Riot Games Reviews

Pros

- Some of the most caring and thoughtful, passionate and skilled people I've ever worked with - Riot is built around a heavy focus on its people, it really cares about their comfort and does a lot to try to be a great working environment. (a lot of that isn't accessible during COVID-19, but the spirit is there. - Has made significant strides in addressing press-reported D&I challenges, but has more to do (as does everyone) - Really great products in League of Legends and VALORANT; some true world-class expertise. - If you're at Riot, you want to be on a game team: League of Legends, VALORANT, even Legends of Runeterra. Wild Rift is more painful potentially... IP/Creative is probably good too. You really want to heavily avoid anything relating to the central teams or "publishing". - This company has incredible potential, but see the cons section below as to why it's a problem

Cons

Riot is truly a place that struggles because it scaled too quickly and never figured out its leadership layer correctly. So, all the successes of the company are found in the part of the company that is valuable: GAMES. The current CEO, Nicolo is a good person, who ultimately cares a lot about the company and the employees, but doesn't have what it takes to lead. It's just a sad reality. He doesn't know how to create games (he never has done this), he doesn't know how to hold his publishing team accountable (he built it, it's pretty much all he's done in his career and so he doesn't know how truly terrible it is), he doesn't know how to prioritize or focus (his approach is always the biggest bets, not necessarily the smartest bets and he's been unwilling to change anything materially--it sounds big at first, but it ends in status quo), he doesn't know how to delegate (he holds his decisions close to himself and doesn't even delegate to his leadership team). He doesn't know how to set strategy (he just talks big talks about things that have nothing to do with the historic success of the company and are not even necessarily valuable moves--I'm being vague for Glassdoor... but basically distractions). He's also not your inspiration type leader either--that's ok. but he's very low empathy and pretty arrogant, which makes him gaffe-prone. Under his leadership he has further eroded accountability and has not furthered "rewards" for "risk"--people internally ask themselves "why should I bust-ass for Riot? why don't I just go somewhere else to gain more upside or grow?". Now, the truth of this is: this really mostly matters if you're director level up. If you're an incredible IC or Senior, that wants to make games and you've got a dream job on League, well then take it. It'll make you very happy, you should get paid well, and the game teams are legitimate. It matters for directors up because you're the ones who have to deal with this level of top-level incompetence. Riot refuses to get a handle on their social media and that blows up? Boom, you're now stuck in 1:1 with annoyed sometimes entitled employees. You drive impact and are successful? Well, too bad: there's no real growth for you, or maybe it's all going to be decided behind closed doors anyway. There are no plans to have growth, no true mentorship, no skip-level investment. You only advance when someone else leaves or by luck of the constant incompetent org shuffles. Of course, if you've got a great manager you're in great shape. But basically it's all local, be in a great situation, you're in great shape. This all feels like maybe it's getting better... but it's way too slow and poorly executed and just a failure of the top leadership team. They don't know how to empower or raise. They're mostly working hard and well meaning, but this is literally what happens when people are stretched into roles that they are not equipped to do and rise to their level of incompetence. And it's hurting the company--because the great talent is leaving. The thing is there is no true top-leadership team, it's just a collection of some mostly great leaders that don't have empowerment, it's just the Nicolo show. Here's the deal: - Game teams and R&D: The true magic of Riot. These work well. - Publishing: led by a truly bad leader who doesn't know what he's doing; no accountability. Ridiculously over-funded to the detriment of other parts of the company that need the resources--with not much to show for it (I know, Riot can do pretty awesome marketing, but that STARTS on the game team, or succeeds despite this organization because of a few heroes) - Central Tech/Riot GO/Central Platform: Really concerning implementation of an idea that could work, but because of bad tech choices, or leadership decisions and the way they are placed is a bit of a mess. Getting better, but concerning. - HR&Finance, etc.: Both hilariously over-funded and under-funded at the same time. These teams were historically dis-empowered at Riot and so have so much org/tech debt. They struggle to pay it off with their team staff sizes and meanwhile were over-funded historically, but mismanaged, so it's a weird game here. Also, company culture wants to ignore this stuff. It sucks. - IP/Creative: IP is important, but under-funded; focus should be on games, but is instead getting pulled into other things that are distractions. Can't mandate, always has to partner. Historically was a very weak team with struggling leadership, now doing significantly better.

Pros

Will caveat that I work on League which I hear is one of the best places in the company: * A lot of agency when it comes to the specifics of your work. * Coworkers genuinely invested in the success and player enjoyment of games. * Not an office politics environment. * Great perks & pay.

Cons

* Maturity can be lacking in process and individual behavior sometimes. * Work/life balance can be pretty bad if you're not structured about it. While the company does a great job of not requiring you to be plugged in at all times, it doesn't do much to dissuade the social example of people posting work updates on Slack at 11pm.

Pros

- Products you work on are games and entertainment that people all over the world are passionate about. Easy to find motivation if you are intrinsically motivated. - Relaxed culture, not too many places in the org where you will find hard deadlines, and even in the cases where there are there is not a lot of pressure from management or leadership. This does lead to low performers overstaying at Riot for far too long, even when they have shown their peak, and high performers not getting compensated for their value because nobody cares quite frankly. - Decent compensation, particularly for gaming. For engineers however, compensation lags greatly behind what you can get at a FAANG or other startups. Overall Riot is a safe place to work, and with that comes the good and the bad. If you are a 2x3 or 3x2 on a 9 box (which you will be graded on), you can expect to stay at Riot as long as you want at a decent compensation. Riot's games are mostly pandemic-proof and recession-proof. However, if you are a 3x3 you will be underpaid and can find better opportunities elsewhere.

Cons

- After the League of Legends 10 year anniversary announcement and launching our new games, the company is struggling to find it's next big goal and that is squarely on Nicolo and the LC1 team. The MMO is good enough as a goal for now, but for some of the big picture goals that the leadership team has been saying for years, Riot is not taking the big bets required to get there because there is not a concrete vision. - Pay bands and changes to job architecture, particularly for technology/engineering, are causing many high performers to exit the company. Their compensation is effectively stuck outside of their 3% annual raise until they can get to the next band or PX+. Riot has some ways around this (cash & stay bonuses, etc.) but this has not stopped the deluge of high performers from leaving over the last 3 years, and has and will only get worse over 2021, especially after the payout in March.

Pros

Great product (League) Passionate people Great benefits

Cons

Becoming overrun by people looking for Riot and Riot Leadership to represent each and every single one of their moral beliefs, and if they don't - are willing to publicly drag the company through the dirt. The sense of entitlement was incredible, and I'm not sure what leadership is supposed to do about it. People aren't bad for wanting what they want, they're totally entitled to the opinion, but I don't know if anyone that leans right politcally would ever feel comfortable saying so lest be best upon by the far left leaning crowd. People voicing that they're burnt out when they only put a solid 3-4 hours of work in during a day drove me up the wall.

Pros

Good response to COVID (ability to work remote during COVID), especially helpful for pet owners Decent wages for immediate area living (if don’t need a big place and don’t hold out for bonuses) Female camaraderie is good, can tell you who to avoid – development is easier to be insulated from it, but not in PR or marketing They put changes in effect in 2018, but they don’t seem to have “stuck” and it’s more business as usual, seems more outward for show

Cons

Cons Have to work irregular hours to cover for other time zones, especially in PR Poor treatment and awareness for female employees and harassment allegations Nepotism, even in game design departments (Valorant, R&D) Poor awareness and disregard for business strategies with proven discriminatory nations and leaders (NEOM partnership), press will listen to you more than company will Boss feedback is rare unless negative Development team (Valorant) have to fight to get updates on features Lots of overseas coordination can get exhausting Despite PR blitz to show they are changing and provide a safer work place, it’s mostly a corporate front for outside eyes looking in Company’s vision for future does not inspire confidence