A report of Kotaku, based on interviews with 12 workers and extrabands of Undead Labs , has revealed labor abuse and lack of leadership that have accompanied the development of state of decay 3 . According to the article, after the purchase by Microsoft in 2018 and the March of Jeff Strain, founder of the study, the preproduction of State of Decay began to lose course before the inoperative of the mother company, who refused to Interfering in the internal culture: “Our collapse came from within, but we could have used the help of Microsoft,” he says in article one of the interviewees. The slow progress of State of Decay 3 began quickly to affect the organization of the study, which after the purchase had doubled its size. As detailed by several workers, the development was divided into different independent creative teams that worked without any direction and without the correct communication between them until reaching a point where the Directive was more concerned about teaching “artificial progress” of the game that in Fix and coordinate the different development teams. Despite having been announced in 2018, State of Decay 3 continues at this time in preproduction phase.
Beyond the lack of organization and leadership, a large part of the interviewees indicate the misogynia, abuses and discrimination established in the study after Strain’s progress and the arrival of their substitute, Philip Holt: «When I did the interview in Undead Lab sold me the idea that the study was making a transition where equality, diversity and the included was a priority. Actually the study directive painted this image for Microsoft while women were ignored by system, rejected, interrupted and blamed with everything. ” Another employee notes that the contributions of women were rejected without being taken into account by the developers of more level: “We had to organize a meeting focused on good manners because men constantly interrupt women and dismiss them. But it did not help anything ». Gender discrimination also affects the career of the workers according to another of the interviewees, which points to Holt to ascend to ascend his newcomers, even dismiss women in leadership positions so that his acquaintances take the Roles: “There is a pattern in which women are eliminated and protected and helped men.”
When asked by this report, Microsoft has denied a large part of the accusations, especially those related to nepotism and discrimination: “There is a standardized and rigorous contracting process in Undead Labs by which all candidates have to be approved by several members of the study ». Since the company have also pointed out that this last year have totally changed the management team, which has been translated into 42% of new hiring are women or non-binary persons. Some of the employees interviewed by Kotaku admit that the study is trying to change direction, while others point to the presence of Holt continues to assume a problem.
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