Just two months into 2024, we have witnessed a massive wave of layoffs that has impacted the creative teams of various studios around the planet, yielding worrying data since so far there are more than 8,000 affected compared to the number of 6,000 which was recorded throughout last year. Below, we review some of the most significant losses.
Microsoft (1,900 people): After the acquisition of Activision Blizzard, duplicate positions had to be eliminated. The most notable departure was that of Mike Ybarrawho was president of Activision and had previously worked on Xbox. In total, the workforce of gaming The Redmond technology giant contracted almost 9%.
Unity Software (1,800): He engine most popular for video game development is looking to make a corporate reboot due to the controversy generated by the charging of fees associated with the number of downloads, causing a quarter of its team to be sacrificed.
Sony Interactive Entertainment (900): The PlayStation 5 production house passed the scissors on studios such as Guerrilla Games, Insomniac and Naughty Dogthe most representative case being the dismantling of London Studiosin addition to the fact that a game under service set in the world of Twisted Metal.
Electronic Arts (670): Around 5 percent have been terminated from their professional roles due to an internal restructuring at the studios. Codemasters and Glu Mobile.
Riot Games (530): No matter how successful it is League of Legends and ValorantCEO Dylan Jadeha announced an 11% contraction in order to develop new and sustainable business approaches.
Twitch (500): The well-known platform to carry out live broadcasts has reduced its workforce by 35 percent.
Lost Boys Interactive (125), Eidos Montreal (97) and Black Forest Games (50): Creative minds affiliated with holding company Embracer Group They are not going through their best moment. The restructuring of the company due to a failed contract with an investment fund has led to readjustments at all levels of its organizational structure.
Discord (170): The famous chat for gamers had excessive growth since 2020 and hiring was made without a detailed analysis for multiple projects, generating a decrease of 17%.
Supermassive Games (90): The developers of Until Dawn They were not the exception and worse still, around 150 positions are in danger, so decisions will be made in this regard in the medium term.
Sega (61): The american division It was also necessary to dispense with professional talent and although the workers' union did its utmost to prevent this, it did not succeed.
Behavior Interactive (45): The creators of Dead by Deadlight They have not been saved from this serious situation and have had losses in most of their departments.
People Can Fly (30): Members of the Polish studio were removed without notice, who were working on an unannounced title under the code name of Project Geminiwhich would be published by square enix.
For many years, the video game industry has been the most profitable in the entertainment field, surpassing cinema, however, the high development costs of the AAA productions, have caused greater risks in investments and any failure can generate catastrophic results. For this reason, every day we see more closely, a paradigm shift so that the games reach various platforms, leaving exclusivity aside.
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