"Staff were informed of the layoffs today and were given roughly 30 minutes to leave the building, according to one source."

Cold. Plain cold.

"Crunch culture” is well-documented and endemic in the game industry, and Telltale was no exception. Some former employees reported working 14- to 18-hour days or coming in every day of the week for weeks on end. But where most developers go into “crunch mode” in the final months of a game leading up to its launch, they described it as constant. "

I blame employee culture for allowing this kind of thing to happen in the general sense (not necessarily all of these people). This is the exact outcome when one-up-manship is used to make you stand out. It is a domino effect.

"Johnny is a beast. He pulled an allnighter."

"Bill did 48 hours non-stop. What an animal."

"Darlene was here all weekend. What a saint."

"Department A is always on time (everyone works into the weekends"

"Oh, but now department B is on the manager's good side because they work from 6am to 11pm on weekdays AND weekends"

And that piling on just goes on and on and on and on.

I remember hearing from someone that in Germany if a manager asks you if you could stay longer and the employee simply says no, then that's the end of that conversation. There's a respect for one's limits and boundaries without the threat of retaliation from the manager because he didn't get his WITH YOU (like a female dog) that day.

Its one thing to do very long hours one day maybe two during the work week but not every single day for weeks on end. That is certifiably crazy.

Don't ever do it.