Spectrum Studios creative director Jacek Piorkowski has caused controversy in the build-up to the developer’s new game by allegedly requiring employees to have naked sauna sessions.
The situation was highlighted by Patryk Suchy, Lead Recruiter at 8bit, who made a post on LinkedIn calling out the requirement. In the post he says, “This dude, a creative director, requires NAKED SAUNA SESSIONS as a part of work in his studio.”
The post contains screenshots of Piorkowski posting on LinkedIn, responding to a developer who he’d spoken to about the job (these comments have since been edited). Aleksandra Wolna, a narrative designer and writer responds on LinkedIn to Piorkowski potentially offering work, saying: “We already exchanged a few messages in the comments.”
“From what you said, you consider naked sauna sessions part of the work responsibilities in your studio. I told you that was a dealbreaker.”
Piorkowski went on to say: “You had a lot of time to prove me wrong. To write scene in sauna without being in sauna… Instead, we are wasting time on social media.”
He continued: “My narrative girls had to go to sauna with me to came up [sic] with amazing script for proof of concept”
“I absolutely adore the fact that they could use their sauna experience to write awesome scenes”
The game that’s being worked on, is highlighted in an ad posting looking for an Art Director on komputerswiat.pl (as pointed out by a user on X) explains the sauna connection. It reads: “Spectrum Studio is working on a new groundbreaking game: mix of Life is Strange (Narrative), Final Fantasy (story, characters), Heart of Darkness (adventure levels with dog), The Turyst (exploration and questing) and THPS2 (tricks and specials).”
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The “Main character will be a saunamaster and will be in charge of performing in various saunas (smells, music, choreography, everything)”
The ad also specifies that attending sauna sessions is “not negotiable” because the “entire team needs to understand the product”
Piorkowski went on to say, “We’re doing a game about Sauna Sessions. I don’t want to waste my time to explain what’s the difference between Ruska Bania or Dry Sauna. You have to feel it.” He then offered to “even organize female only event”.
Piorkowski also said in another post: “If you knew anything about it, wetness level inside Bania or Steam one is around 90%. So, towel is extremely wet after few seconds. So, you can still do it, but it may result with fungal infection.”
“You should be naked in Bania or Steam and with or without towel in dry one”
Wolna expressed thanks for the support from other developers who called out Piorkowski’s offer, in what is a truly bizarre situation. Dexerto has reached out to Spectrum Studios for comment.
