{"id":92951,"date":"2019-05-03T19:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-05-03T19:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/news\/2019\/05\/mortal_kombat_studio_netherrealm_accused_of_taking_advantage_of_contracted_workers"},"modified":"2019-05-03T19:00:00","modified_gmt":"2019-05-03T19:00:00","slug":"mortal-kombat-studio-netherrealm-accused-of-taking-advantage-of-contracted-workers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2019\/05\/03\/mortal-kombat-studio-netherrealm-accused-of-taking-advantage-of-contracted-workers\/","title":{"rendered":"Mortal Kombat Studio NetherRealm Accused Of Taking Advantage Of Contracted Workers"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"media_block\"><a href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/c3554d61a2977\/large.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/c3554d61a2977\/small.jpg\" class=\"media_thumbnail\"><\/a><\/div>\n<figure class=\"picture strip\"><a title=\"Mk11\" href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/c3554d61a2977\/mk11.original.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/c3554d61a2977\/mk11.900x.jpg\" alt=\"Mk11\"><\/a><\/figure>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/nintendo-switch\/mortal_kombat_11\">Mortal Kombat 11<\/a><\/strong> has been available on Switch for around a week or two now, and is a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/reviews\/nintendo-switch\/mortal_kombat_11\">mostly pleasing product<\/a> in its own right, but the release has been dampened somewhat by allegations of an abusive work culture at developer, NetherRealm.<\/p>\n<p>A report from <a class=\"external\" href=\"https:\/\/www.usgamer.net\/articles\/netherrealm-studios-crunch-mortal-kombat-injustice-2-contract\">USGamer<\/a> highlights the voices of four individuals who have previously worked as contractors at NetherRealm. While their time with the company came before Mortal Kombat 11&#8217;s development, they tell stories of crunch, stressful workplace conditions, and an environment where managers and full-time employees have taken advantage of those desperately hoping to earn a secure job with the firm.<\/p>\n<p>The issues seem to stem from NeatherRealm&#8217;s core setup, which allegedly contains a selection of contractors mostly made up of staff who are first-time employees in the games industry. One source told USGamer that &#8220;some people from NetherRealm strung temp workers along on purpose just to get through the project&#8221;, going on to reveal that they saw two people &#8220;break down because they could not keep up&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>The number of temporary staff is reportedly high, with competition to secure permanent positions being fierce. One source noted that some of Mortal Kombat&#8217;s Fatality sequences were designed by temp workers hoping to earn one of those lucrative positions, but due to the terms of their contracts, NeatherRealm didn&#8217;t pay them extra for their input or offer them the full-time employment they desired.<\/p>\n<p>It gets worse, too, with an allegation that says the &#8220;lowest tier of contractor employees were put in the same windowless room,&#8221; described by USGamer as &#8220;a box-like, renovated garage that was often filled to the brim with temp workers&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>The report comes just days after former contract artist Beck Hallstedt shared some startling stories of their time at NetherRealm <a class=\"external\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/beckhallstedt\/status\/1121119595279077376\">on social media<\/a>, simultaneously amplifying similarly horrifying stories from other workers in the process. If you&#8217;re interested, you can <a class=\"external\" href=\"https:\/\/www.usgamer.net\/articles\/netherrealm-studios-crunch-mortal-kombat-injustice-2-contract\">read the full report here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><em>We&#8217;ll make sure to keep an eye out for any more news on this one as it develops.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mortal Kombat 11 has been available on Switch for around a week or two now, and is a mostly pleasing product in its own right, but the release has been dampened somewhat by allegations of an abusive work culture at developer, NetherRealm. A report from USGamer highlights the voices of four individuals who have previously [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-92951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nintendo-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92951\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}