... in Press Reset [Schreier] draws a broader portrait of the volatile videogame industry. He follows the employees at a number of companies as they navigate the highs and lows of a rewarding yet frequently chaotic line of work.

Through first-rate reporting and dozens of first-hand interviews, Schreier walks us through the process of making games through the eyes of the people who make them. We also get to explore the business side of things, watching as executives insert themselves into the process regardless of whether they actually know anything about video games.

Schreier’s first book, Blood, Sweat and Pixels, was a sort of collection of those types of stories, the tales behind how big games came to life, or almost didn’t. His second book, Press Reset: Ruin and Recovery in the Video Game Industry, is a little more harrowing. In Press Reset, Schreier is focusing mainly on the failures, though maddeningly, the failures that can often come with success.

An entire book could be written about the saga of 38 Studios. In Press Reset, the video game industry journalist Jason Schrei­er covers it in a few dozen pages.

Schreier directs his focus toward the volatility of the businesses through which they are created and sold. The author recognizes that such an industry doesn’t generate $150 billion in global revenue without its share of defeats and melodrama.