“I understand if a contractor does a small amount of work for a few months and is left off, but we’re talking full-time employees with over a year invested in the title, and had a hand in significant parts of the product,” one source told GIbiz. “It definitely stings,” another dev said. “To just not be there at all is shitty." None of the developers who spoke out about being omitted from the credits felt that the situation was normal practice, and some claimed they’d been working under crunch conditions on the project. The former Striking Distance devs also said that if the company had a policy of not crediting employees who’d contributed to a project before moving on then staff had not been made aware of that. The International Game Developers Association recommends anyone who worked on a project for 30 days or more should be included in credits, even if they leave before a game’s launch. Some of the former Striking Distance devs felt that being omitted from the credits was a message that they hadn’t been loyal to the company, but others were surprised at being left out and had good things to say about their time working there otherwise. Sadly, devs not being credited for their work is an issue that’s been plaguing the games industry for quite some time now, and it’s disappointing to see studios falling into the same pitfalls over and over again. I’ve reached out to Striking Distance to ask what their policy is on including developers who leave the company in the credits of projects they’ve worked on, and whether they made staff aware of any such policy.
