Any business will have its share of disappointments, and some industries are notorious for the projects that get canceled. The gaming industry is a lot like that too. I know of someone (a very good programmer) who spent 9 years working for major gaming companies, and every single one of the games that he worked on was canceled before launch. He was very well paid, but he eventually became burned out and disillusioned, simply because he was never part of a successful product. Mind you, he did not face long hours or poor pay, he simply faced 9 years of working on products that never saw the light of day. And that depressed him.