Recent waves of layoffs shine a light on the systemic issues in the game industry and the post-graduation promises universities are making to students.
Well, that used to be the model when the big studios and the big publishers were separate entities. After the publisher consolidated the industry during the 00s, employment became significantly more stable. With enough revenue and enough labour power under their control, publishers started rolling development cycles, and employees would be shifted from project to project as needed.
Really what we’re seeing here are publisher making a lot of really bad investments in recent year, as they’ve gotten more controlling. They’ve been chasing the (near) passive income dragon for a while now, and it’s finally caught up with them.
After sinking millions and millions into NFTs, and some of them betting pretty big on game streaming frameworks like Stadia, and most recently everyone turning every IP into GaaS games, and coming up short at every turn, the studios seem to be stuck. They’re turning back to the drawing board to figure out what the next big thing in fucking customers over is, and abandoning efforts that have been in the pipeline for years.
And on top of it all, interests rates are finally back to historical levels, and the cost of gambling on striking lightning with whatever homogenized crap developers have been coerced into making is now higher, and investors are seeking more stability, which means… Time to fuck the employees again!
Well, that used to be the model when the big studios and the big publishers were separate entities. After the publisher consolidated the industry during the 00s, employment became significantly more stable. With enough revenue and enough labour power under their control, publishers started rolling development cycles, and employees would be shifted from project to project as needed.
Really what we’re seeing here are publisher making a lot of really bad investments in recent year, as they’ve gotten more controlling. They’ve been chasing the (near) passive income dragon for a while now, and it’s finally caught up with them.
After sinking millions and millions into NFTs, and some of them betting pretty big on game streaming frameworks like Stadia, and most recently everyone turning every IP into GaaS games, and coming up short at every turn, the studios seem to be stuck. They’re turning back to the drawing board to figure out what the next big thing in fucking customers over is, and abandoning efforts that have been in the pipeline for years.
And on top of it all, interests rates are finally back to historical levels, and the cost of gambling on striking lightning with whatever homogenized crap developers have been coerced into making is now higher, and investors are seeking more stability, which means… Time to fuck the employees again!