Crunch (video games)

In the video game industry, crunch (or crunch culture) is compulsory overtime during the development of a game. Crunch is common in the industry and can lead to work weeks of 65–80 hours for extended periods of time, often uncompensated beyond the normal working hours.^[1] It is often used as a way to cut the costs of game development, a labor-intensive endeavour. However, it leads to negative health impacts for game developers and a decrease in the quality of their work, which drives developers out of the industry temporarily or permanently. Critics of crunch note how it has become normalized within the game-development industry, to deleterious effects for all involved.^[2] A lack of unionization on the part of game developers has often been suggested as the reason crunch exists.^[1] Organizations such as Game Workers Unite aim to fight against crunch by forcing studios to honour game developers' labor rights.