A lot of ink has been spilled here on HN about the dysfunction of the video game industry. I won't rehash that here, but I will speak about my specific experience.
I worked in the video game industry for three years before burning out. I let the company I worked for work me 80 hours a week for 2 years straight[0]. I let them because the work is addicting and I was having fun.
When the project I was working on was finally canceled (we never launched), I was given the opportunity to move on to other teams, but to my surprise I just couldn't bring myself to make the transition. I basically spent two weeks browsing the internet instead of looking for a new game team. When I hadn't transitioned to a new team, I was laid off.
I looked around at other companies (inside and outside the game industry) and once again, to my surprise, found I couldn't progress past the phone conversation stage of the interview process. I would schedule technical interviews and cancel them at the last second or simply not show up. This went on for a few months before I simply stopped looking for work.
I didn't work for a year after that. Then I took on short web dev contracts and, between the contracts and my side projects, over the course of another year finally worked back up to a full time 40 hour a week work schedule.
At this point, I'm sure there are people here that would say what happened is entirely my fault and they would be right. I would have been better off had I refused to work more than 40 hours a week and then been fired.
[0]: Fun fact: during that time, I did the math and found what I was making as an hourly rate. My brother works manual labor for the DOT and made more per hour than I did during those two years.
I worked in the video game industry for three years before burning out. I let the company I worked for work me 80 hours a week for 2 years straight[0]. I let them because the work is addicting and I was having fun.
When the project I was working on was finally canceled (we never launched), I was given the opportunity to move on to other teams, but to my surprise I just couldn't bring myself to make the transition. I basically spent two weeks browsing the internet instead of looking for a new game team. When I hadn't transitioned to a new team, I was laid off.
I looked around at other companies (inside and outside the game industry) and once again, to my surprise, found I couldn't progress past the phone conversation stage of the interview process. I would schedule technical interviews and cancel them at the last second or simply not show up. This went on for a few months before I simply stopped looking for work.
I didn't work for a year after that. Then I took on short web dev contracts and, between the contracts and my side projects, over the course of another year finally worked back up to a full time 40 hour a week work schedule.
At this point, I'm sure there are people here that would say what happened is entirely my fault and they would be right. I would have been better off had I refused to work more than 40 hours a week and then been fired.
[0]: Fun fact: during that time, I did the math and found what I was making as an hourly rate. My brother works manual labor for the DOT and made more per hour than I did during those two years.