Is games industry collapsing? More than 1000 people lost jobs in across Valve, GoG, Blizzard and so on.

[Blitzwing]

2019
Activision Blizzard lays off nearly 800 employees after 'record' 2018
https://www.polygon.com/2019/2/12/18222096/blizzard-layoffs-february-2019

Massive layoffs at EA's Australian studio
FireMonkeys will refocus on live services as up to 50 staff prepare for redundancy
https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2019-02-22-massive-layoffs-at-eas-australian-studio

CD Projekt is laying off around a dozen GOG staff (approximately 10% of the digital storefront’s workforce).
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2019/02/26/gog-layoffs/

Valve laid off 13 full-time employees and 'a portion' of its contractors in February
https://www.pcgamer.com/valve-laid-off-13-full-time-employees-and-a-portion-of-its-contracts-in-february/

Guild Wars 2 Developer ArenaNet Plans For Mass Layoffs
https://kotaku.com/guild-wars-2-developer-arenanet-plans-for-mass-layoffs-1832799804

2018
Telltale with at least 250 people dismissed, the company is a shell of what it once was.
https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-09-27-more-than-1-000-jobs-lost-to-studio-closures-over-the-past-year

Electronic Arts' decision to close Dead Space developer Visceral Games with PC Gamer reporting at least 80 employees affected.

Gigantic developer Motiga saw significant layoffs - reportedly around 70 people

Marvel Heroes developer Gazillion Entertainment was forced to close down, making approximately 200 employees jobless.

Cliff Bleszinski's studio Boss Key Productions was forced to shut down, less than a year after releasing its debut title LawBreakers. At peak, the developer had 60 employees.

A further 150 people were lost later that month when Wargaming closed its Seattle studio, formerly known as Gas Powered Games.

Capcom Vancouver was closing down. The Dead Rising studio had 158 employees


Considering the recent big flops like Anthem and Fallout 76.
It doesn't look good for our entertainment.

What you think? Just a weird coincidence or is there a massive problem upcoming?

[Blitzwing]

Starbreeze Studios 60 people loose the job
https://www.pcgames.de/Starbreeze-Studios-Firma-15758/News/60-Mitarbeiter-fuer-Kosteneinsparung-entlassen-1283450/

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

Betting it has something to do with the walking dead game which was very poorly done, and fail to renew their contract with skybound.

Just to add, they should've just stick to making a new PayDay.

[Dwerklesberry]

If studios had enough to spare to go "woke", they had "idle hands" aplenty.

[Mr Blonde]

Times have changed. Games have never inflated in prices despite longer production. They try to recoup costs with online passes, loot boxes etc which have failed so now only the big sellers survive. New games have become too much of a risk and everyone’s getting bored of sequel after sequel. Before you know it there will only be the yearly fifa and indies

[Trundle]

Just another cherry on top, Activision-Blizzard KEY STAFF Flee amid low morale.

[100% lob juice]

edgy 18 year old me often hoped for a video game industry crash just because it would end pretty much all of the bad AAA publishers and their bad practices in an instant, but now I acknowledge that people actually work in industries and tens of thousands of people losing their jobs wouldn't be so great.

I still think it's gonna happen eventually though (probably around the time of the next economic recession).

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

Цитата допису Mr Blonde:

Times have changed. Games have never inflated in prices despite longer production. They try to recoup costs with online passes, loot boxes etc which have failed so now only the big sellers survive. New games have become too much of a risk and everyone’s getting bored of sequel after sequel. Before you know it there will only be the yearly fifa and indies

Sometimes it's not even that why they push for passes, loot boxes, and etc, like how EA, and Activision has been pushing to get people to buy stuff, despite having games being successful in sales, they either pump out bunch of DLC's, and etc, and that's their way to make extra profit.

I somewhat agree new games has became a risk, but at the same time, "these" new games would be "adventure out, or half-*** project" something that really isn't popular, nor was a good idea to make, or funded. Example how Square Enix funded for Quiet Man, and Left Alive, which were very poorly done, and not only that but the stories being very mediocre at best, or How EA with Anthem, or Bethesda with Fallout 76, and so on. Activistion getting away with their Cod games year after year, same with EA for their sports games, as well 2K, but it works for them, to fund them, as well saving money at the same time, to reuse somethings so they can push for new things, at the very least something decent.

The problem is too many people want to push their ideas, and there's just way too many people have bad ideas as well, which also the problem, the worse part is, it just have to sound great on paper to the higher ups, and woo them into picking up their ideas, which funny enough a lot of people in the higher ups, are not exactly kind of people you would say are "gamers" or etc... Which why we have to question some choices when AAA publishers, or indie devs makes.

Цитата допису hahaha:

edgy 18 year old me often hoped for a video game industry crash just because it would end pretty much all of the bad AAA publishers and their bad practices in an instant, but now I acknowledge that people actually work in industries and tens of thousands of people losing their jobs wouldn't be so great.

I still think it's gonna happen eventually though (probably around the time of the next economic recession).

The crash may most likely not happen, due to the fact how much more people there are playing video games, compare to the great crash in the 80s when Atari went full re****, and amount of games that were being pushed out, as well the amount of consoles at the time, being really high prices, which if you translate the inflation, you're basically pumping out buying new PS4 PRO basically for every new system that was pumping out in the 70s ~ 80s, which THANK GOD FOR NINTENDO for doing the world a huge favor and basically saving the video game industry for consoles, but as you may notice these days we're taking Nintendo for granted, now on the PC side, the crash wasn't really affected, but if console gaming never existed, who knows what gaming could've been on PC, it may be worse, or better, but I doubt better, since getting into PC wasn't an simple thing for the most common consumer from the 80s ~ early 2000s, as prices were pretty high, and we didn't started getting better prices, or hardware for PC, until after 2007 I believe, and I still have some old PC mags, and I can tell you this, buying hardware equivalent to an PS2, in 2001, would've ran you $1000+ easily, that not including sound card, and Voodoo Card, and that would've only be able to run FF7 decently, or barely with all the lowest possible settings, compare to now which you could get away spending $600 ~ $800 that can run any game you wanted, and have pretty much all you needed, but may need to adjust game settings.

[Coal Shoveler]

To me as long as companies like Nintendo, Sony, Naughty Dog, (ad your own here) is still in the game, I belive even if other companies like Bethesda, EA, Epic, and others go bankruped, gaming will still have a chance at suvival.

[Mythical Ostrich]

It's never been a stable industry, employees are constantly let go