After many years of development, developer Team Bondi finally completed and released its massive open world action-adventure game LA Noire in mid-May. Released via publisher Rockstar Games, the title has received solid reviews and sales as it depicts police officers solving crimes in 1940"s Los Angeles. However a new web site has now gone live that claims that the developer took out over 100 names from the game"s final credit sequence. Other people who have worked on the game did get mentioned but only under a "Special Thanks" section rather than under the department they worked under, according to the site.
The web site, LANoirecredits.com, states , "These people devoted their talent, creativity and passion towards the project and, as is common in the games industry, have not been credited because they were not there during the final month or two of production, or other subjective criteria." In fact the web site claims that a number of the Team Bondi team members who are not given credit for their work in LA Noire were laid off from the developer, stating, " ... they were made redundant as art production wound down, and as Quality Assurance work was shifted off-shore to Rockstar"s studios."
The issue of game developers not being given full credit for their work on games, or indeed any credit at all, has been the subject of much debate over the years. The LANoirecredits.com web site says that the game"s developer and publisher should have followed the guidelines of the International Game Developers Association: "As long as developers meet the Guide"s rules for Inclusion, they are eligible for a credit (an Additional credit if they had contributed at least 30 days to the project; a Full credit if they had contributed at least 8 months to the project). "
So far neither Team Bondi nor Rockstar Games has commented on the LANoirecredits.com web site.