[enraged_camel]

>>Apparently, everyone is a victim these days simply by making life decisions they end up regretting. Nobody is responsible for anything concerning themselves anymore.

No one makes decisions in a vacuum. People's behaviors are informed by their upbringing and circumstances, most of which they have no control over. Studies show that people are deeply affected by those around them, and their role models (whether those be friends or family members) have a deep impact on the paths they take in life. For example, arranging regular interactions between kids in school and young, successful white collar professionals drastically increases the likelihood that those kids end up picking similar careers. In contrast, if they are surrounded by high crime and poverty, they tend to not do so well.

This is why one should not rush to judgment when discussing these issues: things are never as simple as "well, they made the wrong decisions in life." Even if the decisions were indeed wrong in retrospect, at the time they might have looked like (or actually have been) the right ones, or simply the best ones available.

[manfredo]

The point is, these jobs still pay an average of over $90k year. They may come with serious hours but that's not unheard of in many white collar industries (e.g. finance, medicine, law). To turn around and call these people victims is really not valuable, and seriously degrades what it means to be a "victim" of labor practices. There are jobs that are a lot harder to do and pay a lot less that nobody bats an eye about.

The video game industry has been nothing but transparent about the working conditions, at least from what I've seen. Every game Dev I've talked to has been clear that working on X field in the game industry is going to be more stressful and less lucrative than applying the same skills elsewhere. The slogan in my CS department was that the game Dev industry is twice the pay for half the work.

While many do have fulfilling careers it was common sense to me and my peers that going into the game development industry was not worth it unless your passion seriously outweighs practical interests. Some people think they belong in that group and later find out that they misjudged their priorities. They made a life decision they regret but they are not victims. No more than my sister is a victim of biology because she studied biology and discovered after graduation she didn't like biology and changed to working in tech.

[gridlockd]

> No one makes decisions in a vacuum.

Of course not. It's still their decision. It's their responsibility what to do with their lives. It's not like we tell young children that they absolutely must become game developers or that it's the greatest job in the world. It's rather the contrary.

It doesn't make you a victim.

Even if we were to agree that this makes you a victim, who the hell cares? There's millions of workers that work far tougher jobs at lousy pay, with no upward mobility. Let's start there.