Re:Head of Remote Work
by 908B64B197 on Sunday December 27, 2020 @01:58PM
(#25553330)
Hierarchical or not, keep in mind Valve was making an enormous amount of money the whole time. Steam is, by far, their most profitable business.
They are also extremely selective when it comes to hiring (they are fairly small but get applicants from literally all over). So that some approach worked for Valve won't necessary work for RandomCo Inc where software is viewed as a cost center, simply because they can't attract the same caliber of talent.
I was being ironic, but decided to write the comment in an ambiguous way as was honestly curious which tack HN would take.
The Alyx story you link is probably a great example of the greatest strength being diversity: where diversity often means breaking your own rules when appropriate.
Even the Roman Republic's Senate reserved the power to appoint an omnipotent dictator in times of need.
Alyx, once it gained steam, ended up turning into a hierarchical project and the largest in the company history, and was the only way Source 2 ever got finished (since they now had people waiting on it to get the game working). And it worked, as we finally now have proof that VR is a great way to tell stories. The book is excellent, and goes on sale often on Steam.
(A decent summary of the book is here: https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/07/valve-secrets-spill-o...)