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Sure, working for a game company may include soul-killing hours and sanity-crushing crunch time, but that doesn't mean it has to be a hellish experience.
Today Insomniac Games was named among the top companies to work for in America. The developer, best known for Spyro the Dragon and Ratchet & Clank, placed fourth on the 50 Best Small and Medium Sized Companies to work for in America list. Last year, the company of 155 employees placed third. Insomniac Games is the only game developer to ever make the list.
The list was compiled by the same company that puts together Fortune Magazine's 100 Best Companies to Work For list.
"It's a real honor to be included once again among the five best small companies to work for in America because the ranking is based on our own employees' attitudes about Insomniac Games," said Ted Price, company founder and president. "Our back-to-back, top-five ranking demonstrates that concepts like 'collaboration,' 'quality-over-quantity' and 'innovation' have real meaning here and are in practice every day."Ryan Schneider, company spokesman, points out that the honor was awarded to the independent developer in a year when they are working on Resistance: Fall of Man for the Playstation 3.
"We are able to get this during a hardware launch cycle," he said. "We have been on a game a year for awhile now and we win awards for those games and we keep people happy, so it is possible."
Schneider says the company offers a number of things to employees to try and cut down on stress and unhappiness.
"We have flexible hours, people can come and go as they please as long as they are in by ten," he said. "In addition to that we have yoga a couple times a week, massage therapy, we cater lunches on Fridays where everyone gets together, we have happy hours, movie nights, Fragfest Fridays."
But the key to keeping employees happy, he says, is making sure they feel they are valued and that their opinion counts.
"It's a great feeling to know that regardless of your position or stature a good idea is a good idea," he said. "It's not a place where the CEO stands on a pedestal."
"I don't feel like I'm a badge number, I feel part of a great time. It's great to wake up in the morning and be excited to go to work."
Price, reached in Washington, D.C. Monday, says he still knows all of his employees.
"Part of my job is to walk around and see everyone and get involved," he said. "Everyone at all levels participate in making the games. Our number one goal is making sure that everyone at Insomniac is listened to."
Price acknowledged that developing for a new console can be more stressful, but says Insomniac tried to cut down on that by changing they way they develop for a new console, like the Playstation 3.
Price added that developing for the PS3 is no harder than developing for the PS2, just with a "different set of challenges."
Price, who founded the company in 1994, says while the company has grown quite a bit, the culture it was built on hasn't changed.
"You wont find a department head that's not participating in making a game," he said. "What that reflects is the same culture from what we had in the beginning."
