Spiders leadership announces audit of working conditions at the studio

Spiders has shared an update following its staff's strike, sharing the results of its mandatory annual negotiations resulting in salary increases and remote working agreements, and announced an audit of the working conditions at the studio.

Minimum salary at the French studio will rise 11%, "aligning with the requests of the union delegation," the Nacon-owned studio said. That's in addition to salary increases of 6.1% that had been previously voted, the firm said.

These increases were decided as part of the studio's mandatory annual negotiations, with the 2025 edition due to take place at the end of this year. Our understanding is that they are not a reaction to last week's open letter, with a studio representative confirming to GamesIndustry.biz that these annual negotiations were due to take place regardless of the strike and had been ongoing "for weeks."

In addition, the company said that it has "no intention to change the working arrangements of employees who are currently working remotely full-time," as this was one of the workers' demands.

Spiders further said that it's launching an audit of the working conditions and environment at the studio, including an "assessment of psychosocial risks."

"For several months, Spiders' management has been engaged in discussions with staff representatives, aiming to reach structuring agreements for the studio's future," the statement also read. "This social dialogue has been at a standstill due to the radical positions expressed by [union] STJV."

French publication Origami reported from Spiders' picket line a couple of days ago (with sister studio Kylotonn joining the movement as well), confirming two meetings between staff and leadership occurred since the original open letter.

That didn't prevent the strike from happening, with staff telling the publication that dialogue with leadership had been "completely stuck" prior to the movement, and saying they simply wanted to "be heard." They added they wanted to continue to be able to "create video games rather than just execute guidelines that tend to change from one day to the other." Representatives added they were hoping for stability.

GamesIndustry.biz reached out to the STJV and Spiders worker representatives to get more information but did not hear back in time for publication.

Workers at Spiders had announced a strike last week, publishing an open letter about alleged mismanagement at the studio. 44 out of Spiders' 95 staff had signed the letter at the time we wrote the story last week.

The studio's latest title, Greedfall 2, is due to launch in Early Access at the end of the month.