Team Bondi celebrates L.A. Noire success by declaring bankruptcy?
 Mr. Phelps does not like bankruptcy. Or much of anything else. In what has become a sad turn of events, the Team Bondi debacle may end soon with the studio filing for bankruptcy and closing their doors for good. The release of L.A. Noire was followed by cries of “foul” not heard since psycho detective Cole Phelps last badgered the hell out of an innocent, defenseless widow during a simple interview. Complaints of 100-hour work weeks without overtime pay and current and former Team Bondi employees being left off the game credits have left studio head Brendan McNamara circled by flames of controversy. The smoke from said fire is beginning to thin and it appears to have left Bondi as nothing but a smoldering pile of rubble. Recent online sources headed by postings at the Neogaf discussion boards have all pointed toward an unfortunate conclusion to this unfortunate story. Rumor has it that bankruptcy will be filed and remaining Team Bondi members will be swallowed up by KMM, a Sydney-based media outlet that includes games under their large umbrella. Beleagured Bondi founder and studio head Brendan McNamara is also said to be joining KMM. Those fearful of what will become of the L.A. Noire IP, fret not. The IP is owned by Rockstar and will likely be safe. Rockstar notably “influenced” production of L.A. Noire quite heavily when they were less than satisfied with Team Bondi’s results at the time. This is most likely why the game received the full open world treatment we all experienced months ago. With the amount of involvement Rockstar had during development, it is unlikely that any plans for a sequel or the inherent gameplay would be impacted by the bankruptcy of Team Bondi. If this rumor proves to be true, what are your thoughts? Did Team Bondi get what it deserves for the treatment of their employees? Do salary employees deserve overtime? Is “crunch time” too prevalent in the development of video games? Would you be against “crunch time” if it meant less quality in your favorite video game? Post below! |
I don’t think this is so much a “Team Bondi getting what they deserve” situation as it is a “We promised hundreds of employees overtime pay for three-four years and there’s no way we can possibly pay this without Rockstar loving us. Let’s declare bankruptcy, liquidating a lot of our debts, and get funding from someone else without owing much money to our employees.”
Sounds like what they’d do.
But whether overtime was promised or not isn’t clear. As a former salaried employee myself, there where times where I would be “asked” (meaning told) to stay late or come in on weekends and there was never any extra pay for that. It was understood. Now, it wasn’t 80 – 100 hours a week or anything, and I’m not saying that there doesn’t need to be a serious eye kept on this in the future. I’m just saying it happens. I was hoping that those workers would see compensation for their OT in the form of bonuses due to how successful the game has been, but the bankruptcy filing could jeopardize that.