CCP Reviews

Current Employee – been working at CCP full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – There's always plenty of challenging and ambitious projects, the team is great and there is always a willingness to do better. At CCP there's an opportunity to work in the game industry while at the same time working on a solid long-term project, EVE Online is 10 years old and still going strong.

Cons – CCP has had its share of growing pains, the vibrancy and spirit of a startup company doesn't really scale. The company has gone through some restructuring which has taken some time, but seems to be heading in a good direction.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

Former Employee – worked at CCP full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – The company-provided meals were outstanding. Company has devotion to producing top shelf visuals. Concerned about developing a strong company culture. Has positive attitudes regarding sex and gender expression issues.

Cons – No private work spaces ... everything out in open. Move to new offices in Atlanta created noise issues. Ongoing tendency to reinvent the wheel as far as tech and graphics go. There was a "not invented here" attitude whenever a new lead level manager took over a department resulting in multiple do-overs in game design and graphics during my tenure. Few female developers in any career discipline in US offices, especially after 2011 layoff. Squeaky wheel focus of Icelandic management team constantly hampered development of US based project.

Advice to Senior Management – Take some of the financial focus on leisure activities and put it into recruiting developers at competitive salaries. Simplify investment in the company for all employees. Create clear growth opportunities for employees within the company. Provide non-discriminatory benefits for US employees.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

Former Employee – worked at CCP full-time

Pros – Free lunch everyday, sometime breakfast and dinner as well. Easy to get a day off no matter what.

Cons – Managers are not good in general especially Icelanders and good managers are leaving the company. If you are not Icelander, you may be sometime intimidated. Some people do unnecessary traveling and earning money from per diem. No career path.

Former Employee – worked at CCP full-time for more than a year

Pros – Great work environment if you're self motivated. Plenty of great benefits and laid back environment.

Cons – Cronyism. If you're not Icelandic and work on EVE, get out.

Advice to Senior Management – Get rid of the deadweight.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at CCP full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – Talented, passionate people working there. Easy to make great friends. Fantastic folks to work with.

A real love for making games that people want to play.

Even when laying employees off, they provided a great deal of support in the process: HR went above and beyond to help place former employees where they could.

Pay wasn't super-competitive, but benefits like the cantina are incredible.

Cons – Not enough trust given to the American employees. We had veterans who'd been in the field for a decade or more being told their experience didn't mean anything; they had to do things in accordance with the Reykjavik way. There was a distinct feeling of the Old Boys Club.

Difficult to advance internally. Some positions had no job descriptions attached to them -- nothing outlining their responsibilities and skillsets -- for years.

Management had difficulty accepting the possibility they might be wrong. The most heartfelt admission of making mistakes happened only when 20% of the company had to be let go. By then, it was too late.

Advice to Senior Management – There are ways that CCP excels by not doing things the way that other companies do things. There are also weaknesses in the company that come from the same attitude. Please, look critically at the internal practices. Building EVE is something to be rightfully proud of. But heavy employee dissatisfaction is a grave warning sign that something is continually going wrong, not something to be shrugged off and set on the back burner.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at CCP full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – Some really great, passionate coworkers.

Cons – Weak and inexperienced senior management. Too much nepotism.

Advice to Senior Management – Pay your people what they're worth, make them feel valued, and they will stay loyal.

Former Employee – worked at CCP full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – The people at this company were amazing. There was a very strong social atmosphere that encouraged everyone to get to know each other, spend some non-work time together, and the working relationships with most of the people flourished because of it.

Cons – There were some issues with management communication and a disconnect between some upper management with the lower level employees. Some decisions that were made the employees feel left out or confused because it affected them the most.

Advice to Senior Management – Please make sure you reward hard working people and really listen to them when they have advice on a position or can best communicate the needs of that position. They are the people who are performing the tasks daily, so they would know best the constraints and feasibility of requests. Also, allow your staff to progress within the company. If they shine, give them the opportunity to move up and take on more responsibilities.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at CCP full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – Getting industry experience and getting a foot in the industry

Cons – Poor salary and a upper management that doesn't listen to its employees or customers.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at CCP

Pros – Free lunches are awesome! The cantina staff are second to none and are probably the most upbeat group of people in the studio. Why they don't run their own restaurant is beyond me. (They'd certainly make more money.)

Cons – The biggest issue at CCP is the distinct lack of true transparency from top management down to the employees who actually build the games. There are far too many secret back-room meetings that never get communicated out to the rest of us, even though they tell us that transparency is important. In a nutshell, top management are the type to tell you: do as we say, not as we do. Loving nonsensical pie charts, bar graphs, and point plots is a requirement to understand anything about the development of the game.

If you're not working on EVE, then no one really cares what you're doing. It's the religion of the studio and if you don't worship it, then you won't have much in common with a lot of the employees. If you're Icelandic, then you're cool! Life is great. make sure to slip into Icelandic tongue around your American colleagues so we have no idea what you're talking about. If you're American... that's nice. Go get some coffee and keep working.

True advancement, say from an artist position to discipline director or producer, is impossible. The studio hierarchy is engineered to place people into cubbies for the duration of your time at the studio. If you're brought on as a Senior Environment Artist, you will only ever be that. If you express an interest in exploring what it would be like to be the Art Director, for instance, you'll be given a pat on the back for communicating your interest, but nothing will ever happen. They say that there are plenty of opportunities for internal advancement, but I have yet to see it happen.

Last time I checked, many of us were being underpaid by $10,000 to $15,000 annually compared to other studios in the Atlanta area. That comes out to being underpaid 15-20% compared to industry averages. Over time, knowing you aren't being paid your true average worth begins to wear on you.

Advice to Senior Management – Adverbially obsessed CCP,

You might try looking around at the amazing talent you're wasting, and try not to waste it. People will eventually leave and find a studio at which their talents will be harnessed. You had to lay off industry-renowned veterans who pioneered many aspects of 3D art because of hubris and losing your vision for the future because you were blinded by the dollar signs when things were good.

Listen to your lowly artists and content developers, not just people with "Senior", "Producer", and "Director" in their titles. I have to see any of those big-titled people contribute much more than unnecessary meeting invites that interrupt production. With the amount of mid and high level management the studio has, you would think the products you're developing would be well managed, on-time, and under budget. Nothing is ever really on time, budgets aren't guaranteed, and quality can be lacking. You might want to examine the structure of the studio from the ground up to see how you can make it a true agile environment for talented people, and less of a rhetoric factory where brainwashing and false promises are the cattle prods of choice.

Stop with the meetings. Games would ship on time if not for the insane amount of meetings after meetings to discuss every single point to the point of exhaustion. At some point, you need to strap in and build something and just try it out. Less meetings, more doing. Action, not discussion.

Pay your employees industry averages. If you feel so honored to be hosting amazing industry talent, then paying them what they're worth shouldn't be a big deal. Time to put your money where your mouth is, CCP.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at CCP

Pros – Good meals, good fun people.

Cons – Communication between manager level people and working level people.