Hm. Even with extra hours, 45 hours a week is a little much, isn't it? 37 - 40 hours a week is the norm, even for software developers. Of course, developing games usually is a bit more fun than other jobs.
You must be European, German if I recall. Not that there's anything wrong with that but you Europeans have it soft.
But 45 hours per week for a salaried position is actually a rather short workweek in the US these days. Typically 50, 60 or even 70 hours is often what is "required". The thing is that it's never in writing. What is technically specified is most often a 40 hour week but the unspoken message is clear and someone that doesn't put in what those around him or her are forced to put in will find themselves out of a job very quickly, weeks not months.
A few years back I worked for a startup and to reach an intermediate deadline I worked a minimun of 12 hours a day for 7 straight weeks 84+ hour weeks (i.e. 49 days). Then 3 months later to get the final product ready to ship I did 10 straight 84+ hour weeks (70 straight days). In between these peak periods one could usually slack off to about a 60 hour week.
Anyway the result was that Sun Microsystems did eventually buy the company but for pennies on the dollar and 5 years after the fact is still shipping the board that I designed for them but prior to that happened everyone except the founders and the venture capitalists had been laid off.
But what is unique in AMerican business today is the implied promise of a certain amount of loyalty. Forty, fifty years ago that used to be the norm but today that is an extreme exception. So 45 hours a week plus some loyalty sounds like an excellent position to me. Sure beats the hell out of working in Lahore.
If I was a software engineer instead of a hardware engineer I would jump at the chance.
