All Articles: L.A. Noire

Things are not looking good for Team Bondi, the studio behind L.A. Noire, after allegations of cruel management and an investigation into such by the IGDA. Now, the Sydney, Australia-based company may need to look for a new publisher.

“Rockstar used to be very keen on making Team Bondi something like ‘Rockstar Sydney’ – the more they worked with Team Bondi management, the more they came to understand that this was a terrible idea,” an anonymous source told Industry Gamers. “I’ve heard a lot about Rockstar’s disdain for Team Bondi, and it has been made quite clear that they will not publish Team Bondi’s next game.”

Of course, it’s hard to question the management of a game that turned out so good, but the source claims, “Rockstar also pitched in with programmers, animators, artists, QA, etc. Part of the conflict between Team Bondi and Rockstar was due to Rockstar’s frustration with Team Bondi’s direction, and eventually Team Bondi’s management in turn resented Rockstar for taking lots of creative control.”

I seriously doubt Team Bondi will have a hard time searching for a new publisher given how well the game has sold. But hopefully the studio can adequately deal with a lot of the negative press it has received.

We just reported today on the various sources claiming Team Bondi developers suffered under harsh circumstances while working on L.A. Noire. Today, the International Game Developers Association is soliciting any and all information from developers and family members about the experience on the work, negative or positive.

“Certainly reports of 12-hour a day, lengthy crunch time, if true, are absolutely unacceptable and harmful to the individuals involved, the final product, and the industry as a whole,” said Brian Robbins, Chair of the IGDA’s Board of Directors.

You can send any information to qol@igda.org.

L.A. Noire turned out to be a pretty great game. But in the seven years it took to bring it to market, not all of the team members had such a great time working on it. In addition to a website detailing the real credits of L.A. Noire, a feature has popped up from IGN revealing some of the horror stories many former developers shared about working on the project.

The piece is a strong indictment of Studio Founder, Writer, and Director Brendan McNamara, as sources claimed working 100+ hour work weeks with “the angriest person” they’ve ever met. IGN also gave McNamara a good amount of space to respond, with him explaining, “you’re competing against the best people in the world at what they do, and you just have to be prepared to do what you have to do to compete against those people.”

While you can’t argue with the results of McNamara’s style, one would certainly hope these harsh revelations would cease before the game industry becomes a less attractive job market.

Media trends come in waves and with zombies shambling off into the sunset and vampires returning to their coffins, maybe its time for the heyday of the 1940s gumshoe because Rockstar is reporting that L.A. Noire has sold 4 million copies worldwide on the PS3 and Xbox 360.

This tremendous debut is obviously swell news for the publisher and developer Team Bondi, but PC gamers will also be making whoopee this Fall when the game comes to the PC as well. Developed by Rockstar Leeds, the PC version will include customizable control options and 3D graphics support.

“L.A. Noire is a new type of game that makes players see through a detective’s eyes in 1940s Los Angeles,” said Sam Houser, founder of Rockstar Games. “Its unique blend of story, action and crime solving will be perfect to play on PC.”

And let us clue you in, L.A. Noire is no jalopy, it’s one of the best games of the year.