If you follow video game news, you know the name Jason Schreier, the Kotaku-now-Bloomberg reporter who has broken many stories about the messy development behind a number of huge games, from Destiny to Cyberpunk, as well as reporting on never-ending labor issues within the industry.
Schreiers first book, Blood, Sweat and Pixels, was a sort of collection of those types of stories, the tales behind how big games came to life, or almost didnt. His second book, Press Reset: Ruin and Recovery in the Video Game Industry, is a little more harrowing.
In Press Reset, Schreier is focusing mainly on the failures, though maddeningly, the failures that can often come with success, as weve seen with big hits like BioShock Infinite or the Dead Space series, which somehow led to the dissolution of those studios for a variety of frustrating reasons.
I felt this way when I read Blood, Sweat and Pixels as well, but you get the sense that the entire video game industry is constantly teetering on the edge of unsustainability with increasingly huge demands for sprawling games which require ungodly hours to complete. Though many publishers have made strides forward in creating better working conditions (at times, even as a result of Schreiers reporting) it remains clear that the video game industry could use some sort of unionizations for better protection for its workers, a point Schreier frequently makes.
As for the book itself, if you have any interest in the inner workings of the video game industry at all, its a must-read, given that few authors have the depth of sources willing to talk to them. In Press Reset, BioShock Infinite feels like a common thread, a main focus for a chapter, but constantly referred to as the rise and collapse of that game led to many other teams and games in the wake of it.
Another highlight is the full documentation of the disastrous tenure of 38 Studios, run by former baseball player Curt Schilling, who clearly didnt have the experience to build the world-changing game he set out to, and everyone attached to the project suffered as a result.
The higher-ups in the industry are not painted in a terribly positive light, as you might expect, where at one point EA bosses asked the developer of Ragtag, a now-cancelled Star Wars game, where their FIFA Ultimate team was, illustrating the eternal demand for monetization, even in places it has no business being.
Press Reset may not have as many big games featured as Blood, Sweat and Pixels, but if you liked Schreiers original, its easily to imagine youll enjoy this as well, as they share similar DNA, even if things are getting perhaps even more¦dark. Its not exactly a cheery read, as were talking about exhausted developers that are often mismanaged out of a job. There are hopeful notes, as some are able to recover and make great things down the road, but as ever, the portrait of the video game industry painted here is relatively bleak, where even massive critical acclaim and sales success can lead to ruin if an executive or creative lead decides they want to peace out and do something else. Or if you dont have an Ultimate Team to deliver to the board.
Schreiers reporting is unparalleled, and I cannot imagine the level of work that went into this many interviews over the past few years. There are few insider looks at this secretive industry in general and pretty much none more in-depth than what youll find in a book like Press Reset. Check it out here.
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Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series, and The Earthborn Trilogy, which is also on audiobook.
