TT Games devs describe crunch, abuse while making Lego games
Over 30 current and former employees at UK-based developer TT Games have told Polygon that the studio's last decade of works on games under the Lego license has allegedly been been marked with crunch, mismanagement, and sexism, all of which have culminated in a burned out workforce struggling to release Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga.
Stories from developers implicate poor decisions made by current and former management, with more recent criticism for the decision to use an in-house engine for The Skywalker Saga, as well as continued refusal to fix common issues that show up in game reviews while doubling down on systems that may not be appropriate for the family-friendly game series.
Reading about crunch, overwork, and bad management at any studio is heartbreaking enough, but there's something extra sour about reading these complaints at a studio making games primarily for children. TT Games' various licensed Lego titles have enjoyed commercial and critical success over the last decade mainly thanks to their charm and intuitive design, making them more accessible for new players of all ages.
Based on Jack Yarwood's reporting, it seems that different eras of poor leadership struggled to properly manage the challenges of game development. The result has been high turnover, frequent complaints, and now multiple delays for a game meant to combine nine Star Wars movies in one package.
Developers described the studio's crunch policy as "soft-spoken blackmail." Complaints about crunch date back all the way to the studio's founding, and apparently management chose to deliberately plan for crunch instead of working to minimize it.
New systems in place like an overtime exchange and "flexitime" were meant to help balance long
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