ASMODAIOS344 Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 (edited) The story of 2024 layoffs that affects the technology industry continues and today is about S.I.E ( Sony Interactive Entertainment) Official 900 employees has been fired as of now, unknown numbers of projects has been cancelled with most likely to be GaaS games and the worst London Studio is to be close. I don't think if the layoffs were planned or is a result of the recent economic new of S.I.E related to low profit margins. https://sonyinteractive.com/en/news/blog/difficult-news-about-our-workforce/ https://sonyinteractive.com/en/news/blog/an-important-update-from-playstation-studios/ Update 1: Guerrilla Games will lost 40 members of its staff. Source: https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/horizon-studio-guerrilla-is-reportedly-cutting-10-of-its-workforce/ Edited February 29 by ASMODAIOS344 Add new information 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thephoenixshow Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 twisted metal was apparently one of them that was canned 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post nrs1nrs1 Posted February 27 Popular Post Share Posted February 27 (edited) The tech industry inclinations towards profit margins and "infinite growth" have infected almost every industry, none more so than gaming nowadays. The endless push for higher short term profits and the chasing of the COVID-era levels of profit are a mirage, and we're still feeling the aftershocks of poor management, ballooning budgets with no regard to who will feel the consequences of missing revenue targets, and an industry that has become numb to the reality of laying off hundreds and thousands of very real people. I can't see the industry improving any time soon without major reorganizing to cap executive compensation, stronger labor protections, higher unionization to protect developers and regular workers, and a market-wide acceptance that live service games are black holes that are going to fail 98% of the time, costing people their livelihoods in the pursuit of a game that prints free money. I feel horrible for anyone trying to break into this space seeing these stories happen every damn week. It's so incredibly demoralizing. Edited February 27 by nrs1nrs1 13 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MidnightDragon Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 Game developers need to unionize or this will keep happening. Just a horrible time for the industry. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yowzagabowza Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 Didn't Sony just go crying to the courts after MS laid off a similar number of people after the ABK merger? Like it violated part of the deal? Well, looks like Sony is guilty of whatever they were charging MS with, too. Anyway, it really does suck for so many people to be losing their jobs especially when video games are bigger than ever. Putting too much faith in a game trend (GaaS) which only has a handful of success stories to begin with was stupid and the decision makers should be the ones to pay the price, not rank and file members of dev teams. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sendai-Horatio Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 (edited) 15 minutes ago, MidnightDragon said: Game developers need to unionize or this will keep happening. Just a horrible time for the industry. Unions wouldn't help in this situation. You need an entirely different corporate structure, all that a union would help with would be to ensure your severance packages are fair(if you're eligible) and you get the agreed upon time for other benefits once you're done with the company. There's also the history of unions arguing themselves out of a job where their demands become too restrictive for a company to do business, so they declare bankruptcy which invalidates a union's influence and then they the company set up shop elsewhere under a different name and makes offers to hire workers under nonunion contracts. Edited February 27 by Sendai-Horatio 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
x49ersblitzkreig Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 It sucks that this is happening. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaivRules Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 1 minute ago, yowzagabowza said: Didn't Sony just go crying to the courts after MS laid off a similar number of people after the ABK merger? Like it violated part of the deal? Well, looks like Sony is guilty of whatever they were charging MS with, too. Are you talking about the FTC filing a complaint that MS laid off 1,900 people after the merger when MS committed to maintaining the studios head count after their takeover? (https://www.pcgamer.com/ftc-hits-microsoft-with-federal-complaint-over-game-division-layoffs/) And that compares to Sony laying people off to blatantly make more profit? Just a reminder for people to support those indie studios. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yowzagabowza Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 Just now, DaivRules said: Are you talking about the FTC filing a complaint that MS laid off 1,900 people after the merger when MS committed to maintaining the studios head count after their takeover? (https://www.pcgamer.com/ftc-hits-microsoft-with-federal-complaint-over-game-division-layoffs/) And that compares to Sony laying people off to blatantly make more profit? Just a reminder for people to support those indie studios. Yup. Both companies laid off people for the same blatant profit chasing, I'm not concerned with details, it always goes back to profits. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sendai-Horatio Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 1 minute ago, yowzagabowza said: Yup. Both companies laid off people for the same blatant profit chasing, I'm not concerned with details, it always goes back to profits. The details make a huge difference, let's say Sony kept all their employees. Where else would the budget cuts come from so they could still make the number that is needed to keep their business running? Even if you were to reduce the pay of people like Herman Hulst to zero it wouldn't cover the tens of millions they would still need to reach their amount needed to maintain their business. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaivRules Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 7 minutes ago, Sendai-Horatio said: The details make a huge difference, let's say Sony kept all their employees. Where else would the budget cuts come from so they could still make the number that is needed to keep their business running? Even if you were to reduce the pay of people like Herman Hulst to zero it wouldn't cover the tens of millions they would still need to reach their amount needed to maintain their business. Probably the $1.5 Billion of their profits they spent in 2023 just buying back stock. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yowzagabowza Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 5 minutes ago, Sendai-Horatio said: The details make a huge difference, let's say Sony kept all their employees. Where else would the budget cuts come from so they could still make the number that is needed to keep their business running? Even if you were to reduce the pay of people like Herman Hulst to zero it wouldn't cover the tens of millions they would still need to reach their amount needed to maintain their business. Maintaining the business? They ain't about to go broke, dude. They made bad bets, executives should pay the price, not employees. Maybe don't spend a shit load of money on a stupid FFVII mural? Or a giant fake axe in the ground? Those things seem pretty stupid and frivolous when you cut this many jobs... 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
samunrizthym Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 bad choices always lead to bad results ,there ,the catch is Sony expectations for ps5 sales are not as good as they wished ,workers pays the bill, IA will somehow replace some of these jobs ,they preserve the share of stock holders for the price of layoffs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sendai-Horatio Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 (edited) 9 minutes ago, yowzagabowza said: Maintaining the business? They ain't about to go broke, dude. They made bad bets, executives should pay the price, not employees. Maybe don't spend a shit load of money on a stupid FFVII mural? Or a giant fake axe in the ground? Those things seem pretty stupid and frivolous when you cut this many jobs... Businesses have daily expenses. The things you're talking about are advertising campaigns. Once the money is spent from those, it's spent, it's not a recurring cost. Those large advertisements also employed people who got paid to work on them. Edited February 27 by Sendai-Horatio 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elvick_ Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 That extra $10 they want to charge is really protecting jobs like all the shill devs on twitter said it would! :'D Get your budgets in control. The hacks that revealed Insomniac budgets are absolutely fucking insane. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AJ_-_808 Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 4 minutes ago, yowzagabowza said: Maintaining the business? They ain't about to go broke, dude. They made bad bets, executives should pay the price, not employees. So, theoretically, if they hired on 2000 people to push the GaaS model, and then changed mind/found out it was a bad decision and move away from that model you'd argue they should keep the employees for jobs that no longer exist? Not entirely comparable to MS pledging to keep people after buying their company and then letting them go. Granted, some positions become redundant, but MS likes throwing money away apparently so what gives? Are you mad at Embracer too for biting off more than it could chew? That one was probably the worst of all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yowzagabowza Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 3 minutes ago, AJ_-_808 said: So, theoretically, if they hired on 2000 people to push the GaaS model, and then changed mind/found out it was a bad decision and move away from that model you'd argue they should keep the employees for jobs that no longer exist? Not entirely comparable to MS pledging to keep people after buying their company and then letting them go. Granted, some positions become redundant, but MS likes throwing money away apparently so what gives? Are you mad at Embracer too for biting off more than it could chew? That one was probably the worst of all. Yes I am mad at Embracer too. I'm mad at every single company who doesn't know how to budget or plan and then ends up doing the easiest thing to solve it. No further questions. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DARKKRAKEN666 Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 27 minutes ago, Elvick_ said: That extra $10 they want to charge is really protecting jobs like all the shill devs on twitter said it would! :'D Get your budgets in control. The hacks that revealed Insomniac budgets are absolutely fucking insane. The new CEO of PlayStation comes across as a bean counter so i think they will be forced to tighten their belts. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post JPtheNeurotic Posted February 27 Popular Post Share Posted February 27 Reminder : corporations are not your friends and they all suck . 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
samunrizthym Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 what if they stick to doing great and fun games instead of trying to sell us shits we dont want (VR?pHD needed games ?subScrition inside subscriPtion,remakes of already remake and the triple combo dlc day one ,microtransaction with endless useless season pass ,and i forgot the meta patchs who changes multiple settings you used to be familiar with in the wrong direction like xp and progression nerf to slow you down ) 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrBloodmoney Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 18 minutes ago, samunrizthym said: pHD needed games What game was that? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slava Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 (edited) One aspect I've recently thought about regarding massive layoffs like this is the ability of these developers to find new jobs based on their location. In the case of affected studios like Insomniac, Naughty Dog, and London, finding studios located nearby may be relatively easy. For Guerrilla and Firesprite it's probably harder. They may have to look for jobs in other cities, work from home, or join forces and start a new studio which is not easy. Otherwise, it means the end of their career in the video game industry. Sometimes I hear about devs opening new studios and starting new projects, but stories like "and I never worked on video games since then" probably go mostly untold. I wonder how many people that is. Edited February 27 by Slava 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
samunrizthym Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 16 minutes ago, DrBloodmoney said: What game was that? i still trying to understand the economy in black desert Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Alchemist Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 Just another day in what has already been a crazy year for layoffs in the industry and it's still only February. I've seen a few people online say that this trend of layoffs will continue for up to another 18 months before it levels off and things become somewhat stable again, so expect to see more stories like this regularly moving forward, because it's far from over yet. 43 minutes ago, samunrizthym said: what if they stick to doing great and fun games instead of trying to sell us shits we dont want (VR...) Speak for yourself, I very much want VR. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ruexnimbus Posted February 27 Share Posted February 27 Everything technology related is full of rot now. I've seen it happening slowly over the last decade. Too many people full of shit and only in it for the money. It's only going to get worse before it gets better. When there's no one left to actually make stuff, maybe then it'll be different. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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