[Agentlien]

I agree with this and think there's been a really good effort lately to shine a light at the problems. A good example are the articles by Jason Schreier of Kotaku.

However, I'd also like to add my own data point. I'm someone who grew up dreaming about developing games and taught myself programming as a kid, with the idea of spending my days as a game developer. However, after having heard so much bad stuff about the game industry and then experienced it first hand when doing a summer job at Starbreeze, I decided to stay away from the game industry after I got my Master's.

Nearly four years later, I ended up switching jobs and entering the video game industry (at an EA studio). I've been there for four years, now. Every week I actively turn down headhunters trying to recruit me for all manner of jobs outside of game development. A lot of things could, and should, be better in game development. But all in all, I still love making games and am much happier with my day to day job now than before becoming a game dev.