I would suggest you look somewhere else. - Anonymous employee Splash Damage Employee Review

2.0
5 Jul 2020
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Most people that you work with are really nice and will answer all your questions. Most people are eager to help and it's very easy for you to learn new things. SD is a good place to start your game development journey. Good benefits. If you are lucky you get to work on amazing games with amazing tech but more on this in the cons.

Cons

Cons are plenty and one problem with Splash Damage is that your experience will be amazing or horrendous based solely on your project and who your lead is. Salary is low but not for all positions. Once you climb the ladder and get into the more senior roles it's fair, comparable to other companies. If you are on one of the internal projects focus on learning from the senior people and find another job. You will never progress at SD if you are on an internal project. You can be the best artist, programmer, tester, producer it won't matter. Even if you are not on an internal project and you do a very good job regardless of your position it won't be enough. You need your manager to be in "with the right people". Your manager will tell you that you are doing a good job but when promotion time comes you won't get it. If you are on the right project , do a very good job and your manager is "in with the right people" your experience with this company will be amazing. SD is a very, very top heavy company I think there's like 8 tiers of management between the top and the first employee that actually works and all the meaningful decision are made at tier 2(under the CEO). So basically between any decision regarding your personal development is your manager, your manager's manager, your manager's manager's manager... You get the point. All the leadership of the company will be strangers to you, you might see them once every 3-4 months and you might not think this is a big deal but remember, these people make all the decisions regarding your promotions, what project you work on and pay raises. All their decisions are based on 5 minute back briefs that people under them give them so don't expect them to actually know what you did. All the positions at SD are shifted one position to the left so the expectations of a junior at SD are the expectation of a mid level in another company. Mid level expectations are senior expectations and seniors are basically leads. If you are in a senior position expect to manage anything from 1 to 5 people. Most seniors are acting leads because the leads are actually in meetings all day every day. Any project that is run by SD becomes a dumpster fire mostly because there is no clear decision making at any level. Any decision will be done by comitee because remember, all decisions are done under the CEO so no one wants to take the responsibility of a decision that the people under the CEO won't like. No one has any real power to do anything at a project level. Any project that you work on will inevitably do overtime and quite a bit of it. Expect to work 50 hour weeks and all weekends at the minimum during the "OT phase" of the project. This is mostly because planning is done by people that don't actually do the work so everything is underestimated. SD is not very good at the game making part of making games. They talk the talk but don't walk the walk. Due to the company "culture", HR and the upper manangement are friends and should an issue arrise they will pick sides. They will side with the people they like regardless if they are right or not. The company used to have an amazing culture but recently(after CEO changed) it has been pushing political agendas more and more to the point that if you disagree with anything they say you can be fired. You are not allowed to discuss, much less disagree with what the company pushes through official channels. The culture now is censorship and fear. SD promotes itself as this very inclusive company but in reality if you don't fall in line with the agenda that is being pushed you will get in trouble. I suggest you never write anything not work related down. It can and will be used against you. It doesn't matter if you are right or not. Sharing a meme could get you in trouble. The company's political bias is very evident and I don't recommend you work here if you don't share their political views. It will not be fun for you at all. This is not going to get any better but it will get worse so proceed with caution.

Explore other reviews about Splash Damage

5.0
6 Dec 2022
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Really fun and very enjoyable

Cons

not very high pay but also not all the time

3.0
18 Nov 2024
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

good people, good hours, good time

Cons

Lots of room for improvement, management was caught off guard a number of times this last few quarters making everyone scramble to catch up.

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