Misguided software engineering department. You won't learn anything about good software development here. - Anonymous employee Big Fish Games Employee Review

1.0
Apr 27, 2014
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The people like having fun -- it's easy to make friends here. Interesting technical challenges.

Cons

Poor management in software engineering. They claim to be "agile" but there is nothing agile about the way they work -- it's really "waterfall" style sprinkled with scrum meetings. I worked on several projects. We spent hours upon hours planning and re-planning entire projects 6 months into the future. When the schedules inevitably slip, we cut corners and cancelled test automation work, requiring entire teams to run manual regression tests on nights and weekends while last-minute bug fixes trickled in. Promotions don't make sense, they're usually based on who makes more noise rather than actual contributions. Retrospective meetings were mostly a facade -- managers didn't welcome negative feedback. Suggestions for improving the development process were often discouraged and frowned upon. People got made fun of by managers for thinking unit tests were a good idea. Technical debt is rampant, even in services/tools that should be long-lived. Good user experience is not prioritized, resulting in bad products that fail in production. Individual contributors clearly not valuable as people to management, treated like interchangeable parts.

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5.0
Mar 24, 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Flexible schedule, great pay, non-toxic culture

Cons

Might not have long-term career advancement anymore.

1
3.0
May 15, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good autonomy mostly, some very strong teams.

Cons

Leadership had trouble finding a successful direction for the company.

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