Do they provide their own money for projects? I would bet that they do. It seems like most of the trouble comes from developers having to answer to a publisher, i.e. the check writer. Developers make ridiculous promises on timeline, to get the contract to make the game. Then the publisher makes ridiculous demands…

Stop planning your project that tight then. If there are always “vagaries” that you can’t account for, then you CAN account for them. You know they will happen. I’ve worked at good studios that knew this, and knew that 80% capacity in a schedule was really 100%. You can bet that remaining 20% will evaporate in all the…

It may be really easy for a programmer to change companies. Look on any game studio website and you see that they need programmers. Not as much for designers, artists, QA. You know, the people that do literally everything else.