Former contractor calls working at Nintendo ‘death planet’

Another day, another workplace culture scandal in the games industry. Rumblings around Nintendo of America hit fever pitch a few weeks ago with the filing of a labor complaint against the company. Now, in an article published yesterday, IGN’s interviews with current and former contractors at the company paint a sad picture of allegedly overworked, underpaid and exploited staff.

The core of the story — that contractors are overused by tech giants — is hardly news to anyone with knowledge of how work gets done in a big company. These are customer service reps, forum moderators, store helpers. No matter which country you’re in, they are unlikely to be treated with as much respect as designers, marketing executives, or other senior staff. That’s a sad, realistic truth which we should probably do more about in general.

However, the specifics of the allegations against Nintendo of America are rather damning. Former contractors talk about a two-tier class system based on badge color, and being unwelcome at events with full-time employees. One LGBTQ+ contractor said her manager had to fight upper management to give her permission to march with employees in the Pride parade. 

There’s also much discussion about the simple matter of overworking, not hiring enough full-time staff, and the pressure this puts on everyone — contractors and full-timers alike. It’s clear everyone involved liked the vast majority of people they worked with; it was the systems in place (put there by much higher-ups) that made it challenging.

The piece ends with one interviewee talking about how they quit for “three times the money and less work,” and says, “I didn’t know I was on death planet until I left death planet.” I’ve had some poor work experiences, but ‘death planet’ is a new one.

Do give the full piece a read for quotes from many others, including former NOA president Reggie Fils-Aimé.

Written by Ben Barrett on behalf of GLHF.