule with “proper management” and how
they can’t produce their best work when their creative energies are tapped
after a long forty-hour work week … sitting … at a desk…. Apparently
people can even “burn out” working too hard to make … video games….
我从未试着去调适这些冲突的经验。每次我听到这些东西，我就会告诉这些人，赶快离开
，去自己做个好游戏，跟随自己的热情，你具备比其他未成年人更能够成功的能力。快点
从这令人憎恨的工作陷阱中逃出，而不要试图在游戏制作中找到一周四十小时的合身套装
（mail）。令我震惊且难过地，这些人从未用任何的感激来回应我试图解开他们心结的举
动。通常我只收到愤怒。作为一个老板的奴隶似乎是他们生命定位的重要价值，任何想要
使他们重燃作自己游戏的建议，跟他有才能的朋友一起群众募资，只招来盛怒，特别是他
们比起那些未成年人作Flash游戏更有优势。这些人针对生活平衡的价值做出咆哮，试图
说明优秀的游戏应该在适当的管理下能够在预定期限上市，在超时工作下创意的能源是如
何的不能正常运作，当然，超时地"坐在位置上"。这个年头显然人们现在连作游戏都能够
"过劳"了。
Having worked with many of the game industry’s most legendary game
developers and also many of the game industry’s least known early retirees,
I can’t help noticing a clear and distinct difference between the people who
really make it huge in gaming and the people who just have long résumes. It’
s the attitude. Every legendary game developer I’ve ever known pursued
gaming as a vocation out of sheer passion. Most could have made more money,
had more security, lived more “balanced lives” in other tech jobs, but they
wanted to make games and they pursued it 110 percent all the time. Not a
single person I have ever known who went on to greatness in the gaming
industry has ever exhibited a shred of wage-slavishness.
我跟很多游戏产业传奇的开发者一起共事，他们之中的很多人都提早退休，我不禁注意到
一个清楚且决定性的差异，在那些真正做大游戏的人及只有那些精彩履历的人之间的差异
。那是一种态度。每个我认识的传奇开发者都把游戏制作视为天职。他们都能在其他科技
工作赚更多钱，更安稳，过更平衡的生活，但他们想要付出百分之一百一十的力量全时追
寻游戏之路。没有一位追寻游戏极致的开发者险露出一丝的领死薪水气息。
Making games is not a job — it’s an art.
游戏制作并非只是工作，而是一门艺术。
You can’t “make fun” on a schedule, under budget, on time with a bunch of
people who are all grumbling about what a miserable time they are having
finishing a game together. That’s not to say that there aren’t good
organized ways to produce games, but it will always still come down to the
same thing. Great games are exclusively made by giving them everything you’
ve got and more, and then hoping it’s enough. There’s no amount of money
that anybody can pay people with a wage-slave attitude to let it go and put
themselves completely into a great game. There’s nothing that can compensate
people “fairly” for the sacrifices that great art requires. It’s art. You
need to get an actual job producing productivity software if you want to be
paid “fairly” and go home at 5 p.m. Anybody good enough to get hired to
write games can get paid more to work on something else. If working on a game
for 80 hours a week for months at a time seems “strenuous” to you …
practice more until you’re better at it. Making games is not a job, pushing
a mouse is not a hardship, it’s the most amazing opportunity you can
possibly get paid to pursue … start believing it, and you’ll discover that
you are even better at it.
你不能在时程，预算，以及在一群试图把游戏作完却抱怨悲惨过程的人之间试图找到乐趣
。这并非说没有使用适当的方法来制作游戏，而仍是指同一件事：伟大的游戏无外地必须
奉献全部的自己，甚至燃烧更多还不够。这些把自己全心全意热情转化为游戏的态度不能
用薪水来计算或支付。对制作这门艺术的需要的牺牲无法公平地反馈。这是艺术，如果想
要拿取公平的报酬，五点下班，你该去找一份有产值的软件开发工作。能在游戏产业把事
情做好的人都能在其他地方拿到更好的工作。如果一周工作八十小时很艰苦，那么你该更
认真的磨练。作游戏不是工作，动动鼠标一点也不难，那是你该值得追寻的美妙机会，试
着相信这件事，你会发现你可以做得更好。
Don’t be in the game industry if you can’t love all 80 hours/week of it —
you’re taking a job from somebody who would really value it.
假如你不对一周八十小时充满热爱，你不应该在这个产业内，你的这份工作其他人很想要
。
Alex St. John is the co-creator of the DirectX family of API’s at Microsoft
and founder of WildTangent Inc., one of the world’s earliest and largest
downloadable game publishers. He has over 20 patents related to online game
publishing and is a speaker and technology columnist on GPGPU programming
today.
Alex St. John 是微软 DirectX 函式库的共同创始人，WildTangent Inc 的创立者，世
界上最早且最大的下载游戏发布人之一。他有二十篇关于线上游戏的专利，同时是一名讲
者，及 GPGPU 程式设计技术社群的一员。