Like, in a contract a company says that you can't work for the competitors.
Is everyone on steam a competitor?
Is a company making AAA FPS games competing against an indie making some platformer game?
Posted Oct 27, 2022, 2:48 PM UTC
This is a question for a lawyer and/or whoever wrote the contract at your company. If they're inclined to bring a lawsuit over something then what you think they mean is a lot less important than what they think it means.
In general, noncompetes in games say you can't work for a competitor while also working for them. If that provision survives the termination/expiration of the contract, that's a pretty bad deal and you should probably not sign that. A month or two is one thing, or a longer period with a very narrow list of competitors, but in general those kinds of provisos are bad and/or not legal depending on where you live/work.
Many game studios I know only really consider direct competitors. A AAA team working on an F2P battle royale shooter may not care if an employee is moonlighting on their own indie platformer, but would be really upset if that same employee is making their own F2P shooter. Some game studios would consider basically anything a competitor. You won't know the difference without talking to them or posting the specific wording of the contract.
Good question. In ca these are unenforceable.
Also in Europe (or at least parts of Europe)
This is true everywhere in the US(even super conservative states).
NaL, but I’ve heard most non-competes are completely unenforceable.
It really depends on the country too.
If I remember it correctly it was absolutelly valid in The Netherlands ... as long as you paid the person for the entire period of the non-compete (so if you want somebody not to "work for the competition" for 2 years, you have to pay them a salary for those 2 years).
In lots of places a non-compete is really just a way to try and scare employees away from moving to other companies (as they're naturally more likelly to go do something they have more and more recent experience doing, which tends to be the kind of thing they're currently doing)
I believe in many other countries it's also not valid per-contract law itself if you're not paying somebody for the service of "refraining from going to work for the competition".
Yep, not a problem in the US game dev market. Ive worked at companies where people left to work at direct rivals (and this was at EA too). If they arent willing to sue, its probably not worth a companies time.
Just work for who you want, its a free country
IANAL, but touched some legal bullshit with employer long time ago.
This is not legal advice, consult YOUR lawyer if you want specific details. Company lawyer may not be at your side.
A lot of stuff in contracts is specifically vague to sue you if they want.
A lot of stuff in contracts is actually unenforceable, especially if you live in a country with strong employee protection rights. Contracts can't override laws and in a lot of countries there is freedom to work as you want.
Sometimes they do this as extension of NDA. NDAs are enforceable, but with caveats (e.g. you need to prove damages, but overall just don't be a dick and reasonably keep your mouth shut).
Sometimes this stuff is overly specific (e.g. can't work on VR AI-generated games) and is tied to your NDA. In those cases it's probably enforceable.
And there is another side to the story. Suing your employee is a fastest way to end your company. People don't like to be sued, people don't like when their friends and colleagues are sued, and people don't want to work for a company that is suing employees. It creates very toxic atmosphere.
Means whatever they would be willing to sue you. If you're willing to sue back then you need an actual lawyer.
That kind of language is a relic of tech industry practices from the early 2000's, designed to keep, like, social media apps from poaching employees who then smuggle code on the way out.
To be perfectly honest, in six years in this industry, I have both never seen a company enforce it, nor do I know anyone that has. Not once have I ever heard of a game company enforcing a non-compete. Most put them in contracts as blanket boilerplate and if you ask if you can take it out, they go "yeah, no problem".
The only thing that has any real teeth are noncompetes about concurrent service (i.e. "you can't be making games for other companies while you're making games full-time for us"). And even those are used pretty scantly nowadays, and again, I've never heard of one being enforced.
Last 2 times i got an offer like this I responded saying something like "I'm ready to sign, except that I find this language vague. Can we remove it?"
And they did. It can be that easy.
You can also try crossing it out, putting your initials there, and returning it =)
Non-competes are usually not enforceable unless you work in sales and actively take customers with you when you go.
The right to work supersedes employer protection in most cases.
Say if you were working with treyarch or infinity ward on a call of duty title, working for the battlefield devs on the side would be a thing.
Or working for 343 and working for bungie on the side.
Definitely ask for specifics, but one interpretation is companies that make games for the same platform, in the same genre, etc.
So for example, I've worked at companies that made MMOs, and as long as you weren't working on an MMO they were fine with it. I've worked at companies where they don't let you work on anything videogames at all - try to avoid these if at all possible. And I've worked at mobile companies where they were fine with me making non-mobile games. Some companies let you work on whatever you want, but they have 'right of first refusal', which means that if you're working on something and you're going to talk to publshers, you need to show it to your employer first in case they might be interested in publishing it. A lot of places will ask you to fill out a form if you're working on side projects, detailing what the game is, platforms, etc, so they can keep records. It varies from company to company, and from CEO to CEO.
If you're interviewing, ask for them to clarify exactly what they mean, and to put it in your contract if it isn't there already. If you're already working someplace, ask HR for specifics, ideally in writing. It helps to have you bases covered just in case.
When I ran my own company I basically informally told the employee so long as it's not a direct competitor it's fine. And if they are uncertain just ask me anytime. It's actually less about worrying competing companies using the idea, but more of hoping to avoid our competitor poaching our employees
But legally it's not enforceable as everyone said, but it's mainly to minimize conflict of interest
well from employers perspective people you hire isn't always "just workers" they are also "investments" so in such cases is very normal that they don't want "invest" in somebody who will use its skills for potential competitor even if its not "immediate" competitor
its definitely not always the case, but i just would talk about it with employee
Thank you, it does look like the best way is to inform the company.
It's usually legally kept vague so that they can claim whatever they don't like personally as a competitor. I'd just ask HR for more details on specifics for where you work personally. Some companies tend to be pretty decent with letting people work on their own indie projects etc whilst some really don't like it.
Thank you, it does look like the best way is to inform the company.
If you’re talking about a non-compete clause, they are almost always completely unenforceable. As long as you aren’t stealing actual assets from the previous company, you’ll be fine working wherever you’d like.
This. What I do on my time is my own business, so long as I use personal hardware and don't copy+pasta code from my day job.
Ask them, they'll likely try to tell you they own your waking thoughts 24/7. Just put walls around your stuff and don't plagarize/reuse proprietary work and never tell them if you publish something. Fuck em. r/antiwork they don't own any more than they pay you for.
When I start at a new company I always ask to have it added into the contract that I'm allowed to work on and release personal projects.