Dragon Age creator says that if crunch is "the only way" to make massive games, "maybe the industry deserves to die"

David Gaider, the creator of Dragon Age's setting, has spoken out against the current state of the games industry, and the "fear" developers have of needing to crunch to make enormous games as if it's the only way forward. He believes that "it doesn't have to be that way," but that if it did, "maybe the industry deserves to die."

This comes from a recent interview with PC Gamer, in which Gaider, who's also the co-founder of Stray Gods developer Summerfall Studios, explains that those at his current studio work four days a week with a "realistic" schedule. By working with the time they have rather than crunching to fit in more, employees "love what they do" rather than feeling like "they're just a resource to be tapped," he says.

"There's this fear that exists – if we don't have everybody working overtime and we don't make AAA games that have $200 million budgets and the focus is on photorealistic graphics and 1,000-hour playtimes, we need to pack all that in and work everyone to death making it and that's the only way to make games," Gaider explains, speaking about the industry as a whole. "If that's true then maybe the industry deserves to die. If that's true. The thing is that I just don't think it's true."

The games industry has been a very turbulent place lately, as reflected by the huge layoffs seen at studios worldwide, which have been particularly prevalent over the last year or so. Speaking last month following the news of EA's plans to cut around 670 jobs, id Software co-founder John Romero said: "I've been in the game industry since I was a kid, and I've never seen anything like we're seeing now. For many of us, being a game dev is not just a job, but an identity, community, and culture. I am so sorry to everyone who has lost their jobs."

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