[ardit33]

I am sorry, but what is wrong with having video games in the office? At both my previous companies I played games time to time, with co-workers. 15 mins of playing Fifa with a co-worker end s up both relaxing, and productive as you both bond and hash out things, and often much better than boring meeting.

I am 35 btw. Also, our CEO regularly played as well.

I have been at an office/environment (Amazon), with cubicles, or offices, people coming in, going home at 5:30pm, no social time, nothing interesting. I thought that was awful, and I would never work in a place that doesn't understand that creativity requires some play time as well.

[mwfunk]

This is all anecdotal evidence of course, but my exposure to this sort of office culture has been much more negative than what you described. Every place I've ever worked, I've played video games or done other fun stuff with my coworkers, sometimes as a part of every day. Nothing wrong with that, I wouldn't have had it any other way. This is the norm, but I don't think this is what people are talking about in this thread.

The negative variant of "come work here, we have video games in the office!" happens when there is an expectation from management (or even just the rest of the team) that everyone is going to participate in Mandatory Team Playtime whether they enjoy it or not. And the 1-2 hours of Mandatory Team Playtime always means that you have to stay at work for an additional 1-2 hours just to get your job done. Or maybe Mandatory Team Playtime is a consolation prize for making you work through the weekend.

[Bahamut]

I usually find there being too much to do to spend time playing video games or whatever at the job, unless there is a company after-hours event.

I'm not exactly on the younger side either, being 32 and having only been working professionally for almost 4 years. It's not that I don't love games either - if the game industry paid comparatively, I would certainly consider going into that industry, and have plenty of very successful friends in it.

That said, I don't view the presence of these things as discrimination - if you don't want to participate, don't. Nobody is forcing you, and if they want to falsify performance reviews/withhold promotions when you're clearly outperforming your peers/etc., then I'd get down and dirty letting them know that their behavior is crap, and then job search because I don't want to work for a company like that.

[flukus]

The problem isn't the games, it's the office space. Having video games, foosball, table tennis, etc near your work space is distracting as hell. If they are optional and silent (from my perspective) it's not a problem but me experience has been the opposite.

I had management buy everyone nerf guns once as part of a "hitting our targets" marketing campaign. It seemed like every time you got deep into concentration a nerf dart would ricochet into your screen. Needless to say, we missed our targets.

[vacri]

> Needless to say, we missed our targets.

... intentional pun?

I've had the nerf war going on around me as well. Everyone else in the office shooting at each other, me in the middle fiddling in my terminals. I learned that if you just don't respond, you don't become a target and you can get on with whatever you were doing (YMMV).

[MichaelBurge]

> ... intentional pun?

I believe his management made the pun when they bought the nerf guns for the "hit our targets" campaign.

[ryanSrich]

It's not the video games themselves. It's the culture. It's a way to keep young employees in the office longer. It's not uncommon for these places to have people roll in around 10am and stay until 10pm. That's not a place I want to work at, and I'm not even 30 yet. But you can bet your life savings on a company firing anyone for not playing this game. That's why I won't work for a place with videogames.

[mahyarm]

I've worked at a bunch of places with video games in SV. Most of the time it's barely touched.

Meals is what really determines how long people stayed. Sometimes 3 people would play video games. Sometimes a team creates a lunch time card game routine. Some teams really love foosball or whatever.

If a place didn't serve 6pm dinner, people tend to leave before dinner time since they got hungry. If they served dinner, then they consistently stayed until dinner time. If dinner was too late like 8pm, then they might as well of had no dinner for most employees.

10am-10pm places develop often because it's a small startup, and because normal commute hours are horrible. I don't know many people although who actually works anything near those 12 hour days.

[reddytowns]

Wait, they fire people for not playing videogames?

[ryanSrich]

Should have been more clear. They fire people for not playing the "12 hour work day" for no reason game.

"Sorry it's not working out. We're looking for dedicated team players". Proceeds to hire 22 year olds with no at home responsibilities.

[baby]

That's complete bullshit, I work for one of those company that happens to have video games around. Not everyone play, but after work, we sometimes get around and play for a couple of hours and we just have so much fun that we end up going home late. What's wrong with that?

[hiram112]

Nothing wrong with it at all.

But realize that companies do not give you these 'perks' like free food, games, laundry, etc. as a bonus. It is to keep you at work for more and more hours.

Honestly, I don't think it is a bad thing if you do enjoy this sort of thing and are young without kids, wife, etc.

The problem is that it creates the 'bro' culture that turns off anyone who isn't in the same demographic. When most of the team is staying late, bonding with COD, those that don't - the 40 year old who needs to pick up his kid, or the 25 year old woman who doesn't play XBox - tend to be excluded as time goes on.

To be completely honest, I've always thought the complaints of sexism in tech were completely bullshit.

But when I look at things as a mid 30's guy who is already seeing hints of ageism and really have no desire to stay 'till 10pm playing video games, I have to wonder if maybe I was somewhat wrong, and maybe the typical SV software environment is somewhat toxic for anyone not a 25 year old guy - females included.

[mahyarm]

Free food is the real perk that changes hours. Everything else isn't used that much or is very very company/team dependent and you have to evaluate them on a company basis.

10 companies might give laundry, video games, board/table games, free gyms and all 3 meals. How the company or team uses those things is very company dependent. Laundry service is not used that much most of the time, since you usually have to pay. It's usually just a purple tie pickup/dropoff closet.

I think the "staying late, bonding with COD" company is like the minority 'nightmare' thing that gets all the media attention, while most of them are pretty normal, does something at lunch sometimes and eats all the free meals.

[baby]

> But realize that companies do not give you these 'perks' like free food, games, laundry, etc. as a bonus. It is to keep you at work for more and more hours.

It's give and take, nothing is for free, and this deal is a pretty good one imo :)

> The problem is that it creates the 'bro' culture that turns off anyone who isn't in the same demographic. When most of the team is staying late, bonding with COD, those that don't - the 40 year old who needs to pick up his kid, or the 25 year old woman who doesn't play XBox - tend to be excluded as time goes on.

So we shouldn't bond and have fun because of these people :D?

[hiram112]

No I think you should do what you want; it certainly isn't the job of young male engineers to make sure everyone else is included in their environment. God knows that other groups were never especially inclusive to many of 'us' growing up.

[DougN7]

Absolutely nothing wrong with it. But people with families, kids that need help with homework, etc won't be able to do that often if ever. Being young very often also means having fewer commitments.

[baby]

If you can't play video games with your friend/coworkers from times to times, then your life suck, kids or not.

[Broken_Hippo]

Or you have different interests. Perhaps you don't expect to be friends with coworkers - so long as folks get along well at the office, that's enough. Perhaps you would rather have the compartmentalism. Perhaps you'd rather play at home while not wearing pants. Perhaps you'd rather spend time with a loved one, your children, and the couple of friends that you've had for years.

Perhaps you are an introvert and really need the downtime. Perhaps you are an artist and enjoy that instead. Maybe you play an instrument and get an hour of practice most days. Maybe you like theater or a good dinner in lue of a few hours of video games.

Not playing games after work isn't an indicator of someone's life sucking. It just means they have different interests or priorities in life that don't match up to spending a few hours at work playing games.

[Psygon1]

I'm not a gamer.

[baby]

Well I'd say it depends what kind of game you guys have. If it's COD like in some of the comments I can understand. But in my office we mostly play goofy party game, I sometimes invite my gf over to play with us and she manages to have fun while not being a gamer as well. Here's a list I made:

So far we've really enjoyed:

* speedrunners

* towerfall

* blazerush

fun:

* lovers in a dangerous spacetime

* overcooked

* miner warfare

* clusterpuck 99 (sucks if you're not > 4)

* hidden in plain sight

* Magicka

that were fun, but got boring fast:

* duck game

* CMYW

* trine 2

* starwhal

* Nidhogg

* Porcunipine

Meh:

* Castle Crashers

* Mount your friends

* Gangbeast

* Hammerwatch

* Screencheat

* ibb & obb

[FLUX-YOU]

No idea. In fact, having some complicated games to learn and compete at is likely a good thing if you have a team of gamers and give your brain a mental break from work while still having something interesting to chew on. Think high level play in fighting games/MOBAs, number crunching in MMOs, FPS map strategies, car simulation builds, sports strategies and teams, etc.

Even if you don't want to think about that stuff, you can then turn to doing silly things and giving yourself a break.