 Dan Hauser was running down a beach in Colombia, being chased by three men with machetes. This is the story that Dan tells about the foundation of Rockstar Games, and it sounds like something out of one of the studio's video games. According to Dan, he was taking a holiday in South America after his employer, BMG Interactive, was acquired by Take 2 Interactive. Dan's job in the UK no longer existed, and he wasn't sure what to do with himself. This was how he ended up fleeing for his life across Colombia, barely escaping serious injury by jumping in a taxi and hiding in an internet cafe. It was there that Dan checked his email, discovering a message from his brother Sam. The pair had worked together at BMG, and Sam was trying to sell Dan on the merits of moving to New York for a position at Take 2. Dan was hesitant, but considering that he was on the run, it made sense to try a fresh start. This was the start of Rockstar Games, a journey that would eventually lead to the creation of Red Dead Redemption 2. Decades after his misadventures in Colombia, Dan had a goal. Along with his brother, he'd somehow, inexplicably, created one of the most profitable entertainment companies in the world. When Dan and Sam had begun working at Take 2, the company was $100 million in debt. Now, its Rockstar subsidiary was worth billions. There was not just one Rockstar Games. The studio's name had been attached to almost a dozen teams working in various locations around the world. While each of these studios fell under the Rockstar banner, they would each work on their own projects. Sometimes multiple studios would work on the same game, but there was never a time when all Rockstars were involved with a single overarching project. The majority of these Rockstar studios were located across the United Kingdom, based in cities such as London, Leeds and Edinburgh. There was also Rockstar Toronto, Rockstar India, and notably Rockstar San Diego. Where is Rockstar India? All the others get a city and Rockstar India gets an entire country. Hmm. It was Rockstar San Diego that had inspired the creation of the brand's biggest recent release. Formerly named Angel Studios, Rockstar San Diego had created a game titled Red Dead Revolver, which had won some attention before being mostly forgotten about. But the higher-ups within the company had taken notice, and Rockstar San Diego was given another opportunity. They worked hard to create Red Dead Redemption, a spiritual successor to their first game that bore a lot of similarity to the open-world sandbox adventures of the Grand Theft Auto series. This was something new and exciting, and while it was never going to rival the sales power of a main series Grand Theft Auto game, it was clear that there was room to build upon Red Dead Redemption to tell engaging, player-driven stories. While the majority of Rockstar continued work on its upcoming tentpole release, Grand Theft Auto 5, Dan began chatting with the San Diego division in order to come up with the basis for another game in the series. This process took time. It wasn't until a few months later that a broad outline for Red Dead Redemption 2 was finalised. After another year, rough scripts were completed. GTA 5 was still in the late stages of development at this point, but even so, teams from all across the world began conference calls, trying to figure out what would happen in this new cowboy game. Dan had a vision. He wanted Red Dead Redemption 2 to be more than simply just another Rockstar title. Rockstar had been instrumental in kicking off a wave of cinematic video games that told big, bombastic narratives, but all of this existed around the sandbox nature of their games. Sure, a player could play through the game's story from start to finish without deviating from the prescribed path, but instead, the experience that stood out in the public consciousness was the frenetic chaos of ignoring all the rules and playing their own way, going on crime sprees, exploring the environment, and messing around with bugs. As much as this type of gameplay was the focus of Rockstar's efforts, it was becoming increasingly clear that the company hardly had a monopoly on the sandbox genre. More and more games from a variety of different studios offered up a Rockstar-style experience with varying degrees of success, meaning that a new game needed to be more than simply another big open world. Dan knew that it wasn't enough to keep sticking to the same formula. What's more, he was well aware of the ways that gaming had changed in the past few years. Where once, a GTA game was the pinnacle of what could be achieved with a cinematic gaming experience, other studios had created far more emotionally impactful titles. Games like The Last of Us and Bioshock had gone a step further, creating exciting combat-driven experiences that were also rich with smart high-concept storytelling and characters that people genuinely cared about. Peppering a world with bombastic humour and satire was no longer enough. Dan wanted Rockstar's next game to be seen as a higher form of art. But getting people to think of Rockstar and artistic storytelling was going to be no small feat. It didn't help that the company's reputation was murky to say the least. Once upon a time, the company thrived on enormous scandals like Hot Coffee, as well as controversial games like Manhunt and Bully. Rockstar became a target for politicians and lawyers who wanted to make a name for themselves, thanks in large part to the hyper-violent misogynistic content within their games. For a time, Rockstar relished the attention. These controversies helped them to grow their public image and connect with their target demographic of disaffected young boys who relished blood and guts and who wanted to engage with insensitive media that broke social taboos. Dan himself was a big part of this image of Rockstar as the bad boys of video gaming. He earned a reputation as a difficult man to work for, crass and inappropriate as well as incredibly demanding of his staff. This all served the company well for a very long time, but it was clear that the video game landscape was changing. Yes, Rockstar games were as profitable, if not more financially lucrative, than they'd ever been, but Dan could see the writing on the wall. Rockstar needed to evolve. Its games needed to be more nuanced, intelligent and genuinely mature. As the finishing touches were put onto Grand Theft Auto V, Dan drew up plans for the company's next big epic. Red Dead Redemption 2 would take more than anything they'd ever made before. This game needed to be on a completely different level. It would require every single Rockstar studio working around the globe. The bad boys of gaming were about to start crafting their interpretation of an art house game. This was not going to be easy. The problem with creating such a carefully crafted, cinematic experience within an open sandbox world was simply the sheer scope of such a project. The final draft of the script for Red Dead Redemption 2 was over 2,000 pages long and created an 8 foot tall pile of papers on Dan's desk. All of this needed to be recorded by actors. Both voice work and motion capture would be needed as part of a recording process that took 2,200 days in total. Wherever possible, Dan threw himself into the mix. He was always willing to act out a scene to show how it should play out affecting character mannerisms that were used as the basis from which to work for the more professional actors. The motion capture shooting was broken down into segments that would take 2 or 3 weeks and before each one there were 4 days of planning and organisation to make sure that the motion capture teams recorded everything they needed on the day. This was a lot of work and it did take its toll on the creative teams involved with the project. The story of the game itself mirrored the transformation that was taking place within Rockstar. Just as this studio was attempting to find a new place in the modern landscape Red Dead Redemption 2 was built around telling the story of a group of outlaws who were becoming obsolete in a changing western setting that was no longer as wild as it used to be. But just as the game focuses on how this process of evolution could be rocky to say the least Dan's group of gaming outlaws weren't going to have an easy time as they were attempting to earn a more artistic reputation. When Dan granted a rare interview to journalist Harold Goldberg he boasted about how his senior creative team went through intense crunch periods during which they worked 100 hours a week in order to get the game done. What Dan wasn't expecting was how this boast would be interpreted. Commenters across the internet responded by questioning Rockstar's barbaric labour practices wondering about the morality of forcing employees to work this hard. The Wild West era of game development was clearly coming to an end and Rockstar were facing pressure for their continued use of draconian work schedules. Dan attempted to provide some damage control insisting that he was only referring to his core team of senior creatives. They'd only crunched for a few weeks, he insisted and this was done primarily out of a passionate desire to make the best game possible. Aside from this, Dan insisted, overtime work at Rockstar is completely optional. Nobody has to stay late in order to finish their work. The company's employees all across the world simply chose to do so out of a love for their work. It was then that former Rockstar employees and other developers who'd worked on previous games began shining in. Dan had inadvertently whipped up a media storm as people with first-hand experience of working on Rockstar titles shared just how horrid Rockstar could be. Perhaps most tragic among all these was the story of Jen Sandercock who shared about her time working on L.A. Noire. Jen and her team were made to struggle through long hours in a constant grind over a period of what she called literally years of hard work and crunch. Jen has a passion for baking. Since her time on L.A. Noire, she's even gone on to create her own indie game that sent us around making cakes while playing. So Jen decided to liven things up a bit. She used her precious, limited free time to bake a couple of cakes which she then brought into the office. She sent out a mass email inviting everyone to come and enjoy half an hour of cake together one afternoon. This soon morphed into a regular event known as Cake Day. Each week, Jen would use her spare time to bake some cakes which she would bring in to share with everyone. Jen found this tremendously helpful and productive. Not only did cake time allow everyone to rest and relax for a minute, but it helped the team grow closer together. Jen got to know members of plenty of different departments on a first name basis. Now when an error report came in, she knew which specific member of the lighting or audio team she needed to talk to in order to help fix the problem. By her own estimations, more bugs were fixed on Cake Day than on any other day of the week. But then, after a few months, Jen was pulled aside by her boss. He told her that the higher-ups at Rockstar didn't like Cake Day. It looked like the team were slacking off. If she continued to bake cakes and bring them into the office, she was jeopardising her career. And so, heartbroken, Jen immediately stopped baking cakes. She'd already prepared that week's offering, a beautiful, portal-themed Black Forest Ghetto. But she felt so ashamed and embarrassed that it was ultimately left uneaten. Jen's story was not unique. Plenty of other former employees at Rockstar from all over the world, freed from their non-disclosure agreements, shared similar accounts of an oppressive office environment. Newer, younger indie studios began announcing proudly that they'd never had to endure any kind of crunch period while working on their games. Such a practice was old-fashioned and harmful. An open letter resurfaced, penned by the spouses of employees at Rockstar San Diego back when they were working on the original Red Dead Redemption. The letter called for the company to end their inhumane work practices and to allow these employees to spend more time with their families. There was nothing that Dan could do but keep quiet. Rockstar was no stranger to controversy, but this was something new. The gaming community itself was turning against them. All of this would likely be forgotten in the end, swallowed up by the excitement surrounding the release of Rockstar's latest technological masterpiece. Dan and everyone else at Rockstar pushed forward. This was a collaborative effort, taking monumental work from every single studio around the world. After eight years of development and many delays and misdeadlines, Red Dead Redemption 2 was finished. It remained to be seen how critics and players would react to the new game, but Dan was proud of it. He'd created the masterpiece that he'd wanted to make. This was Rockstar's new high point, their most impressive achievement to date. The moral of the story is that if you want to make something you can be proud of, it takes dedication. No matter your previous experience or lack thereof, you can make something that you can be proud of if you just keep going. It could take years, but nothing beats the satisfaction of a job well done. That said, be careful not to get so focused on your goals that you overlook the needs of others. If you're so focused on creating your magnum opus that you cause harm to others, then your achievements will be hollow. Treat those around you with respect, even as you push to achieve your goals. Bear in mind that sometimes, being kind and helpful and generous can be more important than reaching your next milestone. Above all, remember to keep going, even if it takes years and years. Someday, you'll make it to where you want to be.