[duwease]

I don't think this is new. 20 years ago, I loved game programming.. I even chose a game dev library in C++ as my senior (college) project. But my obsession also led me to read all I could about the industry, and the stories were the same. I got nervous about the 14-hour-a-day, 7-day-a-week eternal crunch time, the pay, the job security, the lack of prospects without moving around. I chickened out.

I still like my job, but it's nothing like the passion I felt when I built games. Still, I don't think that passion is enough to justify the strain it would put on my family through financial risk, not to mention my work/life balance (or in this case, work/slightly less work balance).

Since it was the same then as now, I suspect it may continue to be. After all, it's a job with inherent joy for people who want it, and those tend to have the luxury of materially rewarding workers less. Much as bars can basically pay bands little to nothing in order to have live music, because there's no shortage of people wanting it just for the inherent joy, I imagine game companies will continue to have a pool of creative technicians willing to work for less. Maybe the higher barrier of entry to learn tech work will change something one day, but it doesn't appear to have done so, so far.