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Striking Distance Studios

Is this your company?

Once a great studio with great talent, now mismanaged and exhausting - Senior Software Engineer Striking Distance Studios Employee Review

2.0
Aug 18, 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Early leadership fostered creativity, collaboration, and strong team culture. Some engineers are paid competitively. Benefits were very good at the start (this has since been reduced/changed to very average benefits). Talented team members (though many have since left). The studio still has potential if leadership course-corrects.

Cons

Current leadership (under CEO Steve Papoutsis) makes top-down decisions without involving teams. Redundant meetings waste time instead of streamlining work. “Not mandatory” overtime, but heavily implied through the “inappropriate hours” Slack channel where leadership stays online in zoom meetings until the late evening, leaving feedback that feels like it requires immediate response. Severe pay disparities: some engineers earn fair wages, others are grossly underpaid for equal or greater workloads. Layoffs prioritized cutting those who voiced concerns/opinions to leadership or who didn’t put in late-night hours, regardless of talent or contributions. Most of the great leadership and talent left after being overworked and underpaid.

Explore other reviews about Striking Distance Studios

5.0
Oct 24, 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Flexible teams, awesome people, passionate leadership

Cons

None that I know of

3.0
Aug 20, 2025
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

-Projects are cool -People are cool -People are extremely talented -Overall a good place to work

Cons

-Despite being a small team, there is a giant silo between leadership and the rest of the team. This causes lots of communication breakdowns which are made up for with an abundance of meetings. -Leadership dislikes when ideas are questioned at times, but encourages being questioned. It's a double edge sword. -Sometimes development cycles get burned needlessly fully implementing an idea instead of questioning at the outset. -Bonuses and raises only handed to a select few regardless if employees meet their goals. It makes the highly structured, time and energy consuming review process pretty much pointless.

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