[frozenfoxx]

Disclaimer: I work at a game engine company.

I wouldn't say it's different but rather improved. There's still a lot of passion and focus on the exciting things rather than reliability and the politics are much more befitting game companies than corporate IT (I've worked at both). That said there's much less crunch and is much more like corporate IT in that there's a regular schedule, more known goals, and more predictability in your paycheck.

Personally I love working on a game engine since it means I can help anyone who wants to build a game. At least at my company I'd say that's definitely the prevailing reason why many of us are here. The biggest drawback at a game company by comparison is that when if you have a great idea of how to fix something you're usually under NDA and cannot help any of your friends elsewhere in the industry. At the engine company your tools help thousands of studios do things better, and solving problems for one studio typically means bugfixes for problems other studios may have as well.

I dunno, that's just kinda what it's like in comparison.