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private:kizstudios
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https://www.glassdoor.com?employer_id=288908
|
Nov 20th, 2017 12:00AM
|
Open
|
Open
|
Kiz Toys
|
Lead Character Artist
|
Charleston, SC
|
|
Former Employee
|
|
Great place to work and grow as an artist.
|
Could have better communication between development teams.
|
1.0
|
POSITIVE
|
1.0
|
POSITIVE
|
|
|
0.0
|
5.0
|
0.0
|
0.0
|
0.0
|
0.0
|
0.0
|
|
288908
|
Open
|
|
0.0
|
[]
|
REGULAR
|
No
|
No
|
|
6.0
|
|
|
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Kiz Studios
|
|
|
|
private:kizstudios
|
https://www.glassdoor.com?employer_id=288908
|
Jun 3rd, 2017 12:00AM
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Open
|
Open
|
Kiz Toys
|
|
United States
|
USA
|
Don't work here
|
|
- Location
- Projects
- It's a job
|
- Poor leadership
- Lack of experience: Somehow, after working as a mobile game studio for many years, they still have no idea what they are doing. They don't know how to make money and they don't know how to ship a game, plain and simple.
- Nepotism: The "core" of the studio are all siblings or college buddies. If they every make any money, the raises will go to them or whatever elaborate money laundering scheme keeps this place running.
- Low salaries
- Terrible health benefits
- Missed paychecks
- No place to move up
- You42 - whatever that is, is somehow the parent company of the studio. Look it up if you need a good laugh.
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
|
|
0.0
|
1.0
|
1.0
|
1.0
|
1.0
|
1.0
|
1.0
|
|
288908
|
Open
|
- Be very cautious about ramping up / hiring. Be a shame to do yet another 95% staff layoff. I would just keep the company slim, so you don't affect the lives of others with your mistakes and inexperience.
- Try to educate yourself on making money from mobile, there's a lot to study and learn. One of the things I heard that works for a lot of companies is advertising, for example.
- Consider new management and staff, the ones you have working for you now haven't lead you to success in 7+ years, what has changed about them?
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0.0
|
[]
|
REGULAR
|
No
|
No
|
|
2.0
|
|
|
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Kiz Studios
|
|
|
|
private:kizstudios
|
https://www.glassdoor.com?employer_id=288908
|
May 14th, 2017 12:00AM
|
Open
|
Open
|
Kiz Toys
|
|
Johns Island, SC
|
|
Completely Wasted Potential
|
|
Great people. Very talented. Passionate. It's getting a little depressingly difficult to fill up this 20 word minimum with honesty.
|
Literally everything else:
Opinions are basically ignored and a lot of the time are not encouraged.
No communication regarding the state of the company.
Seemingly jealous of any success of employees in personal unrelated ventures, would threaten job.
Most people were underpaid and didn't receive raises.
Yearly reviews never happened.
Kept people around just because they've been there forever, who were either really difficult to work with or didn't work at all.
Local management would suddenly want to be involved in development, making snap decisions. Products didn't follow any logical design pattern. Art first meant products got way too far along without determining if the core ideas were any good.
Would make insane decisions, like releasing an alpha to a tiny tiny demographic and wondering why no one saw it. Or sitting on a few products waiting to release them for no particular reason. Or to discourage anyone from suggesting change or growth. Or continuing a business model that was previously unsuccessful FOR NINE YEARS.
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
-1.0
|
DISAPPROVE
|
0.0
|
1.0
|
5.0
|
2.0
|
1.0
|
2.0
|
5.0
|
|
288908
|
Open
|
It's too late for any advice. The company ran itself into the ground because it didn't have the courage to do what made sense.
|
0.0
|
[]
|
REGULAR
|
No
|
No
|
|
1.0
|
|
|
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Kiz Studios
|
|
|
|
private:kizstudios
|
https://www.glassdoor.com?employer_id=288908
|
May 5th, 2017 12:00AM
|
Open
|
Open
|
Kiz Toys
|
|
Charleston, SC
|
|
Unfortunate Times
|
|
Relaxed work environment.
Talented and friendly team.
Fantastic work-life balance.
Studio heads are easy to talk to and quite friendly.
PTO, and decent benefits.
Flexible with time when it comes to personal and family stuff.
A lot of opportunities to branch out of your comfort zone and build your skill set.
Cost of living isn't terrible, and can be very affordable depending on where your looking.
A lot of good BBQ.
Charleston is a really nice city.
|
Feature creep seems to occur a lot resulting in excessive development time. Not enough time spent developing an idea and working out the technical aspects before jumping into production. This can be frustrating for everyone involved, when what started as a nice and simple idea grows into something that even the leads don't want to manage.
Not enough resources are put into properly marketing the games that are produced resulting in a small user base, which inevitably hurts the the bottom line. Some games were better than others, but none were really given the time in the spotlight that was deserved. A lot of people simply haven't heard of the games or the studio itself.
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
0.0
|
NO_OPINION
|
0.0
|
2.0
|
5.0
|
4.0
|
2.0
|
4.0
|
3.0
|
|
288908
|
Open
|
Starting simple and straightforward with an idea that can be proven to work before it begins its journey down the pipeline would help the overall development process.
Developing games for other property's would go a long way to help the studios brand.
Big ideas are great, but smaller and more manageable projects are what are going to help build the foundation to let you produce those big ideas.
Invest more in getting the word out about your products!
The studio has come a long way and overcome a lot of obstacles. I really hope the company can manage to get back to a better version of itself for the sake of both current employees and former ones who didn't have a choice in parting ways.
|
0.0
|
[]
|
REGULAR
|
No
|
No
|
|
0.0
|
|
|
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Kiz Studios
|
|
|
|
private:kizstudios
|
https://www.glassdoor.com?employer_id=288908
|
Mar 31st, 2017 12:00AM
|
Open
|
Open
|
Kiz Toys
|
|
Charleston, SC
|
|
Friendly Chaos
|
|
Talented employees (used to work there). Some of the management was friendly.
|
Horrible management. A majority of the studio was laid off without notice. Every project was "feature creep to completion".
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
|
|
2.0
|
1.0
|
5.0
|
3.0
|
1.0
|
2.0
|
1.0
|
|
288908
|
Open
|
Get better management. Design games before you start making them, promote your games, stop trying to make mobile games, and listen to your employees ideas.
|
0.0
|
[]
|
REGULAR
|
No
|
No
|
|
4.0
|
|
|
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Kiz Studios
|
|
|
|
private:kizstudios
|
https://www.glassdoor.com?employer_id=288908
|
Mar 30th, 2017 12:00AM
|
Open
|
Open
|
Kiz Toys
|
|
Charleston, SC
|
|
Meh
|
|
The people are really nice. Relaxed atmosphere. Charleston is a really nice place to live.
|
Company seems very unfocused and disorganized. None of the companies projects have been profitable.
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
|
|
2.0
|
2.0
|
4.0
|
2.0
|
1.0
|
2.0
|
1.0
|
|
288908
|
Open
|
Invest in the people that work there. Invest in the projects
|
0.0
|
[]
|
REGULAR
|
No
|
No
|
|
4.0
|
|
|
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Kiz Studios
|
|
|
|
private:kizstudios
|
https://www.glassdoor.com?employer_id=288908
|
Apr 24th, 2016 12:00AM
|
Open
|
Open
|
Kiz Toys
|
|
Charleston, SC
|
|
A Mess
|
|
The intellectual property is good and there's some talented people working there.
|
Management is awful/unqualified and nepotism is the bane of the studio. The development cycles take far too long for the products being produced, primarily because the people in charge have no idea what they are doing.
Early game development emphasizes art, which leads to over-attachment to bad game designs. This results in bad products and development hell.
Did I mention development hell? Games meander in development for years due to constant redesign and lack of direction.
Quietly dropped production of a title in Early Access on Steam without
Raises are practically unheard of.
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
|
|
1.0
|
1.0
|
4.0
|
2.0
|
2.0
|
3.0
|
1.0
|
|
288908
|
Open
|
Replace the management with qualified people. Hold failing management responsible for their failures rather than ignoring it.
|
0.0
|
[]
|
REGULAR
|
No
|
No
|
|
4.0
|
|
|
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Kiz Studios
|
|
|
|
private:kizstudios
|
https://www.glassdoor.com?employer_id=288908
|
Jan 15th, 2016 12:00AM
|
Open
|
Open
|
Kiz Toys
|
|
United States
|
USA
|
Good Experience
|
|
The people were very nice, very relaxed atmosphere. Treated employees often with food and outings when able. Lots of feedback on performance helped you know where you were at with the company.
|
Occasional overtime (though, not often), and lacking the ability to flex work hours of you had a longer commute.
|
1.0
|
POSITIVE
|
0.0
|
NEUTRAL
|
|
|
1.0
|
3.0
|
3.0
|
4.0
|
2.0
|
2.0
|
4.0
|
|
288908
|
Open
|
Keep employees in the loop about the status of the company, whether things are going well or if there needs to be some backup planning in the works in case someone needs to plan ahead for the sake of taking care of their family.
|
0.0
|
[]
|
REGULAR
|
No
|
No
|
|
0.0
|
|
|
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Kiz Studios
|
|
|
|
private:kizstudios
|
https://www.glassdoor.com?employer_id=288908
|
Aug 13th, 2015 12:00AM
|
Open
|
Open
|
Kiz Toys
|
Design
|
Charleston, SC
|
|
A strange situation.
|
|
Fairly fun work atmosphere. Nice co-workers. Cool ideas were floating around. It's hard to gauge a lot of positives because when I worked there they were going through a really rough time. Hopefully things are better now!
|
Strange location, unstability. There were a few paycheck issues and also a problem with the septic system! They were just getting their feet off the ground so the project management system was rough at the time.
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
|
|
1.0
|
2.0
|
2.0
|
3.0
|
2.0
|
3.0
|
2.0
|
|
288908
|
Open
|
Communicate with your employees! Keep them in the loop as much as possible. Don't try to read their minds and don't force them to have to try to read yours.
|
0.0
|
[]
|
REGULAR
|
No
|
No
|
|
2.0
|
|
|
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Kiz Studios
|
|
|
|
private:kizstudios
|
https://www.glassdoor.com?employer_id=288908
|
Aug 8th, 2013 12:00AM
|
Open
|
Open
|
Kiz Toys
|
|
United States
|
USA
|
Worst company ever.
|
|
There really are no pros to this job. The people working there were alright, but you can tell the company was falling apart and they haven't even gotten started. They literally have not gone anywhere in the 4 years since I left. I don't even know who the hell they are tricking out of their money for this at this point.
|
The pay was infrequent, when I was working there they were getting money from an investor overseas. It was very flaky, and they had to contact our apartment managers multiple times to explain that it really wasn't our fault we couldn't pay rent, they hadn't given us the money yet. When I left they had started draining new angel investors out of their money, those poor people will never see a return.
The company is being literally run into the ground. None of the "managers" there knew what they were doing. Seriously everyone was a kid fresh out of college with NO experience. I actually had some and when I tried to offer my experience I was shot down immediately because I wasn't friends with the managers. I ended up having no work because they couldn't even pick a project to focus on, and instead tried to force me to learn programming - which is something I've wanted to do for years but my brain just cannot wrap around it, I have tried so many times it's not even funny - and then gave me a bad review when I couldn't do something I am incapable of learning.
Stay away, in fact run far far away, do not buy their merchandise and shut this miserable place down.
|
-1.0
|
NEGATIVE
|
|
|
|
|
1.0
|
1.0
|
1.0
|
1.0
|
2.0
|
4.0
|
1.0
|
|
288908
|
Open
|
Should stop trying to be friends with everyone
|
0.0
|
[]
|
REGULAR
|
No
|
No
|
|
0.0
|
|
|
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Mar 15th, 2021 05:07PM
|
Kiz Studios
|
|
|