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03.02.2007

Free Agency: The Downsides
Michael John's article is certainly thought-provoking, and doesn't even mention one of the best parts of Free Agency: supply and demand guarantee that profitable-but-boring projects will pay better than fun-to-make niche titles, allowing developers to make a tradeoff between money and satisfaction.

However, anyone advocating such a radical change for the industry should be prepared to take a hard look at the negatives and address them, and I was disappointed to not see that in this article.

Downside 1: loss of job stability. Going freelance is fine if you're living in Mom's basement eating ramen, but it's much harder if you've got a family to feed. The reality of the industry is that more people want to work there than actually do; if you have to compete for every project, the length of downtime between projects (with no pay at all) hurts the individual.

Downside 2: much harder to change roles. I started out as a programmer but I had solid game design skills. As a free agent with a programming resume, there's no chance I'd ever get a chance as a designer. As a full-time employee, I can convince management to give me a chance to prove myself on the next project.

Downside 3: sharply increased overhead. A studio may save some money by not having to pay its staff between projects, but it loses money by having to hire everyone from scratch on every new project. I've seen the cost of a new hire estimated as 3 to 6 months' worth of salary, as they get up to speed with your project. Between that and the HR cost of hiring in the first place, any cost savings from studio downtime could be wiped out by higher turnover costs.

Downside 4: if the studio or the free agent doesn't live in California, they're screwed. No one wants to move to the middle of nowhere after every project, and it's pure fantasy to expect a decent AAA title with every individual developer working in a different city.

-Ian Schreiber